3.3.4. Weighted Quality Index (ACHI)

This index assesses the quality of disclosure from the questions answered, ignoring the ones that are not covered in an annual report. Each question answer is scored 1 to 3, with 3 for quantitative disclosures, 2 for specific information but without numbers, and 1 for general narrative.

#### 3.3.5. Weighted Quality Index (SHI)

The SHI statistic combines both width (taking account of all questions) and depth (scoring each addressed question between 0 and 4). Thus, with the reduced volumes of anti-corruption disclosure, SHI is, in effect, the richness calculation for TQLI. The scoring of 0 to 4 uses the same criteria per the TQLI index. One might argue that the SHI index is a more logical version of the ACHI because a high score can no longer be obtained from just answering one question very well but would need many questions answered reasonably.

#### 3.3.6. Conclusions on Measures

Despite similar components, each of the above measures has its own calculative approach and may or may not add insight. We may find that the reduced level of disclosure as that of environmental reporting means their applicability is either enhanced or reduced when applied to the ACD context. We now apply these metrics to our sample set of annual reports.

#### **4. Research Findings**

This section first presents the descriptive statistics (Section 4.1) before addressing the first research question (Section 4.2) and then the second research question (Section 4.3).

#### *4.1. Descriptive Statistics*

Following through with the methodology detailed in Section 3.1 above, we generated a data set of word counts and questions answered by each company for each year. These were then used to produce the more sophisticated metrics applied in Sections 4.2 and 4.3 below. Table 3 shows the word count for each company for each year, with averages for each company at other times and across companies for each year. The word count is the rawest statement of volume. Table 4 progresses this a little by asking how many questions, out of the 26, were answered by each company for each year. A more granular examination of the data shows that companies do not necessarily answer the same questions every year, often with new questions being addressed and previously answered questions being dropped. There are examples of repeat sentences from one year's report to the next, but this was not that common. One might assume that companies read and learn from each other and may even feel compelled to match or beat each other on occasion (institutional isomorphism), but this did not seem evident on any scale or with any continuing trend. In Section 4.3, we will return to assess these statistics further.

**Table 3.** Descriptive statistics of the word count of sentences that address corruption content by the company by year.



**Table 3.** *Cont*.

**Table 4.** Descriptive statistics of questions answered by the company by year.

