PROTOCOLO DE RADIOTERAPIA ADAPTA TIVA EN CÁNCER DE PRÓSTATA: PRO-

The second research population, formed during Phase 1 and discussed in section 3.2, was used in Phase 2 in order to primarily answer research questions 3 and 5. This phase aimed to investigate the quality of sustainability reporting assurance statements and also report on the preferred types of assurers used among the companies listed on NZX in 2013, so far.

To achieve the aim, this research followed the approach of O’Dwyer & Owen (2005) and Perego & Kolk (2012) in assessing the quality of sustainability reporting assurance statements. Considering this approach, the recommended criteria mentioned in the common sustainability reporting and assurance guidelines and standards (i.e. GRI, AA1000APS, AA1000AS, ISAE3000 and FEE) were introduced as quality indicators for the sustainability reporting assurance statements.

Quantitative content analysis was applied to code all the information in the sustainability reporting assurance statements in order to evaluate the quality of those statements. Content analysis has been widely used in accounting research and was the most common method adopted to analyse the content of corporate social reporting communications, such as assurance statements (Ball et al., 2000; Deegan et al., 2006; Gillet, 2012; Lock & Seele, 2015; O’Dwyer & Owen, 2005; Perego & Kolk, 2012; Choon-Yin & Tiong, 2015). As Riffe, Lacy, & Fico (1998) and Weathington, Cunningham, & Pittenger (2012) described, quantitative content analysis was a technique for transforming qualitative data into assigned numeric values by using valid measurement rules in order to simplify the text analysis and draw conclusions.

This research followed Weber’s (1990) eight steps of content analysis, as shown in Table 3.2, to design a suitable content analysis instrument.

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Table 3.2 Common Steps in Content Analysis

Step 1. Definition of the recording units (e.g., word, phrase, sentence, paragraph) Step 2. Definition of the coding categories.

Step 3. Test of coding on a sample of text.

Step 4. Assessment of the accuracy and reliability of the sample coding. Step 5. Revision of the coding rules.

Step 6. Return to Step 3 until sufficient reliability is achieved. Step 7. Coding of all the text.

Step 8. Assess the achieved reliability or accuracy.

(From Weber, 1990, pp 21-25 & Duriau, Reger, & Pfarrer, 2007, p. 19)

Before coding can begin, the content analysis coding instrument needed to be designed and tested. O’Dwyer & Owen (2005) and Perego & Kolk (2012) codebooks were considered as the initial codebooks and they were then modified and updated based on the information extracted from the newly published sustainability reporting assurance standards and guidelines – i.e. ISAE 3000, AA1000AS, AA1000APS and GRI – and FEE Discussion Paper since then it has influenced the reporting and assurance processes (Hodge et al., 2009; O’Dwyer & Owen, 2005). A pre-test codebook including 22 quality criteria, their definitions and the scoring scales was developed. This codebook scored the quality criteria using a scoring system that awarded no points for the absence of information and a range of one to three points for their presence.

To test the coding instrument before the final test, two sustainability reporting assurance statements from two different New Zealand companies outside the research populations (i.e. non-listed New Zealand companies) were selected. Five researchers of various backgrounds were chosen as the sustainability reporting assurance statement pre-test coders to ensure different viewpoints were considered. All coders were provided with a coding package, including an introductory letter about the research topic and the purpose of the pre-test, instructions for how to conduct the pre-test, the codebook and two selected sustainability reporting assurance statements (apart from the sample statements, other information is attached as Appendices A.1 to A.3). One assurance statement had been prepared by an accounting specialist assurer and the other by a non-accounting specialist assurance organisation. These two assurers were chosen to ensure the instrument was appropriate to the main categories found in other studies.

After completing the coding process, the researcher and all coders met to discuss the pre-test results. Although, the researcher was confident that the pre-test had generated a high level of coding

reliability, an inter-coder reliability test was also performed to statistically confirm the coding instrument’s reliability.

Four tests are available to measure inter-coder reliability: the coefficient of reliability (Holsti, 1969), Scott's pi (1955), Cohen's kappa (1960) and Krippendorff's alpha (1980). The coefficient of reliability does not take into account the level of agreement that may result from chance (Holsti, 1969). Although Scott’s pi and Cohen’s Kappa both consider the agreement occurring by chance, they are used when only two coders were involved in the coding process (Cohen, 1960; Scott, 1955). Thus, this study has calculated Krippendorff’s alpha to measure the level of inter-coder reliability. Considering all five coders, the reliability test showed Krippendorff’s alpha of 0.651 for the first assurance statement and 0.504 for the second statement. The reliability test was run separately for the two coders who had the highest level of sustainability reporting knowledge and more coding experience than the other coders who did the pre-test. Considering those two coders, the results of Krippendorff’s reliability test increased to 0.710 and 0.635, for the first and second assurance statements, respectively.

An extensive discussion revealed that the unfamiliarity of some of the coders with sustainability reporting assurance and content analysis, and also some unclear definitions caused some disagreements. Following a discussion some changes, such as dividing one criterion into three separate criteria, clarifying criteria definitions and improving the scoring range, were made to improve codebook clarity and accuracy. Finally, after applying those minor changes, full agreement was reached and a new coding package, including a codebook with 25 criteria, their definitions and the scoring scales (see Appendix A.4) was developed for the final content analysis to be applied to the 85 sustainability reporting assurance statements. This final codebook followed the same scoring system as the pre-test codebook and the range of total quality scores was from zero (lowest quality) to 40 (highest quality).

All 85 sustainability reporting assurance statements were coded by the researcher to ensure consistency. Key words, phrases, paragraphs or sections were highlighted and annotated manually using hand-written numbers, as described in the codebook. The researcher then reviewed all highlighted sections and words in each category of the codebook to ensure consistency of the coding process within each category. Besides, in order to check the reliability of the final code book, three of the 85 sustainability reporting assurance statements assessed by the researcher, were also examined by another coder with sustainability knowledge and content analysis experience. The test resulted in a high level of agreement between the two coders (97.3 percent agreement).

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3.4

Phase 3: Managers’ Interviews

This research phase aimed to interview sustainability managers in order to gather sufficient information to answer research questions 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 – as shown in Table 3.1 – from the manager’s perspectives.

Online one-on-one semi-structured interviews were chosen as an appropriate data collection method for gathering managers’ opinions. In the one-to-one interviews, only one interviewee was the focus of the researcher. On the one hand, this allowed the researcher to conduct an in-depth interview and gather detailed responses. On the other hand, it provided the interviewee with the time and space to express his/her opinions or experiences (Quinlan, 2011). In semi-structured interviews, similar pre- designed questions with similar wordings were asked of all interviewees, while giving the researcher the opportunity to add new questions or change the order of questions based on the interviewee’s responses. In other words, although it was a flexible interview method, which may change with the interview flow, it provided the researcher with comparable responses (Bryman & Bell, 2011).

Considering the limited research budget and also the convenience of the research participants, all interviews were conducted online using Avaya Scopia® Desktop and Mobile Applications (Scopia®). According to King & Horrocks (2010) there is an argument about the difficulties of using video interview instruments, such as lack of knowledge to work with the internet and modern electronic devices, not having access to such facilities, poor internet connections, and video/audio quality problems. However, video interview instruments like Skype or Scopia® provide free visual communications that enable the researcher to observe the participants and allow both parties to transmit items or reports while they are in their own environment and this saves travel costs and time (Salmons, 2014). Although Pretto & Pocknee (2008) suggested that Skype was the most reliable and preferred method of online interviews, they noted that this software package did not provide any audio or video recording function. Hence, Scopia® was selected as it provided the recording function. The participants of this research were not subject to any of those problems mentioned above, as Scopia® was a powerful online software application that could be quickly installed and used on computers (with speackers, microphone and webcam), laptops, tablets and smartphones. This software allows interviewees to join pre-set virtual meeting rooms without creating an account. Scopia® provides the researcher with high-quality recordable video interviews.

To conduct interviews, both research populations were used to consider not only the managers of companies who have already engaged in the assurance process, but also the managers of companies who have published sustainability reports but have not yet experienced engaging in the sustainability assurance process.

3.4.1

Managers Engaged Only in Sustainability Reporting

Managers of 31 companies who formed the first research population were targeted to be interviewed in this phase.