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This study has contributed to the literature of business ethics in general, accounting ethics and management accounting ethics in particular, as well as having implications for researchers and practitioners. These are summarised as follows:

1. This research first sought to extend previous research regarding ethical decision making process and the role that individual variables, organizational variables and moral intensity dimensions play in this process. Previously, several variables have been found to have different levels of association with the four stages of ethical decision making. In this study, the differences in ethical decision making process based on a range of these variables were investigated. Therefore, the study has added new evidence for the ethical decision making literature.

2. By investigating some of the ethical issues that have been identified in the area of management accounting (e.g., Fisher & Lovell, 2000), this study has increased the limited body of knowledge of management accounting ethics and provided both academics and practitioners with some information about the ethical issues management accountants perceive themselves to face in Libyan companies.

3. More than forty empirical studies regarding ethical decision making process conducted between 2003 and 2010 were reviewed by this study. This contributes to the literature of business ethics by updating and renewing the three previous comprehensive reviews (see Chapter Two). This will provide researchers with an insight for understanding organizational ethical decision constructs by indicating where the current theory of ethical decision making stands and the future direction of ethical decision making research.

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4. Studies concerning business ethics in general and accounting ethics in particular in emerging and transitional economics have received little attention and are still rare compared with those that have been done in developed countries. Therefore, one of the major contributions of this study is studying management accounting ethics in one of the developing countries which is a transition economy. The results of this study show a replication of some variables such as gender, personal moral philosophy, and moral intensity dimensions. However, no significant results related to the organizational variables may be because, as mentioned earlier, public sector dominates the Libyan market or Libya is a developing country since most of the significant results related to organizational variables were found in developed countries.

5. Although much research has been done related to business ethics, most of this research was undertaken especially in marketing, management, and auditing areas. Very limited empirical research has been conducted in the area of management accounting in developed and developing countries alike (see Chapter One). Thus, this study has contributed to the business ethics literature in general and management accounting in particular by adding further evidence related to the process of ethical decision making.

6. With respect to significant results found here, this study contributes to knowledge by providing evidence related to the significant relationship of personal moral philosophy components (idealism and relativism) as suggested by Forsyth (1980) with ethical decision making process within a Libyan context. Past research showed that, while idealism has been found to have positive relationship with ethical decision making process, relativism has been found to have negative association with the process of ethical decision making. The result of this study also confirms the model of ethical decision making developed by Hunt and Vitell (1986) that ethical ideology (i.e. personal moral philosophy) has a significant relationship with ethical decision making stages. Moreover, it provides additional support for Jones’s

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(1991) model that different situations will elicit moral intensity dimensions “weightings” that change, depending on the situation and context of the moral issue.

7. While previous studies focused only on the relationship of a few sub-variables such as age, gender, and code of ethics with only one or two stages of ethical decision making, this study examines a range of more than nine sub-variables related to three of the four stages of ethical decision making as theorized by Rest (1986). Thus, the study is more comprehensive than many previous empirical studies. In addition, this study answers many calls in the literature of business ethics by examining the existing models rather than developing new one (e.g., Bernard & Sweeney, 2010; O'Fallon & Butterfield, 2005).

8. Although this study showed several significant differences and relationships in ethical decision making stages based on some of the variables investigated, the results showed that relationships between these variables and ethical decision making stages were generally weak. However, the results of this study support past research and show that the differences between individuals in ethical decision making process are in effect based on a variety of variables including individual variables, organizational variables and moral intensity dimensions and are not based on a certain limited range of variables.

9. Scenarios used in this study, which were originally designed by Flory (1991) and used by several studies (e.g., Leitsch, 2004, 2006; Sweeney & Costello, 2009), were slightly developed and modified to fit the Libyan context. The experience of using these adapted scenarios has not been found to cause any problems. This has contributed to the literature of accounting ethics in that they can be used for future research in other developing countries, especially Arabic countries that have similar characteristics to Libya.

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10. Much of business ethics literature has used student samples to examine several variables that associated with ethical decision making stages. Using students sample has been questioned (Loe et al., 2000) due to their age and work experience, especially when using them to examine organizational variables. In this study, a student sample was used only to investigate individual variables and moral intensity dimensions. Thus, comparisons of the impact of individual variables and moral intensity dimensions in ethical decision making stages between the two samples (students and practising management accountants) could be logically made. In addition, the role of the student sample within the overall research design was clear; by examining the senior accounting students’ ethical decision making stages within a Libyan context, the study provides an indication about future Libyan management accountants. It was found that, in spite of the significant changes that have been taking place as the students have been growing up, they are not very different from the current generation of management accountants.