European Scientific Journal February 2014 /SPECIAL/ edition vol.

1 ISSN: 1857 – 7881 (Print) e - ISSN 1857- 7431

CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSOBILITY RESEARCH

METHODS ANALYSIS

Alfreda Sapkauskiene, Assoc. Prof., PhD

Sviesa Leitoniene, Assoc. Prof., PhD
Department of Accounting, Economics and Management Faculty,
Kaunas University of Technology, Lithuania

Abstract
Although the last decade of the corporate social responsibility (CSR) is talking more
and more, but it is accompanied by many uncertainties that affect the same social
responsibility activities and the disclosure of social information to stakeholders. The problem
remains that the different studies of CSR provide mixed results about nature and scope of
social information, about theories on corporate social information disclosure behaviour and
about CSR impact to company’s reputation and financial performance. Therefore the aim of
this article is to systematize research of CRS information disclosure. In order to narrow the
scope of the study, the object of the study involves scientific studies which were carried out
during the period of 2008-2013 and which deal with social information disclosure in the
banking sector. The main reason why the banking sector was selected is that although banks
actively participate in activities of socially responsibility companies, banks and other
financial institutions are often excluded from scientific studies due to their nature of
activities. The carried out analysis of CSR research methods showed that most often method
used in CRS research is the content analysis method, and only less than a half of the analyzed
scientific studies use other research methods in addition to the content analysis, such as
correlation and regression analysis. The researchers using different techniques of content
analysis, different CSR indicators and different sources of information resulted in the absence
of a unified methodology of corporate social information disclosure and its research the
obtained study results are hardly comparable and in some cases even contradictory.

Keywords: Corporate social responsibility, research methods, content analysis, social

information disclosure

Introduction
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has become an inevitable necessity. The new
development trends of economics, the use of new technologies and economic globalization
presents new challenges not only to the business community of different countries but also to
the whole of mankind. According to the author, today‘s world is living in such a period when
the future of the earth and mankind depends solely on our knowledge and the willingness to
change. Therefore today the CSR is treated as a matter of strategic importance how the
environmental and social aspects should be integrated into the business strategy and everyday
practice.
Corporate social responsibility is conceived as activity policy and practice of
organizations (and individuals) when the companies voluntarily integrate social and
environmental matters into their business and combine them harmoniously with economic
interests, and the relationships with all stakeholders are based on the valuable principles of
respect for the individual, society and the environment.

237
 European Scientific Journal February 2014 /SPECIAL/ edition vol.1 ISSN: 1857 – 7881 (Print) e - ISSN 1857- 7431

Even though the CSR is being discussed more and more, it is accompanied by
numerous uncertainties that affect social responsibility activity itself, the disclosure and
presentation of its information to the users. Different researchers analyze different aspects of
social responsibility and social responsibility itself differs depending on the country context.
It can also be observed that the majority of studies were performed in developed countries
although over the recent years there has been an increase in their number in developing
countries as well. The research of corporate social responsibility showed that recently the
main focus is paid on disclosure of social information. The problem remains that the
different studies provide mixed results about nature and scope of social information, about
theories on corporate social information disclosure behaviour and about CSR impact to
company’s reputation and financial performance. There is no unified and reliable corporate
social information disclosure and research methodology. Therefore the aim of this article is to
systematize research of corporate social responsibility information disclosure.
In order to narrow the scope of the study, the object of the study involves scientific
studies which were carried out during the period of 2008-2013 and which deal with social
information disclosure in the banking sector. The main reason why the banking sector was
selected is that although banks actively participate in activities of socially accountable
companies and are inclined to reveal social information of their activities, banks and other
companies belonging to the financial sector are often excluded from scientific studies due to
their nature of activities.
Research methodology used in the paper is the systemic and comparative analysis of
the scientific literature, generalization, theoretical modelling.

Corporate social responsibility and its information disclosure

The environmental issues which occurred due to the rapid economic development, as
well as social and business ethic issues which emerged during the subsequent economic crisis
encouraged leaders of the countries to take into account the interfaces between economic
development and ecologic and social issues and implement the economic development model
which ensures sustainable development. The pressure of stakeholder groups for the
implementation of sustainable development concept promotes company’s management
decisions related to their social responsibility.
The financial crisis in 2008-2009 has highlighted the importance of CSR in the
banking sector because the irresponsible behaviour of financial institutions is important for
both individuals and businesses, and even the economy of states. According Argandona
(2009) the use of CSR in financial institution could help to reduce financial crisis if not
systemically, at least in some organization, which was most affected by the crisis. First, the
use of CSR could have prevented certain institutions from going bankrupt, or at least it would
have made it less likely. Second, CSR might have contributed to creating a different climate
in the business world. The third function performed by CSR in preventing a crisis, and also in
getting out of one, is the creation and maintenance of trust, whose loss has been one of the
most significant consequences of present crisis. The CSR exist in different sector, but only
few authors analyses CSR in the banking sector. Recent years have seen increase in the
volume of such research, because banks increasingly integrating CSR into its usual activities.
This is confirmed by Scholte (2008) study of bank in North America, the Pacific region and
the Europe which showed that CSR is becoming increasingly important in the international
banking sector. CSR is becoming a well-established concept in the financial services sector.
Hoeper and Wilson (2010) notes that the recent focus on social, environmental, ethical and
trust issues in the banking sector are related to the three international initiatives: United
Nationa Environmental Programme Finance Initiative (UNEP – FI), Equator Principles and
Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI).

238
 European Scientific Journal February 2014 /SPECIAL/ edition vol.1 ISSN: 1857 – 7881 (Print) e - ISSN 1857- 7431

In recent decades many researchers analyze how the company responds to the
increasing external pressure on social responsibility and delivery of social information. The
companies, in order to inform the society about the policies in this field, provide social
responsibility, environmental, sustainable development reports or publish this information on
websites. In order to prepare a report on the organization’s interaction with the environment,
employees, community, users and other stakeholders the specific social information is
needed. For this reason, with the development of corporate social responsibility the growing
role plays the social accounting, which includes social information collection, analysis and
presentation to stakeholders in order to reflect the corporate ethical behaviour, i.e. their
impact on the environment and society. The social information itself is defined as the
information provided by the company on the different social aspects which may be affected
by corporate activities, such as related to the employees, social community, environmental
protection and other ethical issues. The studies of banking sector show that there is a focus
on the environment, culture, education (especially financial education) and social issues. The
scientific literature provides the analysis on various aspects of factors influencing voluntary
presentation of corporate social information; however it is possible to point the following
main research directions: nature and scope of social information; theories on corporate social
information disclosure behaviour; CSR impact to company’s reputation and financial
performance. All directions research provides controversial results because they use different
sources of information, methods, analyzes the different factors on the impact of CSR and
CSR impact to different indicators. Therefore, the remainder of this article will attempt to
systematize CRS study of the banking sector, according to the study methods, the factors and
sources of information.

CSR research: methods, factors and sources of information

The analysis of scientific literature published in the period of 2008-2013 shows that
the method most widely used for CSR research is the content analysis (see Table 1). The
content analysis method is mainly used to determine nature and scope of social information.
Along with the content analysis method about 34 percent of scientists used other research
methods such as correlation and regression analysis. Justification research of theories on
corporate social information disclosure behaviour and the research of CSR impact to
company’s reputation and financial performance alongside to the content analysis uses
correlation and regression methods. In these studies, content analysis is used in determining
the dependent variable, ie the level of disclosure of information.
However, the content analysis is the most commonly used method for research of
corporate social information disclosure. Sweeney and Coughlan (2008) define content
analysis as a research technique that is used for determination of the presence of certain
words and concepts in the text. Some content analysis research measure the presence/absence
of items, some misuses the extent of disclosure of these items (Bouten et al., 2011).
According to the nature of study the content analysis method can be divided into two
groups, i.e. research aimed to investigate the extent of social information disclosure, and the
research aimed to investigate the quality of social information disclosure. In order to
investigate the extent of social information disclosure there are most commonly used research
based on the number of units, while in order to investigate the quality of disclosure there are
used various indexes (Dagiliene, 2010; Hooks, van Staden, 2011; Leitoniene, Sapkauskiene,
2012; Andreaus et al., 2013).
Table 1. The prevalence of methods used for CSR research
Author, year Content analysis Correlation analysis Regression analysis
Barako, Brown, 2008 x x
Branco, Rodrigues, 2008 x X
Sweeney, Coughlan, 2008 x

239
 European Scientific Journal February 2014 /SPECIAL/ edition vol.1 ISSN: 1857 – 7881 (Print) e - ISSN 1857- 7431

Everaert et al., 2009 x

Wise, Ali, 2009 x
Cuganesan et al., 2010 x
Dagiliene, 2010 x
Bouten et al., 2011 x
Dagiliene, Gokiene, 2011 x
Hooks, van Staden, 2011 x X
Lungu et al., 2011 x X
Zickiene et al., 2011 x
Carnevale et al., 2012 x X x
Dagiliene, Leitoniene, 2012 x
Leitoniene, Sapkauskiene, 2012 x
Masud, Hossain, 2012 x
Murcia, Souza, 2012 x x
Relano, Paulet, 2012 x
Roca, Searcy, 2012 x
Sobhani et al., 2012 x
Uwuigbe, Egbide, 2012 x X x
Wijesinghe, 2012 x
Akinpelu et al., 2013 x x
Andreaus et al., 2013 x X x
Sharma, 2013 x x
Total 25 (100%) 6 (24%) 7 (28%)

Selection of units is a key element of the research design in the content analysis
(Hooks, van Staden, 2011). The scientific literature accentuates various research units: words,
sentences, phrases, rows, sheets, percentage in the sheet or in the report. The calculation
methodology of words, sentences, phrases, rows, sheets involves counting the quantity of
words, sentences, phrases, rows, sheets containing the information about the corporate social
responsibility. The percentage in the sheet or in the report shows the proportion of social
responsibility information in the report compared to information presented in one sheet or in
the whole report.
One of the most popular units is the number of sentences. According to Cuganesan,
Guthrie and Ward (2010), the number of sentences is more suitable than the number of the
words drawing conclusions from the narrative reports. In addition, the calculation method of
sentences (rows) is preferable when converting diagrams, tables and pictures to equivalent
rows and this makes encoding more reliable than words (Cuganesan, Guthrie, Ward, 2010).
Dagilienė (2010) also states that sentences provide complete, relevant and reliable
information about the company’s CRS disclosure level. In addition, although this
measurement is not accurate, it provides the possibility to compare variations of disclosure
levels between companies (van Staden, Hooks, 2007). Dagilienė and Gokienė (2011) states
that from the methodological approach the number of sheets of social reports can be easily
counted and is useful in comparing different companies.
Although most authors for calculation of sentences use only grammatical sentences in
the textual parts of the reports and do not take into account the content present in diagrams or
tables, Cuganesan, Guthrie and Ward (2010), Hooks and van Staden (2011), and Everaert et
al. (2009) includes tables and diagrams into the research and thus allows the analysis of the
entire report.
To analyze the evaluation of social information disclosure the authors used a variety
of indexes, some has developed new, and others has adapted or improved indexes that were
used in the previous research. According to Hooks and van Staden (2011), the disclosure
index is used to evaluate, compare and explain differences in scope and quality of disclosed
information in corporate reports. The content analysis using the disclosure index usually

240
 European Scientific Journal February 2014 /SPECIAL/ edition vol.1 ISSN: 1857 – 7881 (Print) e - ISSN 1857- 7431

involves highlighting of any important sentence corresponding to the specification of

disclosure index, and the subsequent encoding of sentences according to the selected quality
assessment scale. In this way, the descriptive text shall be divided into categories in order to
be able to draw conclusions on the thematic content (Hooks, van Staden, 2011).
Corporate social factors are grouped into different groups in the research the
disclosure of CSR information. There are many different ways in which indicators can be
divided into categories For example according to the principles of the UN Global Compact
(Leitoniene, Sapkauskiene, 2012), the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, ISO
9000, SA 8000, the EU Eco-label, triple botton line (Roca Siearcy, 2012), the GRI
Sustainability Reporting Guidelines (Everaert et al, 2009; Bouten et al, 2011; Wijesinghe
2012 and Cuganesan, Guthrie and Ward, 2010). Many of sustainability and CSR indices are
developed based on the GRI Sustainability Reporting Guidelines.
The level of social responsibility information disclosure, factors affecting this level
and their interconnection are identified by using content, correlation and regression analysis.
Different authors studied the connection of social responsibility to different factors (see Table
2). Normally the dependent variable is the level of disclosure of social information, while the
independent variables are used vary depending on the purpose of the study, for example,
Barack and Brown (2008) studied the relationship between the level of disclosure of social
information and corporate governance-related variables.
Table 2. Factors determining CSR information disclosure level
Author, year Factors
Composition of the Board; the proportion of women in the Board; the proportion
Barako, Brown, 2008
of foreigners in the Board; the non-performing loan ratio
Branco, Rodrigues, 2008 Number of sections; total assets; net profit; number of employees
Total assets; gross income; annual income change; return on assets; return on
Lungu et al., 2011
equity
Auditing company; financial leverage; internationalization; issue of shares;
Murcia, Souza, 2012 profitability; equity to asset ratio; origin of control; corporate governance; size;
sector; corporate sustainability
Uwuigbe, Egbide, 2012 Return on assets; financial leverage; auditing company
Akinpelu et al., 2013 Total assets; gross income; number of sections
Total assets; return on assets; financial leverage; equity dispersion; the
Sharma, 2013 independence of directors in the Board; foreign equity percentage in the
company’s ownership capital

Different authors' regression studies give different results. For example, Murcia and
Souza (2008) regression model can explain 48 percent of social information disclosure;
Sharma (2013) - 51 percent; Uwuigbe and Egbide (2012) - 59 percent. Akinpelu et al. (2013)
and Branco and Rodrigues (2008) confirmed that the size of firms is related to the level of
social responsibility information disclosure. Meanwhile Lungu Caraiani and Dascalu (2011)
studied the relationship between corporate performance reporting and disclosure of social
information. They sought to determine whether differences between the scope of the
reporting may be related to the size or profitability of enterprise. In contrast to previous
studies, the results show that there is a significant negative correlation between profitability
and corporate social and environmental disclosure.
Considering social information disclosure measure under investigation, it can be noted
that the majority of researches analyzed the annual reports as a social information disclosure
measure (see Table 3). Also one of the most popular measures is a web site, but most of the
authors did not analyze the web site separately, it was analyzed as an additional source.
However, the popularity of this measure shows that the number of companies which disclose
social information not only through the annual reports but also on the internet is constantly
increasing. Only a few authors analyzed the other reports which disclosed solely the social

241
 European Scientific Journal February 2014 /SPECIAL/ edition vol.1 ISSN: 1857 – 7881 (Print) e - ISSN 1857- 7431

and environmental information (social responsibility report, environmental report,

sustainability report) and this could be related to the sectors under investigation, because not
in all sectors the companies tend to provide separate social, environmental and sustainability
reports.
Table 3. CSR information disclosure measures
Social
Environmental Sustainability Annual
Author, year Responsibility Web site
Report Report Report
Report
Barako, Brown, 2008 x
Branco, Rodrigues, 2008 x x
Sweeney, Coughlan, 2008 x x
Everaert et al., 2009 x
Wise, Ali, 2009 x
Cuganesan et al., 2010 x x
Dagiliene, 2010 x
Bouten et al., 2011 x
Dagiliene, Gokiene, 2011 x
Hooks, van Staden, 2011 x X x x
Lungu et al., 2011 x x
Zickiene et al., 2011 x x
Carnevale et al., 2012 x
Dagiliene, Leitoniene, 2012 x x
Leitoniene, Sapkauskiene, 2012 x x
Masud, Hossain, 2012 x
Murcia, Souza, 2012 x
Relano, Paulet, 2012 x x x
Roca, Searcy, 2012 x X x x
Sobhani et al., 2012 x x
Uwuigbe, Egbide, 2012 x
Wijesinghe, 2012 x
Akinpelu et al., 2013 x
Andreaus et al., 2013 x
Sharma, 2013 x
Total 10 (40%) 2 (8%) 5 (20%) 7 (28%) 17 (68%)

Frequency of use of annual report can be justified by their regularity, reliability,

availability and useful information for stakeholder’s accountability (Dagiliene, 2010). Bouten
et al. (2011) justifies the use of the annual report for two reasons. Firstly, annual report plays
an important role in corporate accountability activities as it is prevailing and often can be
directly accessible in the company’s web site, and also because it is considered as one of the
most important tools used by companies to communicate with the stakeholders (Bouten et al.,
2011). However as stated by Van Staden and Hooks (2007), the separate environmental
report is prepared with ever increasing frequency and/or provided information on the
company’s website. This is supported by Lungu, Caraiani and Dascalu (2011) which states
that the companies provide reports on the corporate social aspects in the separate
sustainability reports, section of annual report or both, therefore in the research they analyzed
websites and CSR reports as regularly published document.

Conclusion
The carried out analysis of CSR research methods showed that:
Most often method used in CRS research is the content analysis method (100 percent of the
analyzed studies), and only less than a half of the analyzed scientific studies use other
research methods in addition to the content analysis, such as correlation and regression
analysis (accordingly 24 and 28 percent).

242
 European Scientific Journal February 2014 /SPECIAL/ edition vol.1 ISSN: 1857 – 7881 (Print) e - ISSN 1857- 7431

The content analysis method is mainly used to determine nature and scope of social
information. The problem is that different authors use different techniques of content analysis
(words, sentences, and the number of pages of disclosure index) and different classification
of social information indicators (for example, according Principles of the UN Global
Compact, Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, ISO 9000, SA 8000, GRI Sustainability
Reporting Guidelines and others) therefore the different research results are difficult to
compare.
Justification research of theories on corporate social information disclosure behaviour
and the research of CSR impact to company’s reputation and financial performance alongside
to the content analysis uses correlation ad regression methods. In these studies, content
analysis is used in determining the dependent variable, i.e. the level of disclosure of
information. Again, different techniques of content analysis influences are still conflicting
results of regression analysis.
Other problem is that investigating of corporate social responsibility scientists uses
not only the different research methods and indicators, but also the different sources of
information disclosure (CSR reports (40 percent of the analyzed studies), section of annual
report or both (68 percent), websites (28 percent), sustainability reports (20 percent) and
other). This also makes it difficult to compare results from different studies and to assess its
reliability.
In summary it can be said that in the absence of a unified methodology of corporate
social information disclosure and its research the obtained study results are hardly
comparable and in some cases even contradictory.

References:
Akinpelu Y.A., Ogunbi O.J., Olaniran Y.A., and Ogunseye T.O., 2013. Corporate Social
Responsibility Activities Disclosure by Commercial Banks In Nigeria. European Journal of
Business and Management, 5:173-185.
Andreaus, M., Costa E., Pesci C., and Taufer E., 2013. The Interaction Between Industry-
specific Standards and Corporate Social Reporting. Empirical Evidence from Cooperative
Banks in Italy. 36 EAA Annual Congress, 1-49.
Argandona A., 2009. Can Corporate Social Responsibility Help Us Understand the Credit
Crisis? IESE Working Paper.
Barako D.G., and Brown A.M., 2008. Corporate Social Reporting and Board Representation:
Evidence from the Kenyan Banking Sector. Journal of Management & Governance, 12 (4):
309-324.
Bouten L., Everaerta P., Van Liedekerke L., De Moord L,. and Christiaens J., 2011.
Corporate Social Responsibility Reporting: A Comprehensive Picture? Accounting Forum,
35 (3): 187–204.
Brancoa M.C. and Rodrigues L.L., 2008. Social Responsibility Disclosure: A Study of
Proxies for the Public Visibility of Portuguese Banks. The British Accounting Review, 40
(2): 161–181.
Carnevale C., Mazzuca M., and Venturini S., 2012. Corporate Social Reporting in European
Banks: The Effects on a Firm's Market Value. Corporate Social Responsibility and
Environmental Management, 19 (3): 159–177.
Cuganesan S., Guthrie J., and Ward L., 2010. Examining CSR Disclosure Strategies Within
the Australian Food and Beverage Industry. Accounting Forum, 34: 169 – 183.
Dagiliene, L., 2010. The Research of Corporate Social Responsibility Disclosures in Annual
Reports. Engineering Economics, 21 (2), 197-204.
Dagiliene, L. and Gokiene, R., 2011. Valuation of Corporate sSocial Responsibility Reports.
Economics and Management -2011, 21-27.

243
 European Scientific Journal February 2014 /SPECIAL/ edition vol.1 ISSN: 1857 – 7881 (Print) e - ISSN 1857- 7431

Dagiliene, L., and Leitoniene, S., 2012. Corporate Social Reporting Development in
Lithuania. Economics and Management -2012.17 (4): 1233-1239.
Murcia F.D.R., and Santos A., 2012 Discretionary-Based Disclosure: Evidence from the
Brazilian Market. BAR. Brazilian Administration Review, 9: 88-109.
Everaert P., Bouten L., Van Liedekerke L., De Moor L., and Christiaens J., 2009.
"Discovering Patterns in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Reporting: A Transparent
Framework Based on the Global Reporting Initiative’s (GRI) Sustainability Reporting
Guidelines," Working Papers of Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent
University, Belgium 09/557.
Hoepner A.G.F. and Wilson J.O.S., 2010. Social, Environmental, Ethical and Trust (SEET)
Issues in Banking: an Overview.
Hooks, J. and Van Staden, C.J., 2011. Evaluating Environmental Disclosures: the
Relationship Between Quality and Extent Measures. British Accounting Review, 43: 200-
213.
Leitoniene, S., and Sapkauskiene, A., 2012. Analysis of Social Information as Measure of
Ethical Behaviour of Lithuanian Firms. Econocmics and Management -2012, No.17 (3), 836-
843.
Lungu C.I., Caraiani C., and Dascalu C., 2011. Research on Corporate Social Responsibility
Reporting. Corporate Social Responsibility, 29: 117-131.
Masud M.A.K., and Hossain M.S., 2012. Corporate Social Responsibility Reporting Practices
in Bangladesh: A Study of Selected Private Commercial Banks. IOSR Journal of Business
and Management, 6:42-47.
Relano F., and Paulet E., 2012. Corporate Responsibility in the Banking Sector: a Proposed
Typology for the German Case. International Journal of Law and Management Volume,
54(5): 379-393.
Roca L.C., and Searcy C., 2012. An Analysis of Indicators Disclosed in Corporate
Sustainability Reports. Journal of Cleaner Production, 20(1): 103–118.
Scholters B., 2008. Corporate Social Responsibility in the International Banking Industry.
Journal of Business Ethics, 86: 159-175.
Sharma N., 2013. Web-based Disclosures and Their Determinants: Evidence from Listed
Commercial Banks in Nepal. Accounting and Finance Research, 2(3): 1-13.
Sobhani F.A., Arman A., and Zainuddin Y., 2012. Sustainability Disclosure in Annual
Repors and Websites: a Study of the Banking Industry in Bangladesh. Journal of Cleaner
Production, 23: 75-83.
Sweeney L., and Coughlan J., 2008. Do Different Industries Report Corporate Social
Responsibility Differently? An Investigation Through the Lens of Stakeholder Theory.
Journal of Marketing Communications, 14(2): 113-124.
Uwuigbe U. and Egbidge B.C., 2012. Corporate Social Responsibility Disclosures in Nigeria:
A Study of Listed Financial and Non-Financial Firms. Journal of Management and
Sustainability, 2 (1): 160-169.
Van Staden C.J. and Hooks J., 2007. A Comprehensive Comparison of Corporate
Environmental Reporting and Responsiveness. The British Accounting Review, 39: 197-210.
Wijesinghe K.N., 2012. Current Context of Disclosure of Corporate Social Responsibility in
Sri Lanka. Procedia Economics and Finance, 2: 171-178.
Wise V. and Ali M.M., 2009. Corporate Governance and Corporate Social Responsibility in
Bangladesh with Special Reference to Commercial Banks. AIUB Bus Econ Working Paper
Series, 2009-05: 1-19.
Zickiene S., Potelis N., Juozaitiene L. And Poteliene S., 2011. Corporate Social
Responsibility Disclosure in Water Supply Companies. Socialiniai tyrimai / Social Research,
4 (25): 43-55.

244