Understanding Self-Regulated Learning and Its Implications for Accounting Educators and Researchers

Recommendations by the AICPA (1998, 2000), AAA (1986), and AECC (1995) have focused on the need for the accounting professional to be a lifelong learner. Attributes and skills connected with lifelong learning may be promoted in accounting classroom instruction by drawing from the work of educational theorists and researchers interested in similar goals. This paper introduces the concept of self-regulated learning and its related attributes and processes that are being studied as a means to promote self-motivated, independent, lifelong learning. Research in education theory and psychology from outside the field of accounting has found that the classroom environment can support the development of self-regulated learning and stimulate active involvement in one′s own learning. This paper discusses the major findings of this research and provides guidance to accounting educators for classroom applications, and to accounting education researchers for studying the effectiveness of approaches to promoting self-regulated learning environment in the accounting curriculum.