Yeungnam University undergraduates lead research published in top accounting journal

Yeungnam University announced Monday that a collaborative research paper completed by its undergraduate students has been published in the Accounting Journal, a Korea Citation Index-listed academic journal issued by the Korean Accounting Association.

The paper is titled "The Impact of the Abolition of General Corporate Accounting Standards Interpretation [56-90] on Rental Housing Construction Companies."

The six authors are Kim Young-jin, a graduate of the Department of Accounting and Taxation; current students Kim Yu-sin, Park So-young and Park Seon-young, also of the Department of Accounting and Taxation; Shin Eun-seo of the Department of Business Administration; and their faculty adviser, Professor Kim Seung-jun of the Department of Accounting and Taxation. Kim Young-jin served as lead author.

It is rare for a paper led by an undergraduate as first author to be published in an accounting journal.

The research had previously won the grand prize — the Hanyoung Accounting Firm Award — at a national undergraduate accounting case competition in December last year, and went on to be published after passing the journal's peer-review process. All five student participants are listed as co-authors.

The accounting standard at the center of the study, Interpretation [56-90], had allowed rental housing construction companies to offset rental housing assets against National Housing Fund borrowings and rental deposits, presenting a net figure. It was abolished in 2024 following criticism that the standard caused liabilities to appear smaller than they actually were.

The research team collected retrospectively restated financial statements for 34 rental housing construction companies from DART, the Financial Supervisory Service's electronic disclosure system, and compared figures before and after the abolition.

The team found that total liabilities at the 34 companies rose by an average of 45.2 percent, the debt-to-equity ratio climbed from 198.7 percent to 310.9 percent, and the industry's net profit for the period swung from a surplus to a deficit due to higher depreciation charges.

Lead author Kim Young-jin said reworking the competition presentation into a formal paper was in effect where the research truly began. "As I revised the data and rewrote the analysis multiple times to address reviewer comments, I learned how far you need to go to verify your evidence," he said.

Professor Kim Seung-jun, the faculty adviser, said the paper's passage through peer review carries significant academic weight. "The fact that a paper with undergraduate authors cleared peer review means the academic community has recognized the quality of the research," he said.