Board Interlocks and Earnings Management Contagion

We examine whether earnings management spreads from firm to firm via board connections. We find that contagion of accounting quality occurs via directors in interlocking boards with other firms. A firm with director links to firms that restated earnings tends to have poorer accounting quality and higher likelihood of restating its own financial reports. A firm with director links to firms that did not restate earnings tends to have higher accounting quality. This evidence supports the idea that economic behavior such as accruals management spreads through social networks