Which is more concerning for accounting professionals - personal risk or professional risk?

Personal and professional risks have been considered separately in research. However, these two concepts have not so far been investigated in research together. In this study, we first tested the importance of these two risks for Iranian accounting professionals through trade-off scenarios. The analysis of data gathered from an online survey of 487 Iranian accounting professionals shows that accounting professionals in Iran prefer to avoid personal risk rather than professional risk when facing a choice between personal and professional risk. Iranian accountants and auditors are personal risk averters and professional risk lovers, even though they think they are not risk-averse in their personal lives and not risk takers in their professional lives. Therefore, there is a gap between Iranian accounting professionals’ thoughts about their personal and professional risk aversion and their personal and professional risk aversion in practice. Furthermore, we found significant relationships between accounting professionals’ gender, religiosity, welfare, and personal risk aversion. In addition, there are significant relationships between accounting professionals’ gender and personal and professional risk aversion.