CONTACT INFORMATION
Office:	219 Kalkin  FIND OFFICE
Phone:	802 656-0502
E-Mail:	bovee@bsad.uvm.edu
Office Hours:	4:00 - 5:30 PM Tuesdays or by appointment

Empirical Validation of the Accounting Models of Information Usefulness: This line of research currently evaluates investor perceptions of the characteristics of useful information according to the major accounting standards boards (FASB & IASB). Perceptions were assessed by a survey created using the accounting standards boards models and documentation. The final sample includes data from over 500 investors. Results suggest that portions of the FASB/IASB model are not suitable for investors. Subsequent surveys are planned for financial analysts and accountants - the intermediary experts in the information flow to investors. A long-term goal of the study is to reconcile and, hopefully, merge the models of information usefulness (Accounting) and information quality (Information Systems).

Assessing Information Quality (dissertation topic): 1) The study developed a theoretically grounded information quality (IQ) model integrating existing models; 2) and empirically validated the model. Future stages of the research will evaluate the suitability of belief functions and evidential reasoning to implement the model in a desktop decision support tool.

Assessing the XBRL (eXtensible Business Reporting Language) Taxonomy for Financial Reporting: Nicknamed The Kansas Project in the XBRL community. Empirically evaluated XBRL, an XML business reporting taxonomy, using financials from annual statements of 80 companies from the 1999 Fortune 1000. Pilot data set was used by EDGAR Online to establish the raw XBRL data set for XBRL Express. Results accepted by JIS. XML holds great promise for Ecommerce information-sharing. However, ontological and semantic consensus and the ease of developing information taxonomies are assumed. Such issues are relatively unexplored and will be widely encountered. The XBRL project explores these critical issues, develops a foundation for future research, and establishes important industry contacts.

The FRAANK Project: Ongoing research at the Ernst and Young Center for Auditing Research and Advanced Technology (EYCARAT), the Financial Reporting and Auditing Agent with Net Knowledge (FRAANK) parses information from multiple sources in real-time to assist in valuations and audit judgments. Currently, FRAANK parses 10Q or 10K financial statements retrieved from the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) EDGAR site and tags the Balance Sheet, Income Statement and Cash Flow Statements in XBRL (see above) using extensive pattern matching and a knowledge-base of synonyms and root terms. Current development is aimed at increasing its accuracy (approximately 65% now) and scope.

Suggested topics for comment:
Theoretic and applied modeling of information and knowledge; health care informatics; knowledge management, IS applications of uncertain reasoning.
Assessing Information Quality, Assessing the XBRL (eXtensible Business Reporting Language) Taxonomy for Financial Reporting, The FRAANK Project.

• BSAD 040 - Information Technology and Management
  Section A, 004 Kalkin 8:30-9:45 TR - ON-LINE SYLLABUS
  Section B, 004 Kalkin 10:00-11:15 TR - ON-LINE SYLLABUS
  Section C, 004 Kalkin 1:00-2:15 TR - ON-LINE SYLLABUS
  Section D, 004 Kalkin 2:30-3:45 TR - ON-LINE SYLLABUS
  Section Z1, 004 Kalkin 8:30-9:45 TR - ON-LINE SYLLABUS
  Section Z2, 004 Kalkin 10:00-11:15 TR - ON-LINE SYLLABUS
  Section Z3, 004 Kalkin 1:00-2:15 TR - ON-LINE SYLLABUS
  Section Z4, 004 Kalkin 2:30-3:45 TR - ON-LINE SYLLABUS

Publication History

Journal Article, Academic Journal

• Bovee, M. W.; Kogan, A.; Nelson, K. M.; Srivastana, R. P.; Vasarhelyi, M. A. - "Design and Applications of an Intelligent Financial Reporting and Auditing Agent with Net Knowledge (FRAANK)" (Refereed) - Journal of Information Systems - 2005 - v. 19, no. 1, pp. 19-42 [View publication] [Show/Hide Abstract]
  Abstract: This paper describes the development and applications of FRAANK - Financial Reporting and Auditing Agent with Net Knowledge. The prototype of FRAANK presented here provides automated access to, and understanding and integration of rapidly changing financial information available from various sources on the Internet. In particular, FRAANK implements intelligent parsing to extract accounting numbers from natural text financial statements available from the SEC EDGAR repository. FRAANK develops an "understanding" of the accounting numbers by means of matching the line item labels to synonyms of tags in an XBRL taxonomy. As a result, FRAANK converts the consolidated balance sheet, income statement and statement of cash flows into XBRL-tagged format. Based on FRAANK, we propose an empirical approach towards the evaluation and improvement of XBRL taxonomies and for identifying and justifying needs for specialized taxonomies by assessing a taxonomy fit to the historical data, i.e., the quarterly and annual EDGAR filings. Using a test set of 10-K SEC filings, we evaluate FRAANK's performance by estimating its success rate in extracting and tagging the line items using the year 2000 C&I XBRL Taxonomy, Version 1. The evaluation results show that FRAANK is an advanced research prototype that can be useful in various practical applications. FRAANK also integrates the accounting numbers with other financial information publicly available on the Internet, such as timely stock quotes and analysts' forecasts of earnings, and calculates important financial ratios and other financial analysis indicators.
  
• Bovee, M. W.; Srivastava, R.; Mak , B. - "A Conceptual Framework and Belief-function Approach to Assessing Overall Information Quality" (Refereed) - International Journal of Intelligent Systems - 2003 - v. 18, no. 1, pp. 51-74 [View publication] [Show/Hide Abstract]
  Abstract: (Cited by 22 other authors/articles) - We develop an information quality model based on a user-centric view adapted from Financial Accounting Standards Board (Wang et al., Wang and Strong). The model consists of four essential attributes (or assertions): accessibility, interpretability, relevance, and integrity. Four subattributes lead to an evaluation of integrity: accuracy, completeness, consistency, and existence. These subattributes relating to integrity are intrinsic in nature and relate to the process of how the information was created and the first three attributes: (accessibility, interpretability, and relevance) are extrinsic in nature. We present our model as an evidential network under the belief-function framework to permit user assessment of quality parameters. Two algorithms for combining assessments into an overall IQ measure are explored, and examples in the domain of medical information are used to illustrate key concepts. We discuss two scenarios, online user and assurance provider, which reflect two likely and important aspects of IQ evaluation currently facing information users - concerns about the impact of poor quality online information and the need for IQ assurance.
  
• Bovee, M. W.; Ettredge, M. L.; Srivastava, R. P.; Vasarhelyi , M. A. - "Does the Year 2000 XBRL Taxonomy Accommodate Current Business Financial Reporting Practice?" (Refereed) - Journal of Information Systems - 2002 - v. 16, no. 2, Fall, pp. 165-182 [View publication] [Show/Hide Abstract]
  Abstract: XBRL (eXtensible Business Reporting Language) is an application of XML (eXtensible Markup Language) intended for use in digital business reporting. Observers predict XBRL will provide benefits to firms that adopt it, such as enhancing information use, facilitating comparability and consistency, and providing technological capability for near-continuous financial reporting through the Web. However, questions arise regarding how well the proposed taxonomy for financial statements corresponds to firms' preferred reporting practices. We argue that a poor fit may lead to information loss and to subsequent resistance to use or general adoption of the taxonomy. A lack of fit could therefore negate anticipated firm or information-user benefits. To address this issue, we assess how well the year 2000 version, for financial reporting by commercial and industrial (C&I) firms under U.S. GAAP, accommodates current financial-reporting practices of public companies. We attempt to match each line item in the 1999 annual financial statements of 67 companies with an XBRL taxonomy "tag," employing two measures of the frequency of "special attention" (difficult-to-match) items as indicators of the quality of "fit" between the taxonomy and firms' reporting practices. Analyses show a good fit on average, but also indicate significant differences in the number and proportion of exceptions across financial statements and industries. In light of these results, we suggest modifications to the taxonomy and discuss the need for industry-specific taxonomies. (Cited by 6)
  
• Bovee, M. W.; Paul, D.; Nelson, K. M. - "A Framework For Assessing The Use of Third Party Software Quality Assurance Models to Meet FDA Medical Device Software Process Control Guidelines" (Refereed) - IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management - 2001 - v. 48, no. 4, November, pp. 465-479 [Show/Hide Abstract]
  Abstract: The proliferation of medical device software (MDS) potentially increases the risks of patient injury from software defects. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 1998 updated its MDS regulations, moving away from a product-based regulatory approach toward one more focused on quality assurance processes. However, what constituted acceptable software quality assurance (SQA) processes and whether regulations could be met by the use of third-party standards was not specified. The FDA has implicitly sanctioned using third-party SQA audits in submissions for accelerated review of modifications of existing MDS, but it has neither approved nor rejected their use in submissions for new MDS approval. Suppliers must assess whether adopting a thirdparty SQA standard assures full or only partial conformance with FDA requirements because they remain potentially liable for damages resulting from software defects. However, substantial differences in the philosophy and organization of FDA requirements and third-party standards make this assessment difficult. This research develops a framework to assess whether third-party SQA standards can meet FDA requirements and then employs the framework to determine if ISO 9000-3 or the Software Engineering Institute's Capability Maturity Model is sufficient to meet such requirements. Our research analyzes four SQA categories specified by the FDA guidelines: process management, requirements specification, design control, and change control. Analysis indicates that while neither third-party SQA standard by itself fully meets FDA requirements, either standard is worth adopting and is approximately equivalent in its usefulness.
  
• Sharp, M. A.; Harman, E. A.; Boutillier, B. E.; Bovee, M. W.; Kraemer, W. J. - "A Progressive Resistance Training Program For Improving Manual Materials Handling Performance" - WORK - 1993 - v. 3, no. 3, pp. 62-68

Journal Article, Public or Trade Journal

• Bovee, M. W.; Jones, B. H.; Harris, J. M.; Cowan, D. N. - "Intrinsic Risk Factors For Exercise-Related Injuries Among Male and Female Army Trainees" - American Journal of Sports Medicine - 1993 - v. 21, no. 5, pp. 705-710 [View publication] [Show/Hide Abstract]
  Abstract: Physical training-related injuries are common among army recruits and other vigorously active populations, but little is known about their causation. To identify intrinsic risk factors, we prospectively measured 391 army trainees. For 8 weeks of basic training, 124 men and 186 women (79.3%) were studied. They answered questionnaires on past activities and sports participa tion, and were measured for height, weight, and body fat percentage; 71 % of the subjects took an initial army physical training test. Women had a significantly higher incidence of time-loss injuries than men, 44.6% com pared with 29.0%. During training, more time-loss in juries occurred among the 50% of the men who were slower on the mile run, 29.0% versus 0.0%. Slower women were likewise at greater risk than faster ones, 38.2% versus 18.5%. Men with histories of inactivity and with higher body mass index were at greater injury risk than other men, as were the shortest women. We conclude that female gender and low aerobic fitness measured by run times are risk factors for training injuries in army trainees, and that other factors such as prior activity levels and stature may affect men and women differently.
  

Conference Proceeding

• Bovee, M. W. - "XBRL and Information Quality: Promise, Progress, and Future Benefits" - KU CIBER 2007 International Conference on XBRL Taxonomies and Assurance - 2007 [Show/Hide Abstract]
  Abstract: Adoption of XBRL for business reporting purposes is purported to confer various benefits, including improved information quality. If realized, such benefits are potentially non-trivial, especially across large industries. This paper reviews the trade and academic literature regarding XBRL implementation, using the framework of information quality modeling to highlight promised, present, and future XBRL progress toward improved information quality benefits for practitioners. These are then organized around the themes of the categories of strategic information technology adoption - automate, informate, and transform - to consider important areas for future research.
  
• Bovee, M. W.; Roberts, T. L.; Srivastava, R. P. - "Characteristics of Decision-Useful Financial Reporting Information: An Empirical Validation of the Proposed International Accounting Model" (Refereed) - Massachusetts Institute of Technology - 2008 - v. 13, [View publication] [Show/Hide Abstract]
  Abstract: Poor quality information costs businesses trillions of dollars. Yet a foundational model influencing the quality of financial reporting information - the United States' accounting model of information usefulness - is still not empirically validated. In the near future this model is set to be incorporated into an international standard, globally affecting professional decisions about the characteristics of useful financial reporting information and thus its quality for a multitude of business users. Validated information quality models exist in Information Systems as potential substitutes, but these have not been fully reconciled with descriptive models of information usefulness in accounting. Using survey data from business information users as defined by the accounting standards, and partial least squares analyses, we empirically test and compare the proposed model for the international standard and a pre-existing empirically validated Information Quality model from Information Systems.
  
• Bovee, M. W.; Lee, B.; Tran, T. - "Why Not Semijoins for Streams, When Distributed?" (Refereed) - IEEE Computer Society - 2007 - v. 2, pp. 27 [Show/Hide Abstract]
  Abstract: This paper addresses the semijoin-based window join algorithm over distributed data streams. In distributed stream query processing, data streams arriving at remote sites need to be shipped to the processing site for query execution. This typically introduces high communication overhead over the network. Our observation is that semijoin, effective to reduce communication overhead in distributed database query processing, can be also effective in distributed stream query processing. The challenge, of course, lies in the streaming nature of tuples, the processing of which is fundamentally different from processing a set of tuples. We address this challenge by first adapting the window-based stream join to a distributed environment. The resulting join algorithm (called simple join) uses the idea of exporting a window to the query processing site. We then adopt the semijoin to reduce the communication overhead (in return for a marginal increase of the processing overhead). The resulting semijoin-based join algorithm uses the ideas of a mirror window and a partial tuple. That is, it creates a copy of a remote window at the processing site and sends a partial tuple to probe for matching tuples before sending a full tuple. Finally, we analyze the two join algorithms using our proposed cost models and verify the analysis results through a set of experiments.
  
• Bovee, M. W. - "Empirical Validation of the Structure of an Information Quality Model" (Refereed) - 9th International Conference on Information Quality - 2004 - pp. pp. 358-372
• Bovee, M. W.; Srivastava, R. P.; Mak, B. - "A Conceptual Framework and Belief Function Approach to Assessing Overall Information Quality" (Refereed) - 6th International Conference on Information Quality - 2001 [View publication] [Show/Hide Abstract]
  Abstract: This work examined the applicability of belief functions for aggregating user evaluations of ratings of the attributes of information quality into an overall measure. It also presented the logic and theory supporting the merger of the FASB model of information usefulness and the Wang & Strong (1996) model of information quality.
  

Book, Chapter in Textbook-New

• Jones, B. H.; Bovee, M. W.; Knapik, J. J. - "Associations among Body Composition, Physical Fitness, and Injury in Men and Women Army Trainees" - Body Composition and Physical Performance - 1992 - pp. 141-173

Technical Report

• Friedl, K. E.; Vogel, J. A.; Bovee, M. W.; Jones, B. H. - "Assessment of Body Weight Standards in Male and Female Army Recruits" - USARIEM Technical Report - 1989 - no. ARIEM-T15-90, [View publication] [Show/Hide Abstract]
  Abstract: Army enlisted candidates are screened for obesity with height-weight tables (AR 40-501) which exclude few young males but approximately one third of young females in the U.S. population. Another regulation (AR 600-9) sets standards for retention in the Army on the basis of body fat estimated from circumferences. The suitability of accession weight standards with respect to the retention standards was examined by studying the effect of excess fatness on attrition from active duty, physical performance, and ability to achieve fat standards after basic training. Keywords: Body weight; Fat cells; Anthropometry; Recruits; Physical fitness; Weight loss; Attrition; Standards; Army personnel.
  
• Sharp, M. A.; Harman, E. A.; Boutilier, B. E.; Bovee, M. W.; Kraemer, W. J. - "USARIEM Technical Report " - ARIEM - 1988 - no. M2-90,

Material Regarding New Courses/Curricula

• Kraushaar, J. M.; Bovee, M. W.; Cats-Baril, W. L.; Chittenden, T. I. - "Curriculum Redesign - 1st Year Course: Management & Information Technology" - School of Business Administration - 2006 [View publication] [Show/Hide Abstract]
  Abstract: To further introduce students to Tablet PC Functionality expanded lecture demonstrations were incorporated into the primarily first-year introductory business course (the first business school course required of Business school majors). These lectures included demonstrations of: Keyboard & Writing Pad (TIP-Tablet Input Panel); Microsoft Journal (right-clicking, double-clicking, lasso, erase); Virtual Printers (Document Image Writer, Journal Note Writer, CutePDF Printer, etc.); Microsoft OneNote (audio capture, importing electronic content, content organization, notebook organization); Tablet PC Experience/Education Pack. The course was altered to expand coverage of the uses of Microsoft One-Note for in-class shared sessions as well as home-work involving MS OneNote. The course also integrated a Tablet PC - Classroom oriented application called Classroom Presenter (http://www.cs.washington.edu/education/dl/presenter/) developed and distributed by the University of Washington. This application was designed for enhanced classroom sharing of digital hand written notes and is currently being integrated into the junior/senior level Information systems course.
  

Cited Research

• Bovee, M. W.; Ettredge, M.; Srivastava, R. P.; Vasarhelyi, M. A. - "Enabling Semantic Consistency for Electronic Business Reporting: Does the Year 2000 XBRL Taxonomy Accommodate Current Business Financial Reporting Practice?" - 2001 [Show/Hide Abstract]
  Abstract: Working Paper - Cited by 3
  

Other

• Bovee, M. W. - "XBRL (eXtensible Business Reporting Language) Express Pilot Database (nicknamed "The Kansas Project" in the XBRL community)" - Edgar-Online - 2002 [Show/Hide Abstract]
  Abstract: Data used to assess the XBRL (eXtensible Business Reporting Language) USA Commercial and Industrial (CI) taxonomy (nicknamed "The Kansas Project" in the XBRL community) was used to create a publicly available XBRL repository for testing and development of the XBRL taxonomies and standards by practitioners and academics. Hosted online by Edgar-Online, the repository consisted of data from 80 Fortune 1000 corporate financial statements. This pilot data set was used by EDGAR Online to establish the initial raw XBRL data set for what is now XBRL Express.