Utilization of Auditing Techniques and Fraud Detection in Medium Scale Enterprises in Akwa Ibom South Senatorial District, Nigeria

Abstract

The study investigated utilisation of auditing techniques and fraud detection in medium scale enterprises in Akwa Ibom South Senatorial District, Nigeria. To guide the study, two specific objectives, two research questions and two null hypotheses were formulated respectively. A correlational survey design was adopted for the study. The population of this study was 406 internal auditors. The sample size of the study was 244 respondents drawn through purposive sampling techniques. The study adopted 60% of the study population. The researcher developed a structured questionnaire entitled, “Utilisation of Auditing Techniques and Fraud Detection Questionnaire (UATFDQ)” which was utilized to get information from the respondents. The reliability coefficient of the instrument was 0.80 was considered high enough for the study. Simple linear regression analysis was used to answer all the research questions and for testing  the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The finding of the study revealed that there is high and significant extent to which utilisation of computer assisted audit technique predict fraud detection and that there is low extent on the use of machine learning techniques in medium scale enterprises in Akwa Ibom South Senatorial District. The study recommended among others that, medium scale enterprises should adopt computer assisted audit and machine learning techniques for fraud detection in their business by using experienced auditors and that shareholders‟ should have insightful ideas about the machine learning techniques in accounting environment to help boost the business.