Todd has walked the path of accounting, from undergraduate education to public practice, from academic research to graduate instruction. He loves searching for why decision makers do what they do and how to help them make better decisions. His research has focused on the effects of feedback, incentives, and control systems on performance and how personalities might interact with these. He has also researched how control and evaluations system features affect decision-making. Todd enjoys being with his family more than accounting and playing basketball only very slightly less.

Todd's research is published in Contemporary Accounting Research, Accounting, Organizations and Society, Management Accounting Research, Journal of Management Accounting Research, Auditing: A Journal of Practice & Theory, Behavioral Research in Accounting, Accounting Horizons, and Advances in Accounting.

Selected Publications/Articles

• Erickson, D., D. K. Holderness, K. J. Olsen, and T. A. Thornock. 2024. Relative performance information and employee performance: The role of need for cognition. Journal of Management Accounting Research (forthcoming).
• Owens, J., K. K. Saunders, S. Schachner, and T. A. Thornock. 2024. How management disclosure and auditor disclosure affect auditor liability: The case of the going concern financial accounting standard. Auditing: A Journal of Practice and Theory 43 (4): 143–162.
• Holderness, D. K., K. J. Olsen, and T. A. Thornock. 2024. I’m working hard, but it’s hardly working: The negative effects of incentivizing effort that ultimately falls short. Behavioral Research in Accounting 36 (2): 71–90.
• Chan, E. W., and T. A. Thornock. 2022. Disaggregated versus holistic performance evaluations in a promotion setting.  Journal of Management Accounting Research 34 (3): 77-97.
• Erickson, D., D. K. Holderness, K. J. Olsen, and T. A. Thornock. 2022. Feedback with feeling? How emotional language in feedback affects individual performance. Accounting, Organizations and Society 99: 101329.
• Holderness, D. K., K. J. Olsen, T. A. Thornock, and E. C. Tomlinson. 2022. Will someone be checking my work? The effect of psychological entitlement and the expectation of being monitored on task performance and misreporting. Accounting Horizons 36 (4): 47-65.
• Thomas, T. F., and T. A. Thornock. 2021. How incomplete information of team member contributions affects subsequent contributions: The moderating role of social value orientation. Journal of Management Accounting Research 33(3): 145-161.
• Holderness, D. K., K. J. Olsen, and T. A Thornock. 2020. Assigned versus chosen relative performance information: The effect of feedback frequency on performance.  Journal of Management Accounting Research 32(1): 137-158.
• Cannon, J. N., and T. A. Thornock. 2019. How do managers react to a peer’s situation?  The influence of environmental similarity on budgetary reporting.  Management Accounting Research 44: 12–25.
• Holderness, D. K., K. J. Olsen, and T. A. Thornock. 2017. Who are you to tell me that?! The moderating effect of performance feedback source and psychological entitlement on individual performance.  Journal of Management Accounting Research 29 (2): 33–46.
• Thornock, T. A. 2016. How the timing of performance feedback impacts individual performance.  Accounting, Organizations and Society 55: 1–11.
• Kachelmeier, S. J., T. A. Thornock, and M. G. Williamson. 2016. Communicated values as informal controls: Gaining accuracy while undermining productivity?  Contemporary Accounting Research 33 (4): 1411–1434.
• Krumwiede, K. R., M. R. Swain, T. A. Thornock, and D. L. Eggett. 2013. The effects of task outcome feedback and broad domain evaluation experience on the use of unique scorecard measures.  Advances in Accounting 29: 205–217.

Accounting Systems (ACCT 309) - Examination of accounting system concepts, applications, and the process by which they are analyzed, designed, and implemented. Emphasis on management information and computer applications in financial accounting, auditing, and management accounting by means of case study analysis.

Controllership (ACCT 857) - Rudiments of conceptual framework for designing and evaluating management accounting and control systems for business firms and situations.

Journal Service

Editorial board member - Behavioral Research in Accounting (2023-present), Journal of Management Accounting Research (2025-present)

Ad hoc reviewer – The Accounting Review (8), Journal of Accounting Research (1), Contemporary Accounting Research (8), Accounting, Organizations and Society (6), Management Science (1), Journal of Management Accounting Research (9), Management Accounting Research (6), Behavioral Research in Accounting (5), Journal of Information Systems (2), Journal of Business Ethics (4), Journal of Accounting and Public Policy (2), Accounting Horizons (1), European Accounting Review (1), Advances in Accounting (1), Journal of Forensic Accounting Research (1), Accounting Perspectives (1), Advances in Accounting Behavioral Research (1), Accounting and the Public Interest (1)

Academy Service

Chair – Best MAS Paper at the AAA Annual Meeting Award Selection Committee – 2024

Chair – Distinguished Contributions to Accounting Literature Award Selection Committee – 2023-2024

Co-Lead – Management Accounting Section AAA Annual Meeting Program – 2022-2023

Member – Distinguished Contributions to Accounting Literature Award Selection Committee – 2022-2023

Member – Best Paper at the MAS Midyear Meeting Award Selection Committee

Other Service

Member – 2023-2025 Bretton Woods Accounting and Finance Ski Conference (University of New Hampshire)

Reviewer – German Israeli Foundation for Scientific Research (GIF)

Organizer – Management Accounting Experimental Research Brownbag (MAERBB) – Formed January 2015 (37 events to date)

Co-Organizer – Audit Experimental Brownbag (AEBB) – Formed February 2019 (4 events to date)

Awards

• Institute of Management Accountants (IMA) Academic Research Fellow (2024-2026)
• IMA Lybrand Award Certificate of Merit