Commercial High School Students’ Conceptual Structures of Accounting

The purpose of this study was to investigate commercial high school students’ conceptual structures of accounting. Data was collected from 132 students using a free word association test in Turkey. The results of this research revealed the conceptual structures of accounting of the participant students with various dimensions. Eight different categories were formed with the participant students’ response words about accounting. These categories were: tools used in accounting, the accounting profession and education, accounting results, accounts, the accounting environment, the professional ethics of accounting, the technicality of accounting and, mathematical operations. The category with the highest frequency was tools used in accounting whereas the category with the lowest frequency was mathemetical operations. It was observed when the categories formed were analyzed that, accounting students’ conceptual structures of accounting were on various dimensions and at an adequate level. These results were compared with the related literature and recommendations were developed.