Award Criteria | American Accounting Association

AAA Competitive Manuscript Award

Sponsored by the American Accounting Association

Call for Nominations and Award Criteria

Nominations Deadline: January 31 at 11:59 pm Eastern Time

Previous Award Recipients

The Competitive Manuscript Award Screening Committee is currently accepting nominations for the 2024 Competitive Manuscript Award.

Award Intent

The award is intended to showcase the highest quality solo work by junior researchers—those who are current PhD students or have earned their PhD within the past five years.
The anticipation is that papers selected for the award will be published in The Accounting Review subject to satisfactory resolution of the editorial review process.

Award Selection Criteria

Any subject matter in the field of accounting is proper for inclusion.
Manuscripts must generally conform to the style and length requirements of The Accounting Review. A submission to the AAA Competitive Manuscript Award should be considered as if it were a submission to The Accounting Review and must meet all requirements that apply therewith, including not being under review at another journal.
Co-authored papers are not eligible.
Papers previously rejected from The Accounting Review are not eligible.
Previously published manuscripts are not eligible.
The AAA Competitive Manuscript Award Screening Committee will select up to six papers, observing subject matter interest, depth of research, contribution to knowledge, and organization of subject matter. These papers will be forwarded to the AAA Competitive Manuscript Award Selection Committee, which is comprised of the Chair of the Screening Committee who also chairs the Selection Committee, the Senior Editor of The Accounting Review, and a subset of editors from The Accounting Review as selected by the Senior Editor of The Accounting Review. Beginning in 2024-2025, the Senior Editor of The Accounting Review will Chair the Competitive Manuscript Award Selection Committee.
The AAA Competitive Manuscript Award Selection Committee will select as many as three recipients.

Award Presentation

The recipient(s) will receive an award at the AAA Annual Meeting.
The recipient(s) will be announced on the AAA website and in multi-topic mass emails.

Nominations Deadline

Nominations are due by 11:59 pm Eastern Time on January 31. Self-nominations are encouraged.

Instructions for Submitting Nominations

Members of the committee are encouraged to submit nominations.
All conflict-of-interest rules applicable to The Accounting Review also apply to both the Screening and Selection Committee members. Conflicts are managed at the discretion of the Chair (either by replacing the committee member or recusing the committee member from voting on the paper for which they have a conflict).
Authors of submitted papers that are not selected for the award may re-submit their paper in subsequent years if all other criteria are met.
PhD criteria:
- Nominees for the 2024 award must either be current PhD students or have earned their PhD during the five calendar years preceding the year of the award – 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 or 2023.
Manuscripts will be subject to a blind review; therefore, all personal information, any "identifying" information, acknowledgements on the title or abstract page, including the author’s dissertation chair and other committee members (which would indicate the school the author is from), a list of schools where the paper has been presented, and awards the paper previously won should be removed prior to submission in order facilitate a truly "blind" review. Any identifying information in the submission will be removed by the AAA Professional Staff Liaison prior to sending the submission to the Chair.
Only electronic submissions in a Word file will be accepted. If, however, all identifying information has been removed from the submission, an electronic submission in a PDF file will be accepted.
Each nomination must include:
- An electronic submission of the manuscript in a Word file or PDF file with all identifying information removed, and
- A cover letter stating the mailing address, the date PhD degree was awarded or is expected to be awarded, and a statement acknowledging that by submitting to the AAA Competitive Manuscript Award, the paper meets the criteria to be submitted to The Accounting Review, including that the paper is not in the review process elsewhere. Note that papers currently in the review process at The Accounting Review are eligible.
Please attach the manuscript and cover letter to an email and send to Barbara Gutierrez, Professional Staff Liaison, at awards@aaahq.org with "Competitive Manuscript" in the subject line of your email.
Upon receipt of your nomination, you will receive an acknowledgment message from the Professional Staff Liaison.
All documents submitted in support of your nomination become the property of the American Accounting Association and will not be returned. Do not submit by mail any irreplaceable documents.