The Impact of Firm Characteristics on the Level of Its Social Responsibility Disclosure (An Applied Study on Firms Subject to the Regulations of the Syrian Commission on Financial Markets and Securities)

This research aimed at studying the impact of firm characteristics on the level of social responsibility disclosure by firms subject to the rules of The Syrian Commission on Financial Markets and Securities. The research was applied on 38 companiesfor which data was available from 2007-2013. To measure the level of firms’ social responsibility disclosure, the dependent variable, an index was built based on the KLD index. Firm characteristics, the independent variables, that were examined are: profitability, financial leverage, age, industrial sector, size, managerial ownership, institutional ownership and foreign ownership. Data were hand collected from the annual reports of the firms in question and analyzed following the random effect model, of the panel data models. The results indicate that the size of the firm and its profitability are positively linked to its social responsibility disclosure. No effect however was detected for the age of the firm, the industrial sector, and the ownership structure. The results also reveal that the Syrian crisis had a positive effect on the level of social responsibility disclosure, as these firms increased disclosure of social responsibility related to community service, particularly those related to the support of martyrs families and war casualities.