La regulación de la auditoría: ¿Un factor institucional ineficaz frente a la problemática de la brecha de expectativas de auditoría?

Audit regulation (AR) has garnered increasing attention in academic literature, mainly due to the pursuit of higher audit quality (AQ) and the aim of narrowing the audit expectation gap (AEG). The AEG refers to the discrepancies between what stakeholders expect from an audit, what they perceive it delivers, and what it can realistically achieve. This gap undermines the credibility of the auditor’s role and contributes to a decline in public trust in the profession. Through a systematic literature review, this study analyzes 72 academic articles published between 2019 and 2024 to identify the main topics addressed in recent research on audit regulation. The findings reveal that AR has focused on enhancing audit quality, strengthening oversight and inspection mechanisms, mitigating litigation risk and legal liability for auditors, and improving key elements such as auditor independence and audit fees. However, despite these efforts, current regulatory approaches appear ineffective in addressing the underlying issues of the audit expectation gap (AEG).