亞洲公司治亞洲公司治理協會(Asian Corporate Governance Association)與里昂證券(Credit Lyonnais Securities Asia)於2012年9月共同發佈的亞洲公司治理報告中顯示，對設置獨立董事及審計委員會，因執法成效不佳、不夠透明、未全面要求上市櫃公司設立，使台灣排名自2010年第四名下降兩名為第六名。
因此，強化董事會功能、聘請獨立董事為我國公司治理應加強目標，如此使其立於更客觀立場保護公司利益，並對管理階層具制衡作用。基於此本研究探討獨立董事職責是否有效發揮，對盈餘管理與資訊揭露是否具相關影響。
本研究以2007年至2012年台灣上市櫃公司為研究樣本，研究方法以SPSS進行研究模型之實證分析。本研究結果為：設立獨立董事席次越多對資訊揭露較佳，設立獨立董事席次越多使應計基礎盈餘管理程度小，並未發現設立獨立董事席次越多對實質盈餘管理有顯著影響。
Asian Corporate Governance Association and Credit Lyonnais Securities Asia co-published the Assessment Report of Asian Corporate Governance in September 2012. The Report indicated that Taiwan did not regulate the listed companies to fully establish the Audit Committee and Independent Directors. In addition, the law en-forcement is ineffective and transparency is not sufficient. Consequently, the rank-ings of Taiwan dropped two places from 4th to 6th since 2010.
Therefore, to strengthen the supervisory function in Directors of Board and to employ the Independent Directors are the objective of corporate goverance in Tai-wan. The Independent Directors can be more objective and to protect the interest of company and to develop the mechanism of check and balance in the management. Accordingly, this research explores whether the duty of Independent Directors is ef-fective and any impact on earnings management and information disclosure.
The research samples are listed companies of Taiwan from 2007 to 2012. The research method employs the SPSS to conduct empirical analyses on research models. The results show that the more establishment of Independent Directors performs better in information disclosure. More establishment of Independent Directors makes lesser level in accruals earnings management. However, this research can not find any obvious impact of Independent Directors on real earnings management.
