Between Conscience and Calculation: A PRISMA-Guided Systematic Review of the Behavioural Determinants of Tax Evasion

Abstrak

Purpose: This study systematically reviews recent empirical evidence on five behavioural determinants of tax evasion, namely moral obligation, tax fairness, taxpayer understanding, subjective norms, and attitude towards evasion. It responds to conflicting findings in Indonesian and international studies and to the persistent compliance gap in self-assessment tax systems such as Indonesia's.

Method: The review follows the PRISMA 2020 statement. Eight Boolean search strings were run in the Crossref database for peer-reviewed journal articles published between 2020 and 2024 with available abstracts, and citation tracking was used to add key studies outside the database. Records were de-duplicated, screened by title, and assessed for eligibility against predefined criteria. The included studies were coded by context, design, outcome, and the direction of each determinant, and then synthesised using vote counting and thematic analysis anchored in the theory of planned behaviour.

Findings: Moral obligation and tax morale emerge as the most consistent deterrents of evasion across countries, outcomes, and analytical techniques. Taxpayer knowledge and understanding generally reduce evasion, although a minority of studies report null or reversed effects, suggesting that technical knowledge without ethical commitment can be used to exploit loopholes. Perceived fairness shows the most mixed pattern, especially in Indonesian studies that use perception-based outcomes. Subjective and social norms act mainly as amplifiers, increasing evasion where referent groups tolerate it and deterring it where honesty is the descriptive norm, while favourable attitudes towards evasion consistently increase evasion intention.

Implication: Tax authorities should complement enforcement with programmes that build intrinsic tax morale, make the fairness of tax treatment and spending visible, and use credible social-norm messages. Tax education should combine technical literacy with ethical reasoning. Researchers should use behavioural outcomes, multi-group designs, and moderation models instead of further replicating simple perception models.

Originality: The review integrates moral, fairness, cognitive, and social-psychological determinants in a single extended theory of planned behaviour framework and shows where the evidence is robust, where it is contested, and why. It also brings Indonesian evidence into dialogue with international studies and proposes a research agenda for Indonesia's self-assessment system.