Abstract: This paper tries to explore whether and how the earnings management decision-making of listed companies is influenced by investor sentiment, and on this basis, it analyzes the motivations of earnings management strategy under the influence of investor sentiment. The findings show that when the investors sentiment is higher (or lower), the company would be inclined to positive (negative) earnings management; investor sentiment thus would be positively related to the size of earnings management. The earnings management decision-making of the listed companies is not influenced by the managers’ own emotions, but a means of rational catering towards the investors’emotions. The study of this paper can enrich the related literature on the problem of the investor sentiment affecting the decision-making of corporate accounting information disclosure, and at the same time has provided new evidences for the catering theory of the behavioral finance.

Key words: investor sentiment; information disclosure; earnings management; catering theory