Recent financial frauds in China such as Kangmei Pharmaceuticals’ case have raised suspicion in the capital market and among academics about the reliability of accounting information of listed companies, and as a result, various non-financial information that is compulsory or encouraged to be disclosed by regulators and voluntarily disclosed by listed companies is gradually gaining attention from various stakeholders and academics. The corporate social responsibility (CSR) information is one of the most widely disclosed non-financial information by listed firms, but its reliability and motivation are also questionable, for example, is CSR commitment affected by firms’ financial information quality? Using China a-share listed companies that disclosed their corporate social responsibility reports from 2009-2019 as a sample, we investigate whether earnings management can influence corporate social responsibility by analysing the management’s motives embedded in earnings management, in order to further examine whether Chinese listed companies are morally motivated to undertake social responsibility or use social responsibility as a strategic tool to maintain the reputation of the firm and the management. The results of the study show that earnings management and CSR are positively correlated, and the finds continue to be robust when using 2SLS, Heckman two-step regression and propensity score matching to control for reverse causality and self-selection bias, proving that China's listed companies are ethically motivated to fulfil their social responsibility. Therefore, it is important to focus on the quality of earnings information in order to perceive the motivation of CSR when evaluating a company’s CSR commitment.