Cheating

ASHWINI JAKHAR CWID-10427504 CS-560 TEAM -2

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Cheating Cheating is commonly defined as an act of lying, deception, fraud or trickery. It is commonly employed to create an unfair advantage usually in an individual’s personal interest and often at the expense of the other. The act of cheating is prevalent in every sphere, be it in academics, business, sports, leisure activities and even relationships. At some point someone resorts to cheating to gain a biased advantage over other individuals. The focus of this research paper is to discuss the most common venue for cheating i.e. in an educational environment and its continued persistence, regardless of numerous anti-cheating measures. Academic dishonesty or cheating is endemic in all levels of education. In recent decades, there has been a steady rise in cheating incidences within United States of America.

According to survey statistics gathered by Educational Testing Service in

1998, some 70% of country’s top high school students admitted to cheating on a test (1999, Oct 16, The San Diego Union Tribune) In other surveys conducted by the Josephson Institute of Ethics reveal that as high as seven in ten students surveyed indicated cheating on a test at least once and nearly half admitted having committed act of cheating more than once.(2000, Oct16, CNN.com) Cheating in educational settings occurs in number of forms. Cheating on a test or school work may include the sharing of information among test takers or the use of secretly covered notes or crib sheets. Cheating during tests can be as simple as looking over the shoulder into other student’s paper or hiding notes in their clothing to more elaborate methods of obtaining information such as through use of cell phones, pagers, graphic calculators, 2

handheld computers or Palm Pilots. Such devices can easily download information; take pictures of notes or text-message answers during exams. Obtaining questions or answers to a test ahead of time are other common form of cheating amongst students. On academic essays cheating often takes the form of plagiarism. Through simple cut and paste technique students usually adopt ideas, words or statements of another individual without giving due recognition. Act of plagiarism ranges from borrowing exact phrases to paraphrasing someone else’s original work or idea without acknowledgement or citation to indulging in contract cheating. The phenomena of contract or bargained cheating have been observed to be increasing at an alarming rate. In the past, students would purchase old test papers or essays from fellow or former students. However, this business has changed in new millennium. In the age of growing Internet, the business of selling custom written academic papers is booming. These papers are written according to the student’s needs, their specification of topics, length and number of works cited. For a specified fee, students get access to thousands of papers or customized essays written by other individuals. Academic dishonesty differs between schools depending on the size of the institution or individual classes, selectivity, anti-cheating policies, learning environment and expectations from the students. Generally the smaller and more selective the institution or class, the less the cheating occurs there. This is possible because in a smaller group of students chances of getting caught cheating are more likely than in classes having large number of students. Moreover researchers have found that students who attend a school with a set honour code are less likely to cheat than students at school with other ways of enforcing academic integrity. These codes 3

provide guidelines to students about acceptable academic behaviour and the repercussions of its violation. Similarly in a highly competitive learning environment students might resort to cheating in order to sustain themselves in competition. Act of cheating also varies according to age. It appears to increase as students move through the kindergarten to high school system; no age group is exempt from cheating. Studies have indicated that cheating occurs amongst elementary school children, in middle, high school students or even amongst undergraduate or graduate students (Anderman et al. 2007) Cheating if caught often leads to either suspension, failing grades or other forms of punishments depending on an institution’s regulations. Students resorting to academic misconduct not only indulge in unethical practices but often find themselves at the losing end. A student purchasing a badly written paper suffers all the usual consequences of plagiarism, but also added consequences of a low grade and loss of money (Embleton & Helfer vol15.6: p 23). So why do students of all age groups and achievements level cheat? Student’s academic dishonesty, a prevalent and perennial phenomenon has been an issue of considerable interest amongst researchers and educators in ethics, psychology and sociology. Many theories have been proposed explaining the underlying dynamics behind cheating and its persistence in academics. It is widely accepted that most cheaters make a rational decision to commit academic dishonesty. Cheating in academics is more easily traced to the academic or social environment of the students than to his or her background (Anderman et al. 2007).These factors can range from one’s social surroundings at school to what 4

instructions are given before exams. Psychologists explain cheating from the perspective of learning as a strategy that serves a cognitive shortcut. Whereas effective learning often involves the use of complex strategies, cheating precludes the need to use such complexities. Thus students may choose to cheat either because they do not know how to use effective learning techniques or simply because they do not want to invest time or energy in such strategies (Anderman et al. 2007).Cheating offers an easy way out. Students view it as why bother studying hard, doing all those term papers by yourself if someone else’s work is readily available. Strangely, students will go out of their way to cheat or prepare cheat sheets than to study for a test. Occasionally this is due to boredom. Lack of clarity in a lesson, perceived lack of relevance and too few tests offered in a grading period are few examples urging students to indulge in cheating (Anderman et al. 2007). Cheating may occur in different qualities and quantities depending on a student’s level of cognitive, social or moral development. Cheating tends to occur less in younger children than in adolescents. These developmental differences stems from changes both in student’s cognitive abilities and in the social surroundings in which they interact (Anderman et al. 2007). For example, cheating may be more likely to occur amongst middle or high school students than elementary students because the instructional practices used in middle and high school are more focused on grades, ability and competition than in elementary school. From a motivational perspective, learners report many different reasons for engaging in academic cheating. Some students cheat because they are highly focused on extrinsic outcomes such as grades (Anderman et al. 2007). This is the case in competitive exams for professional schools, 5

undergraduate or graduate schools. At this point, students are struggling in competitive environment and cheating again offers an easy way to deal with competition as long as it remains unnoticed. A survey published by the Academy of Management, Learning and Education of 5300 United States graduate students found that 56% of business students were worst offenders of academic misconduct followed closely by Engineering students at 54%. Both groups admitted to plagiarism to smuggling crib notes into exams. (Gulli et al. v120.5: 32) Some other students cheat because they are concerned with maintaining a certain image to themselves or to their peers. Psychologists note that mostly people tend to follow the norms of their peer groups. Thus students who believe their peers disapprove of cheating are less likely to cheat. Most decisive factor in a student’s decision to cheat is his perception of his peer’s idea of academic dishonesty. Some students who fail to develop skills in dealing with complex topics or tasks or those having low learning abilities might resort to cheating as survival mechanism in competitive world (Anderman et al. 2007). In certain other cases, poor time management can become a principle cause for cheating. It has been found that there is a strong correlation between extracurricular activities and cheating. Managing time between studies or extracurricular activities can be a real challenge and often exhaustive task for some students, who might indulge in cheating as an easy way out. In certain educational settings such as highly competitive business schools the tactics of cut throat competition is inculcated in students as an absolute necessity in order to gain competitive advantage. In such fields, the ability to utilize someone else’s intellectual idea is considered smart and rewarded. Students in such scenarios do not consider

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cheating as unethical and form fluid notions about what is actually unethical. (Verchoor: v89.1:15) The reasons for cheating and its continuance in academic setting is wide ranging, extending from academic competition to more fluid notions around what is unethical to a cultural generation gap between students and instructors. It is therefore not possible to pin point on a factor as a sole contributor to cheating in academics. Educational institutions have resorted to numerous ways in combating the unethical practice of cheating. Faculties usually incorporated some kind of instruction or warning about plagiarism into the class curriculum. Students are frequently explained what constitutes plagiarism and are instructed in writing citations or how to give credit where it is due. Many universities have honour codes but students get these along with large package of other information about university, when they are enrolled. It does not seem to make an impact on them until they are caught or threatened with expulsion. Certain other ways institutions fight cheating is through strict vigilance, seating schemes during exams, supplying different versions of exams, banning large number of electronic devices, mandatory removal of all bags, books, coats or hats while giving exams. More and more faculty require students to show outlines, progress reports, drafts and reference notes throughout research progress. This helps instructors to understand students thought process while students are encouraged to get involved in their work and reduce chances of plagiarism. Some instructors have resorted to giving more analytical home work that is aimed at encouraging students to think and apply their own thoughts. While many institutions have also resorted to websites such as Turnitin.com that help in catching plagiarised work. Such measures have been 7

successful to some degree but cheating still prevails as students become more creative to fight anti-cheating measures. Combating cheating is not an easy task. It appears to be a never ending game. Institutions can only police dishonesty and punish it. However that does not appear to be enough to remove the plague of cheating. Punishing students for academic dishonesty can either remove occurrences of such acts but mostly it suppresses them. At some point, students resort to creative ways of dealing with anti-cheating measures. Therefore, there is a need to promote a sense of honesty; integrity and honour and make students understand its importance. It is necessary to promote schools, colleges and universities as an umbrella institution that not only imparts basic education or knowledge but teaches how to learn, behave, face challenges and succeed in real world. This can only be achieved with a continuous effort of students, their parents and instructors, through ways of teaching that aim at original and analytical thinking with a considerable emphasis on academic honesty. As Michael Josephen, founder of the Josephson Institute of Ethics puts it, “if students take it honestly, they’ll not only learn more than they think but will become better, stronger people.” (ABC Primetime News: April 29th) References: ABC Primetime News (April 29th): A Cheating Crises in America’s schools- How it is done and Why it’s happening URL: http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime/story?id=132376&page=1 (Accessed 13th Sept, 2007)

Anderman Eric M. and Murdock Tamera B. (2007): The Psychology of Academic Cheating. Academic Press- ProQuest Database URL8

http://books.elsevier.com/bookscat/samples/9780123725417/Sample_Chapters/02~cha pter_1.pdf (Accessed 13th Sept 2007)

CNN.com (2000, Oct 16th): Study finds widespread lying cheating among U.S. teensURL- http://archives.cnn.com/2000/US/10/16/morality.study.ap/index.html (Accessed 12th Sept 2007)

Embleton Kimberely and Helfer Doris S. (2007, June): The Plague of Plagiarism and Academic Dishonesty, ProQuestComputing, ProQuest Database URLhttp://proquest.umi.com.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/pqdlink?index=4&did=12883621 71&SrchMode=1&sid=3&Fmt=6&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&VName=PQD&TS= 1189648407&clientId=12520(Accessed Sept 13th, 2007) Gulli Cathy, Kohler Nicholas, Patriquin Martin (2007, Feb 12th): The Great University Scandal. Maclean’s vol120.5: p32 ProQuest Database URLhttp://proquest.umi.com.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/pqdlink?index=11&did=1219488 921&SrchMode=1&sid=4&Fmt=3&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&VName=PQD&TS =1189648507&clientId=12520(Accessed Sept 12th2007)

Pence Angelica (1999, Sept 13th): Cheating on rise in U.S. schools, study indicates. The San Diego Union Tribune, pg B 6: PRoQuest Database, URLhttp://proquest.umi.com.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/pqdlink?index=3&did=44650790 &SrchMode=1&sid=8&Fmt=3&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&VName=PQD&TS=11 89993919&clientId=12520 (Accessed Sept 12th, 2007)

Verschoor Curtis C. (2007 July): Who is Responsible for College Students Cheating?” Strategic Finance vol 89.1: p15 ProQuest Database URLhttp://proquest.umi.com.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/pqdlink?index=3&did=13069491 51&SrchMode=1&sid=3&Fmt=3&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&VName=PQD&TS= 1189648407&clientId=12520(Accessed Sept 12th, 2007)

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