Effects of classroom context on university students’ judgments about cheating: mediating and moderating processes

Abstract

Hypothetical vignettes were used to examine the effects of classroom context variables (pedagogical quality and classroom goal structure) on undergraduate (study 1) and graduate (study 2) students' judgments about cheating. Consistent with attribution theory and previous findings, poor (versus good) pedagogy and performance (versus mastery) goals structures resulted in more teacher blame and less student blame for cheating, and cheating was rated as more acceptable and more likely in these situations. Participants' own prior cheating history but not their experience as a classroom teacher also affected these judgments. Relations between classroom context variables and assigned blame for cheating were mediated by students' assessments of the fairness of the classroom situation.

Student or situation? Personality and classroom context as predictors of attitudes about business school cheating

“…We chose methodology previously introduced by Murdock et al (2004Murdock et al ( , 2007, utilizing classroom "vignettes" that presented four conditions: mastery culture/good pedagogy; mastery culture/poor pedagogy; performance culture/good pedagogy; performance culture/poor pedagogy.…”

“…Their confidentiality was ensured by asking them to create a personal, numerical code to use on both questionnaires. The first survey included personality measures (using Oliver P. John's 44-item Big Five Inventory); the second randomly presented one of four vignettes (Attachment A, from Murdock et al 2007Murdock et al , 2004 describing classroom culture (mastery vs. performance) and pedagogy (good vs. poor).…”

“…If students believe their instructor cares about learning and takes teaching seriously, they are less likely to "blow off" the experience, see learning as important, and are less likely to cheat. Murdock et al (2004Murdock et al ( , 2007 see this phenomenon supported by attribution theory (Weiner 1995): When students perceive that their bad experience in a classroom is the fault of the teacher, they are more likely to attribute their poor performance to the teacher than to themselves (Murdock et al 2004), thus justifying cheating to get ahead. Further, students may rationalize their cheating behavior and "neutralize" it by attributing its cause to something external, such as the teacher's performance (LaBeff et al 1990;Murdock et al 2007Murdock et al , 2004.…”

“…rather than mastery-focused (based on intrinsic achievement such as learning the material; Murdock et al 2007Murdock et al , 2004Nichols and Subramaniam 2001;Nichols and Berliner 2007). Indeed, it has been proposed that cheating across our society has increased in proportion to the degree to which large economic gains can be made by only a few individuals, increasing the stakes of "winning" (Callahan 2004).…”

I Did Cheating, Because… : A Phenomenological Study

“…Öğretim elemanları ile öğretimsel etkinliklerin niteliğine ilişkin algıların da kopya çekme ile ilişkili olduğu diğer araştırmalarda da (Ersoy ve Özden, 2011;Murdock, Miller ve Goetzinger, 2007) (Akbulut ve diğ., 2008b;Ersoy ve Özden, 2011;Malgwi ve Rakovski, 2009;Minarcik ve Bridges, 2015;Teodorescu ve Andrei, 2009 Özellikle öğretim elemanlarının öğrencilerin etik olmayan davranışlarını neden görmezden geldiklerinin incelenmesi gelecek araştırmacılar için bir gündem olabilir.…”