Introduction

Many see the rise in new digital technologies as a catalyst for change, one that provides new and innovative ways for enhancing learning and online collaboration, with the Internet providing access to an unprecedented amount of information across a variety of sources. However, there are growing concerns that a reliance on technology and the easy access to information may lead to the misappropriation of material and the promotion of academic malpractice, especially among undergraduate university students (Underwood & Szabo, 2004). Undoubtedly, technologically-rich environments promoting a wealth of information can help students to copy, share and paste material without any consideration towards academic integrity and originality of their own work. There is no doubt technology makes plagiarism easier but it also facilitates other malpractices as in the case of mobile phone support in the examination hall (Umarji, 2005). Indeed there are now websites giving helpful instructions on how to commit such a felony and advice on how to beat the system to achieve better grades in assessments.

Exploiting the Internet and online resources to plagiarize or to gain access to materials, whether these are off-the-shelf essays or simply bespoke products, presents only a partial picture (for a fuller review see Underwood, 2006). Technology also provides tools to detect malpractice of course: If plagiarism is easier to commit because of the Internet, it is also easier to catch because of the Internet (Purdy, 2005, p. 276). Many universities offer, indeed insist, that their students use text-comparison software partly as a means of engendering a strong sense of academic integrity across the student community. However, we know that the use of anti-plagiarism software does not always work and students can often cheat the system (White, Owens, & Nguyen, 2012). Research has focused on the institution’s use of such software and not what benefits the students may take from the experience. It appears that we are in a game of cat and mouse played by some tech-savvy students, aided by ‘free spirits’ against the educators and regulators, but who are the winners and who the losers? The key issue is whether the prevalence of academic malpractice represents students’ misunderstanding or misbehaviour, which is the key focus of this chapter.

What is Academic Dishonesty?

Defining academic dishonesty is easy but interpreting that definition has proved far more contentious. Let us start with a definition. Academic dishonesty is any action carried out to gain an undue advantage and includes cheating in examinations, colluding with other students and plagiarizing another person’s work. It is an intentional act of fraud, in which a student seeks to claim credit for the work or efforts of another without authorization, to use unauthorized materials or fabricate information in any academic exercise. Forgery of academic documents, intentionally impeding or damaging the academic work of others, or assisting other students in acts of dishonesty also fall under this definition and are considered to be misdemeanours (Gehring & Pavela, 1994). There are great variations in the types of academic dishonesty: simply ‘cutting and pasting’ online materials; using a few attributable sentences; purchasing or downloading articles from the Internet; engaging in discussion forums for the sole purpose of copying and pasting other people’s responses for inclusion in an essay; purchasing a ghost-written essay from an online provider (Selwyn, 2008); or stealing another student’s work online (Austin & Brown, 1999). These types of academic dishonesty, all indicative of misbehaviour or deliberate plagiarism, have become more prominent in recent years and are receiving a high level of media attention (Hughes & McCabe, 2006; Sendag, Duran, & Fraser, 2012).

One example of the media attention around open-access online resources concerns the software Grade.Guru.com, which was originally developed and promoted by McGraw Hill as a free knowledge-sharing network to facilitate the practice of collaboration, peer review and online study forums within the United Kingdom¹. However, despite winning an Effective Practice award in 2010 from the Sloan Consortium (Sloan-C) for revolutionizing digital ways of learning, the site was closed down in April 2010 for reasons that were not specified. The assumption within the educational community was that McGraw Hill felt their reputation would be in danger if it was seen to be promoting, albeit inadvertently, higher incidences of academic malpractice.

It is often perceived that plagiarism occurs when the writer deliberately uses someone else’s language, ideas or other original material without any clear acknowledgement of its source. The use of the word ‘deliberately’, however, causes much confusion. How do we know an act is deliberate? Who is to judge? These are two crucial but contentious questions that arise from the use of the term: whether this act is deliberate and whether our response as educators to issues of plagiarism significantly affects our response to such student misbehaviour and creates additional issues that continue to cause ongoing difficulties.

Prevalence Rates of Academic Malpractice

There is clear research evidence revealing an increase in student engagement with academic malpractice. There is no doubt that academic malpractice has become a significant problem within many higher educational institutions (e.g., Hart & Friesner, 2004; Hughes & McCabe, 2006; Moon, 1999; Sendag, Duran, & Fraser, 2012; Underwood & Szabo, 2004). While identified as a significant problem within many higher educational institutions as also prevalent in schools, although the research here is less extensive (McCabe, Trevino & Butterfield, 2001). Ofqual, the regulatory authority for national examinations in England and Northern Ireland has banned a range of technical devices such reading pens, mobile telephones, iPods and MP3/4 players from the examination hall. The Authority caught nearly four-and-a-half thousand students cheating in the 2009 GCSEs and A-levels examinations. According to Ofqual (2011): more than 1,300 penalties were issued to students during the summer 2010 examination series after they were found with a mobile phone or other banned device.

This is a global phenomenon cutting across cultures and education systems. For example, Moon (1999) found that 60 per cent of UK and US undergraduate students confess to some kind of academic malpractice. Findings corroborated by Underwood and Szabo (2004) who in their manuscript cite a number of studies, including work by McCabe (2005), who found a further indication of the extent to online academic misconduct within 4,500 schools. Among this sample, 74 per cent admitted to serious test cheating, 72 per cent serious cheating with written work, 97 per cent admitted copying homework while 15 per cent admitted taking term papers from the Internet and finally, 52 per cent admitted the deliberate copying of sentences from external web pages.

More recently, Akbulut, Uysal, et al. (2008) conducted two large-scale factor analyses to identify both the types of academic dishonesty and the reasons for students’ engagement in a representative sample of 249 undergraduate Turkish students. The first factor analysis identified five distinctive types of academic dishonesty (i.e., fraudulence, plagiarism, falsification, delinquency, and unauthorized help), while their second factor analysis revealed three issues that explain the reasons for students’ engagement in academic malpractice: individual, institutional pressures and peer pressure. In another study, Gulli, Kohler, and Patriquin (2007) quote figures of 54 per cent of students at the University of Guelph admitting to being involved in cheating. Further evidence comes from a large-scale US survey which found that 51 per cent of high school students admitted to cheating at least once in the previous year (Josephson Institute of Ethics, 2012). Measures of verifiable, rather than self-reported, behaviour show a lower but still disturbing prevalence of academic misconduct. In the United Kingdom some 15,000 undergraduates have actually been assessed as cheating in each of the three previous academic years (Brady & Dutta, 2012). In a New Zealand study, Walker (2010) found over 25 per cent of 1,000 undergraduate course scripts contained a measurable level of plagiarism, with 10 per cent of the scripts showing extensive copying of material.

The prevalence rates of academic dishonesty have increased over time. For example, the Center for Academic Integrity recorded a four-fold increase over a 5-year period in the number of undergraduates who used unattributed text excerpts from Internet sources to construct assignments (McCabe, et al., 2001). While Brown, Weible, and Olmosk (2010) note there is a shift from 49 per cent of undergraduate marketing students reporting academic dishonesty in 1998 to 100 per cent of undergraduate management students in 2000. Admittedly, this increase in online academic malpractice needs to reflect changes in subject area, but nonetheless this evidence provides a clear indication with regard to increases in academic dishonesty over time. This is not the whole story and there are findings that present a far more positive picture. Cases have been recorded of declining rates of malpractice and a growing student awareness of the serious nature of such behaviours. The Josephson Institute of Ethics (2012) similarly recorded a decline in students admitting to copying from 34 per cent to 32 per cent between the two academic years of 2010 and 2012. What message should we take from this conflicting evidence? The answer is one of hope. While cases of malpractice will continue to rise if no action is taken, there are steps that can be taken to halt the escalation of unacceptable behaviour. We will return to this shortly but first let us look at why such behaviours occur at all.

Why do Students Take the Risk?

There appears to be a general consensus around an increase in prevalence rates, but what about the students’ rationale, motivation and reasoning behind such engagement in dishonest academic practices? Is it all about the student or are we creating structures that encourage cheating? It is clear that some students are more resistant to poor behaviours than others and individual student characteristics may be central to encouraging or discouraging malpractice. Many authors have argued that students engagement in, for example, misuse of the Internet can be explained by a range of individual and personal backgrounds as well as other demographic variables, such as age, gender, and motivation (Seifert, Pascarella, et al., 2010). For instance, Internet-based plagiarism seems to be most prevalent among male students, who are relatively proficient in Internet searching (Selwyn, 2008; Sendag, et al., 2012; Underwood, 2006; Underwood & Szabo, 2004). This is certainly the case in Selwyn’s study, which surveyed 1,222 undergraduate students attending a UK institution and found that while at least three-fifths engaged in ‘moderate’ levels of online plagiarism, this was mediated by gender, subject discipline, and the student’s educational background. Gender is a key factor, with males being more likely to cheat than females (Jensen, Arnett & Feldman 2002; Underwood & Szabo, 2004) and academic ability another, with students achieving lower grade point scores being more likely to cheat (Straw, 2002). These are the more unequivocal findings in this rather confused area of research.

Students with high emotional stability and conscientiousness tend not to be involved in academic dishonesty (Etter, Cramer, & Finn, 2006) but a lack of self-control and an overall propensity to engage in deviant behaviour or risk-taking has been shown to lead to impulsive cheating (Underwood, 2003; Underwood & Szabo, 2004). We know that impulsivity, an individual’s inclination to act without forethought, coming to a decision very fast and having a low boredom threshold, (Barrett & Patton, 1983) has long been associated with problem behaviours such as cheating and gambling. An erroneous conclusion of this research would be to assume that malpractice is chaotic. There is evidence that self-control may lead to deliberate forms of cheating, particularly if the student assesses the risk of detection as being low and the rewards being high (Bolin, 2004). On the other hand, students who view such behaviours as serious breaches tend to have an ethical principle of doing no harm to others, and typically see themselves as idealistic and disapprove of engaging in high sensation-seeking activities involving alcohol, drugs and sex (Etter, Cramer, & Finn, 2006).

As well as self-control, there has been a link between individual personality factors and engagement in online cheating (Sendag, Duran, & Fraser, 2012; Williams, Nathanson & Paulhus, 2010). More recently, there has been an established link between narcissism and increased levels of engagement with academic dishonest practices. For example, it has been noted that narcissistic tendencies can encourage students to cheat (Menon & Sharland, 2011) leading to more rationalized cheating to secure higher grades (Brown, Budzek, & Tamborski, 2009). More specifically, having exploitative attitudes mediates the link between narcissism and academic dishonesty and one particular dimension of exhibitionism (Brunell, Staats, & Hupp, 2010; Menon & Sharland).

However, it is not simply personality factors, but also performance and time pressures, especially when poor organization is coupled with the desire to achieve irrespective of the consequences, which are potent drivers of academic dishonesty. In a recent study, Jones (2011) surveyed 48 undergraduates enrolled on a US online business communications course to assess their views on cheating and online plagiarism. He noted that while 92 per cent of these undergraduates either actually reported online plagiarism or were aware of someone who had committed the act, the most prominent reasons for plagiarism were to improve grades (92%), the result of procrastination (83%) and a lack of time to complete assignments (75%). Whitley (1998) argues that social norms that allow cheating and an individual’s own favourable attitudes towards cheating act together to encourage malpractice.

Many background factors have been found to influence students’ engagement in academic malpractice. If we start first with the subject discipline, then Gerdeman (2000) found that subject areas perceived as being of low relevance are more susceptible to cheating behaviour because of a lack of motivation to study. However, it is not simply motivational aspects that influence cheating, there are notable subject-level effects in the extent to which students report committing some form of academic malpractice or cheating (e.g., Sendag, et al., 2012; Underwood & Szabo, 2004). High status vocational subjects such as Law and Business Studies are particularly vulnerable (Hendershott, Drina, & Cross, 2000).

Perceptions of teachers and academic institutions lay attitudes towards plagiarism and academic malpractice, often influencing students’ engagement in plagiarism or academic cheating (Gerdeman, 2000; Murdock, Beauchamp, & Hinton 2008), which reduces the potential risk of being caught out (McCabe, 2005; Simon, et al., 2003; Underwood & Szabo, 2004). Moreover, the research also suggests that performance and time pressures may affect engagement with academic malpractice. The conclusions of a 2004 pan-European study confirms this low-risk assessment in that students do not believe tutors will detect their plagiarism and so they commit the act even when there are dire warnings of punitive penalties. It appears that when good grades are critical and competition is high, some students bow to the pressure to achieve and will use any route possible to ensure high grades (Bolin, 2004).

A final area is the social milieu, the context in which the students find themselves. This has profound effects on students’ behaviours as they seek social approval, respond to peer pressure to support a friend or simply join the crowd. For many, the benefits of using other people’s work through either copying from discussion forums or pasting from original research articles seem too appealing (Gerdeman, 2000; McCabe & Trevino, 1997). Anderman and Murdock (2007) have argued that competition is a toxic ingredient that fuels academic cheating and undermines intrinsic motivation. However, Orosz, Farkas, and Roland-Lévy (2013) have shown that acceptance of cheating and the degree to which the individual feels guilt have significant and direct effects on the propensity to cheat, while others have confirmed that feelings of guilt are the most effective deterrent of cheating (Diekhoff, LaBeff, et al., 1999). Perhaps a suitable step forward is to raise awareness of the principles of academic dishonesty and focus on the moral integrity of students.

Do they Know What they are Doing?

It has been argued that Internet facilitated plagiarism is so easy that students are unaware that they are cheating even when they express disapproval of such unethical actions (Kraus, 2002; Stevens, Young, & Calabrese, 2007). This inability to realistically self-evaluate their actions raises questions about our students’ understanding of right and wrong. Olson and Shaw (2011) conducted two studies with 4 and 5 years olds designed by to assess whether at this early age children have any understanding of the concept of ownership of ideas and the associated concept of plagiarism. They found that by 5 years of age children do show an awareness of the ownership of ideas by others and a dislike of the copying of those ideas. These studies suggest that 5 year olds have a moral compass that will guide them towards academic integrity so where and why do they lose that compass? Sadly there are many examples of the great and the good showing a cavalier attitude to another’s intellectual property not just within students but also among those receiving professional training (see for example, Jump, 2013). High profile and successful people including politicians, members of religious orders or members of the medical profession, all of whom have been caught cheating, are disturbing role models as they give a face-validity to unethical behaviour. There are many examples of the significant harm that is caused when individuals forget or ignore the effects of their dishonesty. A recent study of pharmacy and medical students has shown that this behaviour may not be confined to the classroom. In this study students who self-reported their cheating were also more likely to suggest unlawful solutions to a series of ethical dilemmas (Henning, et al., 2013).

To complicate the matter even further, there are academic disputes as to what counts as plagiarism. For some copying is not plagiarism but considered to be the careful accumulation of a body of knowledge. This cultural perspective is more prevalent in hierarchical educational environments where learning the ‘master’s’ thoughts is seen as an essential part of scholarship. In many, but not all, Western educational cultures the concept of the guru has largely disappeared but even here there is not a single response to malpractice. For some Western tutors plagiarism is an unintentional act resulting from students’ lack of knowledge and understanding of the required behaviour, while for others it is a deliberate act of malpractice designed to gain an advantage.

Many tutors show this ambivalence towards plagiarism. One grey area concerns responses by staff to intentional, as opposed to unintentional, plagiarism. Sutherland-Smith’s (2003) qualitative study found that there was a consensus among tutors that downloading texts from commercial sites or from a friend or another college was indefensible and needed to be penalized. However, there was a much more lenient view of unintentional plagiarism, although what this term actually meant to those staff members contributing to this research was somewhat vague. Coren’s (2011) findings on staff members’ responses to academic dishonesty are more disturbing as they are not a simple matter of setting clearer boundaries. Of faculty members, 40 per cent of those sampled admitted to ignoring student cheating on at least one occasion. While student reluctance to report malpractice is both known and possibly understood (Bilic-Zulle, Frkovic, et al., 2005; Underwood, 2003) the reluctance of individual staff members to highlight malpractice is far more disturbing as it hits at the heart of academic integrity. Coren went on to ask the obvious but necessary question as to why these staff members were exhibiting such reluctance? While a number of staff cited reasons such as insufficient evidence, low level of infringement or that it was a time-consuming activity, a more telling reason was that many tutors found the whole experience of dealing with acts of plagiarism unsettling as a result of the heightened emotional level and stress involved when confronting the student.

And the Solution Is?

Plagiarism is a major challenge for academia but also the wider world. So how do we stop it or more realistically reduce such activity? In a more detailed report Underwood (2006) suggested the three E’s approach to cheating and plagiarism: enlightenment, engineering and enforcement (after Hinman, 2002).

• Enlightenment: develop students who do not want to cheat. The rational and moral approach should always be the first line of defence against maladaptive behaviours. Work to foster students’ love of learning and understanding of their responsibilities as learners and members of the academic community For example, honour codes and contracts between students and schools have proved effective in reducing cheating.
• Engineering: the prevention approach reduces the opportunities to cheat and reduces the pressure to cheat. One simple solution is being innovative in the assignments set for students.
• Enforcement: the policeman approach in which behaviour is monitored to diagnose those at risk and also those indulging in malbehaviour.

A study at the University of Sydney found that a purely deterrent approach to reducing student plagiarism such as the use of detection software had relatively little effect (White, et al., 2012). However, a new approach, which helped students to understand what constituted plagiarism, proved to be far more effective. Their approach was to ask incoming students, some 1,300 participants, to read some text and construct from that text an appropriate paragraph in relation to a designated research question. Responses were tested using plagiarism detection software and were also assessed according to writing style, referencing and use of quotations. Examples of good and poor summaries fully annotated with comments were posted on the virtual learning platform along with a guide as to what constitutes plagiarism, a demonstration of the frequency of plagiarism, the ease of plagiarism detection and the penalties for plagiarism. In comparison to the year prior to this intervention, the subsequent formal assessments showed a significant fall in the number of ‘severe’ plagiarism cases following this holistic approach.

While plagiarism software fulfils the policeman role acting as a deterrent, designed to reduce the number of cases that require some level of formal action by the institution, Hunter (2012) argues it can also be a tool to aid student understanding of appropriate behaviour. We can encourage students to view the software as a formative learning tool that will engage them in a meaningful discussion about their understanding of key concepts such as intellectual property rights but also what makes a good piece of writing. Some argue that allowing students access to plagiarism detection software encourages them to defeat the system. There is a level of cynicism here but that does not mean these colleagues are wrong. Their views, even if in a minority, do support our argument that the policing of bad behaviour, while important, should not be a main form of defence against malbehaviour.

There is little doubt that academic dishonesty is a real, non-trivial issue and to ameliorate potential problems we need to have:

• Clear and transparent rules and regulations governing academic dishonesty. All interested parties need to have an agreed perception of what constitutes cheating. This agreement should not just be between teaching staff and students but also between tutors and the executive at all levels.
• Develop a culture of academic integrity that uses peer pressure for good rather nefarious purposes. Honour codes have proved to be highly effective in reducing malpractice.
• Design assessments that reduce the opportunity for malpractice.
• Policies must be practical and workable. Overly bureaucratic procedures will deter staff from taking action.
• Staff’s willingness to treat academic dishonesty as a serious but resolvable problem is the key to the successful implementation of any policy. Operating policies at the centre level, with a view to raising standards in centres, is less contentious than operating at an individual level.
• Support staff when they question student integrity but at the same time recognize that students have rights too. So the burden of proof must be necessarily high when dealing with individual student cases.

The way forward is necessarily a holistic approach which fosters and re-engages students and tutors with a love for the value of learning while excluding those conditions in which plagiarism has been allowed to flourish. We must also show less tolerance of malpractice by high profile societal role models. While cheating is seen as a low risk road to success some of our students will remain immune to our entreaties to take the ethical road.

Risks, Skills and Opportunities

The Internet provides access to a wealth of information, from e-books, journals, web pages to Wikipedia, and students are consistently moving beyond printed texts to online resources in order to support their learning activities. This provides a real opportunity for improving and sustaining learning and helps improve access to resources and information that can then support classroom learning. However, access to such material may not be wholly accurate and students have increased access to mistakes, misinformation and unreliable sources. This misinformation and inaccurate information is making its way into the classroom through students’ schoolwork. The prevalence rates of academic misconduct show no signs of abating and this can cause a real tension for teachers, educators and educational institutions. But the situation is not too dire. Despite a lack of teaching about how to judge the reliability of information online and insufficient knowledge about plagiarism and academic integrity (Bartlett & Miller, 2011), there are real possibilities to reduce academic dishonesty or acts of deliberate plagiarism. By developing a culture of academic integrity and providing clear transparent rules, the problem can be tackled head on. We know that plagiarism detection software, on many occasions, has relatively little effect so punishment may not be the best deterrent. Raising awareness of good academic values and the direct teaching about plagiarism through quizzes, reflective writing and tutorials are strategies that may show promise (Owens & White, 2013). As Flint, Clegg, and Macdonald (2006, p. 147) clearly suggest: staff, student and institutional perspectives on plagiarism should not be seen as three alternative and mutually exclusive categories but instead there is a growing need to change student, staff and institutional views about plagiarism, in a way which provides an integrated focus on informing students of the values and principles of good academic practice.

Conclusions

The current chapter has addressed a prominent issue within education, one that questions whether academic dishonesty is seen as a misbehaviour or merely a misunderstanding of what is required on the part of students. It is recognized that the Internet provides an incredible resource for teaching and learning, one that allows students access to materials far beyond those offered within the constraints of the classroom. However, this has presented a significant shift in education because it provides access to education for anyone who has Internet access. With this increased access to online resources, and often open access to inappropriate, misinformed and on occasion unreliable information, presents a real challenge to educators and institutions, not only in teaching students to become digitally literate but also in ensuring they do not use this material for ill-gotten gains. As we have seen, an individual’s propensity to cheat, whether this relates to their gender, academic background or personality factors, is highly influenced by environmental factors that can either encourage or surpass poor behaviours (Whitley, 1998). Many teachers themselves acknowledge their own lack of awareness about plagiarism and show reluctance to penalize students directly (Coren, 2011). This of course presents a complex issue with no easy answers. Any attempts to reduce or ameliorate academic dishonesty require a more focused, institutional-led approach that addresses not just the students’ own perceptions and intentions, but those of teachers and educators. Institutions also need to focus on teaching students about the values and principles of good honest academic practice. So any attempts to reduce academic dishonesty require a more focused approach that addresses not just the individual student’s perceptions and intentions but also those of staff members and the institution as a whole.