More Research Links Cheating to Personality

Plus, Chegg and cheating in Australia. Plus, arrests for cheating in China. Plus, deliberate misinformation on "room scans."

Issue 149

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Machiavellianism, Psychological Well-Being, Perception of Peers and Punishments Drive Cheating

A study of 591 medical students from scholars in Portugal and Brazil confirmed a link between negative personality traits and academic misconduct while adding a few wrinkles.

The research from earlier this year was by Ana Cristina Veríssimo, Joselina Barbosa, Sandra F Gomes, Milton Severo, Pedro Oliveira, and Laura Ribeiro of the University of Porto (Portugal) and George AM Conrado, from the University of Pernambuco (Brazil).

The survey examined the dark triad of personality traits as well as “cheating-related” behaviors, which:

were assessed using an original Academic Misconduct Questionnaire (AMQ). Thirty-one items describe various types of academic misbehaviours, such as using hidden notes during exams, copying/allowing a colleague to copy an academic work, signing/asking others to sign attendance sheets when missing a class, copying ideas without referencing the source and obtaining/providing information about exams in advance.

Importantly, the survey also asked perceptions of peer conduct and perceptions of institutional penalties for being caught cheating.

Confirming previous research, the dark triad personality traits linked with academic misconduct, especially and significantly Machiavellianism (See Issue 115 and especially Issue 64 for more). From the new paper:

Fifth-year medical students who scored higher on Machiavellianism and psychological well-being and perceived greater peer fraud and lower severity of institutional penalty for cheating were more likely to report academic misconduct.

Of the three dark personality traits, Machiavellianism was the strongest and most significant predictor of academic cheating in this study.

What was new to me in this paper is the finding that psychological well-being (PWB) also connected to academic misconduct, especially, the researchers offer, among those who exhibit Machiavellianism or narcissism. That may be, they say, because:

Students with higher scores on PWB have a more positive self-perception, seeing themselves as more independent and competent, while also experiencing a greater meaning and purpose in life, personal development and satisfying relationships with others, compared to lower scorers. Machiavellian medical students who share these attributes may feel more confident in their ability to successfully conduct academic misbehaviour and/or, also due to their greater sociability skills, to help/ask others for help to commit cheating as a manipulative strategy to achieve their personal goals, disregarding the ethical costs.

That’s frightening.

Further, it’s not a surprise, but it is good to have on the record again, that:

Academic misbehaviour may also increase when students perceive a greater permissiveness towards cheating in their academic institution and a lower cost attached to their actions. In this study, perceived peer fraud was one of the strongest contributors to explain cheating, being positively associated with academic misbehaviour, while perceived severity of penalty was a negative predictor of cheating.

Interesting here that the study not only puts perception of peer cheating in the context of assumed disadvantage - I have to cheat to keep pace - but also in the context of institutional “permissiveness.” Which is to say that everyone is cheating, so clearly the school or program or professor does not care. Since we know that perceived permissiveness by professors or institutions is linked to misconduct (see Issue 66), it’s interesting to think of “peer cheating” as a proxy or perception maker for permissiveness. Frankly, I had not considered that.

Anyway - yes, students are more likely to cheat if they think their fellow students are cheating. And they are more likely to cheat if they perceive the penalties are light or lacking.

The authors of this study suggest:

The effective and consistent communication of academic integrity standards, through an ethics committee, ethics and academic integrity codes, where consequences for cheating are also clearly stated, alongside the implementation of a monitoring system to detect academic integrity violations, including cheating detection programs, are key to achieve that. Other preventive strategies, such as using appropriate assessment designs and increasing awareness and education on academic integrity may also contribute to disrupt the opportunity structure for misconduct.

Personally, it did not escape my observation that the authors frame communication and implementing monitoring systems to detect violations as “key,” while interventions such as assessment design “may also contribute.”

Chegg and Australia

An outlet in Australia called GreenLeft has a really strong article on Chegg and - surprise, surprise - cheating. It’s a suggested read.

It jumps off from the good reporting by the Australian Broadcasting Company on students using Chegg and other for-profit providers to cheat (see Issue 143). But from there, the piece goes on to examine Chegg’s fig leaf integrity policies and its shameful profits.

For example, there’s this:

An article from the College Guide Post is fairly unequivocal: “Chegg is cheating if you use Chegg Study in college to complete homework, answer quiz questions, or answer exam questions.”

(Is it really useful for anything else?)

I am aware the question is rhetorical but I will answer anyway - probably not.

The article touches on the recent action by the national regulator to block 40 cheating websites (see Issue 142). And the article continues:

The slant taken by Chegg CEO Dan Rosensweig is to shift the focus back to who he sees as the main culprit: the university itself. Traditional tertiary institutions, he stated in 2019, had to adjust to the on-demand economy and accept the binge-worthy nature of modern education.

Shocking, but true. He actually said that.

Finally the piece lands with two more little parts that are worth sharing. One:

Universities have always faced the problem of cheating. But the market of mass, corporatised education has also produced the means of its own subversion.

True. And I think it’s fairly well accepted at this point that one of the significant drivers of the shocking growth we’ve all seen in cheating is the rise of profiteers who are eager to sell shortcuts and misconduct in bulk.

And two:

The problem will not be resolved by simply targeting the likes of Chegg. A broader institutional approach is required and Australian universities have repeatedly shown they are not up to such challenges.

I don’t know and cannot say whether Australia’s schools are up to the challenge of addressing industrial cheating. If I think about it for a minute, I do think they are far better positioned than school elsewhere. But at the same time, I wish Chegg was being targeted. But it’s not - not at all, not in any way whatsoever.

Anyway, the article is a good read, a good review of what Chegg really is.

Disinformation on Room Scans and Proctoring

As I mentioned in the recent Special Edition on the Ohio “room scan” ruling, plenty of media outlets messed it up - declaring, for example, that room scans were now banned. If you are reading this you likely know that they are not.

I did not highlight any examples of media folks getting it wrong because, even though it’s literally their job to get it right, the case is complicated and requires context. An understanding of academic integrity practices is helpful. So, in a breaking news context, I give a little latitude. I hate it. But I understand it.

What’s less excusable in my view is the people who present themselves as experts but still get it wrong - so much so that you have to believe it’s intentional. And what’s really unfortunate is that the regular media quote these folks, taking their views as facts - when, well, they are not (see Issue 138).

I’ll highlight just one example - this spectacular piece of junk propaganda from an outfit called the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). Here’s their headline:

Federal Judge: Invasive Online Proctoring "Room Scans" Are Unconstitutional

Nope. “Room scans” are not unconstitutional.

And here are the first two sentences:

Online proctoring companies employ a lengthy list of dangerous monitoring and tracking techniques in an attempt to determine whether or not students are potentially cheating, many of which are biased and ineffective. This week, one of the more invasive techniques—the “room scan”—was correctly deemed unconstitutional by a federal judge.

From the jump, they clearly link the “room scan” with “techniques” that “online proctoring companies” use and say, again, that these were deemed unconstitutional. And, again, that’s wrong.

But more importantly, Zoom.

In the case in Ohio, the school did the “room scan” over Zoom - not a “proctoring company.” Come on. That’s a deliberate factual error and misrepresentation.

In fact, if you read the case, it’s possible to make the argument that had the school used an actual proctoring company to do the test setting scan, that would have been fine. But using Zoom, which allowed other students to see the student’s test environment, was a no-no. As it should be.

And another example - EFF writes:

Traditionally, the Fourth Amendment requires a warrant before the government can search in our homes, and that includes searches by government institutions like a state-run university. There are few exceptions to this requirement, and none of the justifications offered by the university—including its interests in deterring cheating and its assertion the student may have been able to refuse the scan—sufficed to outweigh that requirement in this case. 

Here you’re led to believe that the Judge said a warrant was necessary to do a “room scan.” EFF says the Fourth Amendment “requires a warrant” which includes state-run universities, and that the exceptions - to the warrant requirement - were not met by the university. The school’s justifications, EFF clearly says, did not outweigh the “that requirement” - of a warrant.

Maybe that’s just bad writing. But the fact is that the Judge specifically said a warrant was not required in this case. What EFF said or implied there is just wrong. Again.

Near the end, EFF backtracks somewhat saying:

As of yet, however, there has been no judgment or injunction, which means what specifically Cleveland State will have to do is not fully determined. 

Exactly. Nothing has been determined - not least of all that “room scans” are unconstitutional, as EFF declared anyway.

I could go on. But the piece ends with this:

We hope schools will recognize, in part thanks to this decision, that this element of remote proctoring is both unnecessary and invasive, and, at least for state schools, unconstitutional.

First, I’m not sure why schools would “recognize” that they have no need to know where a student is taking a test. I mean if controlling the test setting was unimportant, schools would not have test centers.

But it’s EFF’s hope that schools “recognize” that room scans are “unconstitutional” that is - once again - the problem. Let me say it again - they are not.

My point here is that supposed experts - people quoted by the media as experts - simply are not. They either don’t understand what they’re writing about or they’re overtly trying to mislead. I cannot say which it is. But I do think it’s important to put it on the record either way.

Arrests in China Over Leaked Exam

News in Shanghai is that three people - two parents and a printing company employee - have been arrested over a leaked entrance exam.

The article is behind a paywall and I did not want to subscribe to Caixin Global, so I did not read the entire article. Sorry. I am not sure that people being arrested for cheating in China is actually big news, to be honest. Show me someone arrested for cheating in the U.K. or in the United States and I’ll buy the subscription.

Anyway, three people in China were arrested for trying to cheat an exam. That happened.

Class Notes:

I was honored to give an interview recently on This Morning with Henry Shinn, a radio program in Seoul (TBS eFM 101.3). The topic was plagiarism. If you’re incurably bored, the clip is here on iTunes or here, directly. I make no assertion whatsoever that this will do anything for your boredom.