Content area
Full text
Abstract: Many recent studies has been indicating that academic dishonesty is more frequent in higher education, under the form plagiarism, cheating on exams, and copying assignments from other students. The present research aims to explore the relationship of personality traits, academic dishonesty and academic adjustment. The results showed that conscientiousness, honesty and openness were significantly negatively related to reports of academic dishonesty. Academic neuroticism was the most powerful predictor of cheating behaviours, while an overall high level of maladjustment predicted the positive attitudes towards academic cheating. The significant associations between academic adjustment and academic dishonesty confirmed previous research in the field.
Key words: academic dishonesty, personality traits, academic adjustment, use of Internet.
1.Introduction
Many recent studies indicating that academic dishonesty is more frequent in higher education, under the form plagiarism, cheating on exams, and copying assignments from other students. Some reports claim that 74% of high school students and 95% of college students are admitting to at least one incidence of cheating. Academic dishonesty could also be considered a form of academic maladjustment. Research on academic dishonesty has focused on the individual (age, gender, personality, motivation and academic engagement) and contextual factors (academic honour codes, penalties, in case of detection) related to dishonest behaviours.
The associations between the personality traits and the cheating behaviours are extensively discussed in the literature, the Big Five model being the most extensively used (Giluk & Postlethwaite, 2015; Nguyen & Biderman, 2013; Stone, Jawahar, & Kisamore, 2010). We focused in our study on the HEXACO model of personality (Ashton & Lee, 2009). The six HEXACO personality traits are defined as follows: persons with very high scores on the Honesty-Humility scale avoid manipulating others for personal gain, feel little temptation to break rules, are uninterested in lavish wealth and luxuries, and feel no special entitlement to elevated social status. Persons with very high scores on the Emotionality scale experience fear of physical dangers, experience anxiety in response to life's stresses, feel a need for emotional support from others, and feel empathy and sentimental attachments towards others. Persons with very high scores on the Extraversion scale feel positively about themselves, feel confident when leading or addressing groups of people, enjoy social gatherings and interactions, and experience positive feelings of enthusiasm and...