Cheating

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Cheating

Cheating has seemingly become an everyday phenomenon in examsituations at most of Hungarian universities. Almost every student preparesfor the examinations making handy little bits of paper, contemplating onwhere to sit and, during the exam itself, the most sophisticated even usetheir mobile phones to surmount the numerous gaps in their knowledge. Dayafter day in the exam period stories such as the following circulate in thecorridors of the School of English and American Studies, as well as otherfaculties of ELTE and other universities in our country. It may seemsurprising, but the story is not fiction, in fact, a student at ELTE toldit to HVG last year. ‘I always elaborate on all the possible topics at homeand write them down on A/4 sheets of paper. My special ‘examination suit’has an A/4 size pocket. I always put the sheets into it, and, at theexamination I wait until the topic of the essay is given out, then pick theright sheet in my pocket, and hand that one in.’ 2.1. Research Questions Ischeating really such an everyday phenomenon as it appears to be? Ischeating so easy to manage? What about morals? 3.1. Theoretical BackgroundBrown, Earlam and Race reported in their practical handbook for teachersthat ‘Sitting written exams is one of the most stressful parts of life formany pupils’ (p. 44). The book also suggests that if candidates get awaywith cheating, it is going to be regarded as the teacher’s fault. Mostteachers feel uncomfortable when encountering cheating and they do notthink it is their task to prevent pupils from doing it. At least, they tryto minimise the possibilities by telling students to leave their bagssomeplace far from the desks, and before starting the exam they are

reminded to double check that they have nothing on their person that couldbe interpreted as a crib (Brown, Earlam & Race, 1995, p. 44). But there arealways a few who take the risk. ‘Better safe than sorry!’ – say studentsafraid of not knowing one single answer to the exam questions. This is whythey invented their own means, the ‘illicit aid’, as termed by teachers:the cheat-sheet. Students know hundreds of methods to avoid spending longhours preparing for examinations and tests. Of these, everyone can choosethe one which best suits his cheating skills and of course the aim.Cheating, in general, begins at senior primary school. The most widespreadmethods at this age are hiding small bits of paper (which contain allrelevant information) in their pockets, under the question sheet or intotheir pencil cases, and writing things on their palms. The creation of thesmall sheets is quite time (and patience-) –consuming as kids do not usecomputers to design these pieces. Writing on one’s hands is risky as thereis no way to remove the text when the teacher approaches suspiciously. Asyou can see now, these methods are quite elementary, easy to discover and,in fact, mostly done to amaze classmates rather than instead of learning.The next age group, 14-18 years old, uses more sophisticated methods.Modern technology is often of great help to the secondary school student:the computer edited A4 page can be reproduced on a much smaller scale.Experts on the topic say that the smallest font legible to the students’eyes is the 3 pt size. The laziest do not bother with typing, they simplyphotocopy the book at about 8 pages / A4 rate and cut the pages apart.University students prefer the ‘previously-written-essay method’, which isoften much more dangerous than the others, that is why they use those as
well. Everyone tries cheating once. After that, he decides whether it isworth it or not (Réka & Bunny, 1999). In September 1996 a research wascarried out at the University of Economics (BKE), Budapest for personalpurposes under the co-ordination of G. Vass (personal consultation, March3, 2000). A small group was interested in students’ opinion about honesty.Similar to us, the research group used a questionnaire as a measuringinstrument, which had, beside 45 others, 5 questions about cheating atuniversity examinations. They asked about 100 participants from differentfaculties to fill the questionnaire. However astonishing the results were,the research has not been published in any way. The first two questions onthe topic had four possible answers: ‘Always’, ‘Often’, ‘Sometimes’ and‘Never’. The first question concerning cheating was the most obvious one,‘Do you cheat in exam situations?’. The results showed that the vastmajority of the participants were ‘regular cheaters’, in fact, 12% said‘Always’, 53.5% ‘Often’, 26% ‘Sometimes’ and a strikingly low 6.5%proportion said ‘Never’. It must be noted, though, that cheating wasdefined as ‘making use of any source of information apart from thestudent’s own mind’. The second question of their questionnaire was ‘Do youget caught cheating?’. The answers partly explain the results of the firstquestion. Most of the students never get caught, the risks are minimal, ‘Sowhy not?’ – said youths at the University of Economics – ‘It’s much moreconvenient than learning.’. Table 1.a – Questions and results of the 1996research at BKE Question Always Often Sometimes Never Do you cheat in examsituations? 12% 53.5% 26% 6.5% Do you get caught cheating? 0% 5% 18% 77%The following three were Yes/No questions focused on the fact that cheatingis something dishonest, something that should not be done, a fact whichthey ought to be aware of. They were, as it was clearly shown by the
answers to the questions ‘Can you be proud of a mark which is the result ofcheating?’, ‘Do you feel uncomfortable when cheating?’ and ‘Would you saythat cheating is a ‘normal’ way of passing exams?’ (The answers given tothese questions are summarised in Table 1.b below.) Table 1.b – Morequestions and results of the 1996 survey at BKE Question Yes No Can you beproud of a mark which is the result of cheating? 8% 82% Do you feeluncomfortable when cheating? 62% 38% Would you say that cheating is a‘normal’ way of passing exams? 27% 73% The overall conclusion of thissurvey was that students at the University of Economics are not as honestas one would expect educated people to be but they are at least aware ofit. Another fact may be of some significance concerning the topic of ourresearch. It is the fact that Western European and U.S. Universities arenot experiencing the problem of cheating as a problem at all. Of course,their students do cheat sometimes, but so few of them and so seldom that itcannot be considered ‘general’. A quick survey of only one simple questionshows that, for example, at the Utrecht University only 3 out of 50students would risk cheating at an exam (personal consultation with TobiasKulka, March 6, 2000). Much the same is the situation at the MassachusettsInstitute of Technology (MIT). Of the 20 students asked only one personanswered that he does cheat sometimes at examinations (personalconsultation with Sarah Thomson, March 2, 2000). Unfortunately, thequestion ‘How can you manage so well without cheating?’ was not askedeither in Utrecht or in Massachusetts – in fact, Hungarian students mighthave made good use of the answers for that. 4. Method 4.1. Participants Asour research group was interested in the opinions of students as well asteachers, so there were two target groups of the survey. On the on hand,
the students at ELTE – SEAS irrespective of what year they are or whetherthey are students at the Dept. of American Studies, the Centre for EnglishTeacher Training or the Dept. of English Studies. On the other hand, therewere the teachers at these departments. The only criterion was that everyparticipant should have taken part in some examination at SEAS. All in all,40 people took part in the survey, 12 teachers and 28 students. It is arelatively low proportion of the total number of teachers and students;therefore it cannot be considered a representative research. 4.2. MeasuringInstrument As a measuring instrument our research group chose thequestionnaire. Some features of this instrument are of great importancewhen dealing with a question of such great nicety as the one when a personhas to provide information about his own uprightness. One of these featuresis anonymity, which obviously facilitates being sincere, and another one isthe time factor. Using a questionnaire requires much less time than anyother method in research. More people can answer the questions at a time,and participants can take their time answering the questions. If someonewants to, he can take the questionnaire home to fill it at a later time andthen give it back. This also promotes honesty: it is always easier to behonest when nobody is paying attention. An interviewee asking the samequestions in person would have resulted in completely different results, asparticipants would have answered affected by public opinion. Twoquestionnaires were used for data collection; both are included in theAppendix section. The two variants, the Students’ Questionnaire and theTeachers’ Questionnaire share many features. In fact, the only differencebetween the two is that four questions that do not refer to teachers wereleft out and replaced by others. Both versions consist of ten questions.
Four of them are yes/no items including sometimes an ‘I cannot decide’option; there are some questions referring to frequency or proportion, andone multiple-choice question. The last item of both variants is an open-ended question where a short (five-line) answer was expected but, in fact,only 3 of the participants answered that one. Apart from this drawback,choosing the questionnaire as our measuring instrument was a good choice.(See Appendix A & B for the two questionnaires.) 4.3. Procedures of datacollection We began data collection with the students. They were all veryhelpful and enthusiastic; no one refused filling in the questionnairebecause, as one of them told us afterwards, ‘it took only about fiveminutes and when I saw the topic I got curious’. It took only two days tocollect the 28 questionnaires. The situation with teachers was quitedifferent. It was rather difficult to find them and they were not ashelpful as students. I cannot believe that they do not have five minutes tofill in such a questionnaire. Most of them were mannerly, though, they tookone and promised to bring it back later. But this way out of the 20questionnaires we distributed we got only two back. We managed to collectthe other 10 by standing beside them while they filled it. It was rathersurprising that generally about 15% of the teachers had the willingness tohelp us in this research. 4.4. Procedures of data analysis Apart fromsummarising the collected data and reckoning the percentages, there weresome interesting results that we further analysed. In some cases teachers’and students’ general opinion was much the same, in others they were incontrast. These cases required further analysis, the results of which shallbe discussed in the next chapter. 5. Results and discussion 5.1. What ischeating? Why do students do it? Question 1. – How detailed is the material
students have to learn for a SEAS examination? One participant told us, ‘Ionly cheat when the material is too detailed. Dates and other small detailsare rather hard to memorise and quite easy to confuse. Stress mixes me up.’The aim of the first question was to find out whether the students thinkthey have the argument ‘material is too detailed’ as a bogus excuse forcheating. The teachers’ questionnaire included this question as well tocheck if there is a contrast between the two opinions. It occurs sometimesthat teachers do not realise how much they overload students; this oftenabets cheating. But that does not seem to be the case at the SEAS. In fact,the responses of the two groups are quite parallel. Most of both students(68%) and teachers (59%) told us that what students have to learn is ‘quitedetailed’, and only one teacher and three students think the material is‘very detailed indeed’. The only significant difference between answers’ ofthe students that no student chose ‘not detailed at all’ which was theopinion of only one teacher, and, the answer ‘very detailed indeed’ waschosen by only 11% of the students and no teacher. (See Diagrams 1/ Student& 1/ Teacher below.) Question 2. – What is cheating? Everyone thinks aboutcheating differently, according to their values. Some consider every littlething illegal, even ‘looking at the neighbour’s paper’, which I cannotaccept. It is a psychological fact that a person is not able to look in thesame direction for hours. Looking at the neighbour’s paper not alwaysserves ‘cheating purposes’. Some argue that it is just a compulsivemovement of the eye because it is not used to situations when part of itsfield of sight is visible but should not be focused on. However, this
activity is considered cheating by most participants (77%). The mostcontroversial result was that more than 60% of the students said ‘asking aneighbour a question’ is not cheating but taking a look at his sheet is.‘Using a pre-designed cheat-sheet’ is considered cheating by allparticipants. But it is also a good way of preparing. If one has written acheat-sheet he has half learned the material. The rest of the results arerepresented in Diagrams 2/ Student and 2/ Teacher below. 5.2. Is cheatingan everyday phenomenon? Question 3 – How many cheat? The third questionreferred to the proportion of cheaters at an average written examination.Exactly it was ‘Imagine a written examination where 100 students take part.How many of them would you expect to do any of the activities mentioned inthe previous question?’ There were six possible choices: ‘no one’; 0-25; 26-50; 51-75, 75-99 and ‘all of them’. In this question the teachers were muchmore optimistic about the possible proportion of cheaters. The vastmajority estimated the average number of them between 0 and 25.Nevertheless, the students’ opinion may be closer to reality as they arethe ones who ‘live’ it. Many of them (43%) said 26-50, but 76-99 was alsoestimated by 25%. The other three variations were less frequent. Thisdifference between the teachers’ and the students’ estimation can beaccounted for in two ways, One possible explanation is that teachers arenaive or they just do not see people cheating; the other is a bit morecomplicated. A story about a lucky cheating goes round the corridors of thebuilding, changes several times. When somebody was not cheating, that isnot a story. Much is heard of cheaters; this might explain why studentsthink more people are cheating at examinations. (See Diagrams 3/ Student &3/ Teacher below.) Question 4.a – How often do YOU cheat? (Included in
Students’ Questionnaire only) In this question we tried to check howrealistic the estimations of students were about the proportions; thisrequired some mathematics. A student has an average of three writtenexaminations per semester. Lets say that people who never cheat (I do notbelieve such a person exists) cheat on no exam out of the three. The peoplewho said ‘seldom’ do it once, and those who told us ‘quite often’ do it twotimes. Nobody said that he always cheats but that is also relative. If 11%cheats on one exam and 75% on two exams out of three, that means on anaverage exam one third of the 11% (which is 3.7%) and two thirds of the 75%(which is 50%) cheat. That makes a total of 53.7%, which means that thestudents were closer to reality when estimating the number, not theteachers. But this also suggests that the gap between the teachers’estimations and reality, which is at least 28.5%, are those who cheatunnoticed. Further analysis reveals that more than half (53%) of thecheaters remain unnoticed. 5.3. Is it easy to cheat? Question 4.b – Whenyou were a student, did YOU do any of the activities listed in 2) above?(Included in Teachers’ Questionnaire only) It seems, according to theteachers’ answers, that decades ago cheating was a much less commonphenomenon than it is today. Only ‘looking at a neighbours’ paper wassomething most students (83%) done. Using pre-designed cheat-sheets was nota possible method for the students at that time. There was only one teacherwho admitted using one. For the results see Diagram 4.b/ Teacher. Question5.a – Would YOU do any of the activities listed in 2) above? (Included inStudents’ Questionnaire only) Looking at the neighbour’s paper is the mostcommon method which students use. 71% said they would do it when in need.
Asking a neighbour a question is less common, but still many students (60%)risk it; the third most popular method, which is used by 46%, is the pre-designed cheat-sheet. This suggests that students consider ‘looking at theneighbours’ papers’ the least risky. Question 5.b reveals that teachers seethis differently. Question 5.b – Which one of the above could a studentactually do? (Included in Teachers’ Questionnaire only) Teachers estimatedthat 92% of students could use a pre-designed cheat-sheet; 83% could lookat the neighbour’s paper and 67% ask a neighbour a question, which meansthat students consider some of the methods less risky. Teachers think thatthe situation today is best for the cheat-sheets instead of looking at theneighbour’s paper. Maybe youths should change their methods according tothese results. See diagram 5.b/ Teacher. Question 6.a – Do you think any ofthose activities are accepted by teaches in general? (Included in Students’Questionnaire only) There is a common opinion among students that there aresome teachers who think cheating is the attribute of examinations. In fact,there are teachers in every school who pretend they have not noticedanything and students do whatever they want to. They do not do anything toprevent cheating. Question 6. in the Students’ Questionnaire refers to thisproblem, and the results are rather interesting. The answers show thatstudents are still ‘afraid of’ being caught. Only 43% said that there aresome teachers who might accept looking at the neighbour’s paper. More-evidently-cheating methods have really low percentages such as 7% and 10%.Consequently, if the students still fear, the situation may not be so bad.Question 6.b – How often, in exam situations, do you encounter cases whenteachers overlook cheating? (Included in Teachers’ Questionnaire only) Theaim of this question was finding out teachers’ opinion of their colleagues.
Surprisingly, most teachers (59%) claimed that they face such situationsquite often. But, as you will see in question 7. (See diagram 7.b/Teacher.), only one third of these people admitted doing it ‘quite often’.It does not seem very likely that they lied about their experience;instead, they might not have been honest about their own behaviour. (Seediagram 6.b/ Teacher.) Every teacher faces situations when he knows one’sreasons for cheating and understands them or he simply does not care andlets students do it. The easy way to account for this is obviously bysaying ‘they cannot cheat me, only themselves’. Theoretically it is rightbut what about morals? This behaviour on the part of the teacher oftenresults in students thinking cheating is the way. They will never learn itthis is not the method to cope and will go out into ‘real life’ in thebelief that cheating is a normal and accepted way of solving problems.Question 7.a – How often so students see teachers overlooking cheating?(Included in Students’ Questionnaire only) It is interesting to note herethat students are rather critical concerning this question. He, who hasonce been caught, will remember every other case when someone else iscaught and thinks of the problem differently from others. Most students(68%) said that teachers are seldom so generous, generally they punish thecheater instead of ‘not noticing him’. (See Diagram 7.a/ Student.) Question8. – Why do you think students cheat? Strikingly, answering this question,all except for two students admitted that ‘They are too lazy to learneverything for an examination’, which was in fact the opinion of everyteacher. Many students also chose ‘They have to many examinations’ and‘They have too much to learn for one particular examination’ but themajority was honest enough to us and also to themselves that the case is
simpler than anyone would expect it to be. Being lazy is not the teachers’fault; it is something isolated from any other factors, and also maybe theonly thing that depends entirely on the student himself. 5.4. What aboutmorals? Question 9. – Do you think cheating is sin? It is not surprisingthat all teachers, except one, claimed cheating is sin. Students regardthis question differently, which indeed causes some controversy. We arguedin the previous questions that students are generally afraid of gettingcaught cheating, which is, psychologically speaking, an indication thatthey are aware of its being bad. But if they know it, why then do they saythat it is not sin? Majority of the students say so, as Diagram 9.a/Student below indicates. 6. Conclusion The aim of this research was to findout how widespread cheating in the School of English and American Studiesis, and what people think about it. We agreed that the main reason forcheating are the numerous details in the material. Teachers and studentsboth think that the material students have to learn for a SEAS examinationis ‘quite detailed’, which suggests that quite many people use such illegalmeans as a cheat-sheet in exam situations. 6.1. Is cheating so common as itseems to be? At an average written examination 53.7% of the participantsuse illicit sources such as the neighbour’s paper, which is almost the samenumber as the number of those who ‘often’ cheated at the University ofEconomics in 1996. Of the cheaters about 28.5% remains unnoticed everytime. 6.2. Do students find cheating difficult? ‘Looking at the neighbour’spaper’ or asking him a question are the methods, which the majority of thestudents would use in exam situations. According to the teachers, themethods which a student could actually do are ‘using a pre-designed cheat-
sheet’ and ‘looking at the neighbours’ paper’ rather than the others. Thereare students who think some teachers do not mind cheating at their exams.42% of them consider ‘looking at the neighbours’ paper’ is ‘permitted’ bymany teachers. What is more, 59% of the teachers even admitted that theysometimes do look over cheating. 6.3. What about morals? In the light ofthe results discussed above we can say that most of the students do notthink of cheating as sin, whereas teachers do. But neither group seems tobehave according to their opinions. Teachers, 92% of whom believe thatcheating is sin, sometimes pretend not having seen anything and letstudents do it. Students in general do not regard cheating as sin but whenthey say that there are teachers who allow it, they question teachers’ .The psychology of the situation is obvious: Students do not want to admitthat what they do is wrong, that is why they say it is not sin but theyfeel it inside. It is always more comfortable not to accept morals but forman opposition against the authorities. Students reinforce each other in thebelief that cheating is really ‘not that bad’, inducing this way a falseidea that makes them feel more comfortable while being aware of doingsomething they should not do. This way, students and teachers complementeach other; there is no clash of interests in this case. Students want tominimise their efforts and choose the easier way; teachers want to avoidconflicts and walk along as if everything were all right.