Academic Dishonesty in the Information Age Table of Contents

2020-04-07

Academic Dishonesty in the Information Age

Benjamin Park Computer Ethics CS-3111 Instructor: Prof. Timothy Colburn TA: Dale Dowling

Table of Contents

• Main Points • Motives for Academically Dishonest Actions • Definition of Academic Dishonesty • Cheating • Plagiarism • Forgery • Facilitating Academic Dishonesty • Conclusion: Solutions to Curbing Academic Dishonesty

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Motives for dishonest actions[1]

Culture of Competition Better grades / fear of failing Time constraints Everyone else does it! Where’s the honor code?

Main Points:

Can we tell the truth from falsehood? Unprecedented rate of diffusion of knowledge “Policy vacuum” for honor code

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Cheating

Facilitating Plagiarism Academic Dishonesty

Definitions of Academic Forgery Dishonesty[2]

Cheating on Exams and Assignments Statistics : : Entrance Examinations : : Paper Mills

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Are incidents of cheating on the rise?[3]

Rates of Cheating for U.S. High School and College students combined as a function of time

100

30 Self-reportedPercentage

0 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 Time

Self-reported cases of U.S. high school students cheating in exams for the previous year as a function of time since 1992[4][5]

60 Percentage ofStudents 55

50 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015 Year

Question: Have you cheated on an exam in the Albrecht, W. S., C. C. Albrecht, C. O. Albrecht, and M. F. Zimbelman. 2009. Fraud Examination, Third Edition. past 12 months? Percentage of people who said South-Western Cengage Learning. Ohio. “yes” Payne, C. “High school students cheating less, survey finds.” Source: Josephson Institute of Ethics USA Today. 25 Nov, 2012.

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Self-reported cases of U.S. high school students cheating in exams for the previous year as a function of time since 1992[4][5] Shift in focus on honesty and character 80

70 Leniency of definition 65 of academic integrity 60 among successive

Percentage ofStudents generations

50 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015 Year Note the baseline!

Academic Elitism

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Cheating Devices for Gaokao

Paper Mills and Test Banks

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“ Course Hero does not tolerate copyright infringement, plagiarism, or cheating of any kind. Anyone who misuses Course Hero to gain an unfair advantage; submits another member's content as their own; or violates any law, regulation, ethics code, or school code will be permanently banned from the platform. [11] ”

Individuals can now collect and build their own test banks

Cheat websites Google and directory climb[11] SQL injections Directory Traversal[12]

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Forgery Data Fabrication : : Data Doctoring : : Ghostwriting Services

GHOSTWRITING AND AUTHORSHIP VS

TRANSLATION SERVICES

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• Higher degree of anonymity than a pen name • Concealed identities of writers

CASE STUDY GHOSTWRITER FOR COLLEGE APPS

KANTIANISM : : ACT UTILITARIANISM : : SOCIAL CONTRACT THEORY : : RULE UTILITARIANISM : : VIRTUE THEORY

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Case study: A Researcher Caught in

Western Blot Scandal UPSIDE DOWN UPSIDE

Plagiarism Case Study of Melania Trump : : Five Workable Ethical Theories : : The efficacy of Plagiarism Checkers : :

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MELANIA 2016 2008 TRUMP STOLE

SPEECH! CASE STUDY WITH FIVE WORKABLE ETHICAL THEORIES: WAS HER ACTION JUSTIFIABLE?

CONTEXT FIRST…

Melania Trump is from Slovenia, which was formerly a Soviet Communist bloc.

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BP1

Soviet Union included Communist Slovenia, where Melania Trump is from.

50+% of the students self-reported Plagiarism in Universities located in Russia[20]

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BP1 Benjamin Park, 2020-04-07 2020-04-07

Reason for Approval of Plagiarism

• Countries that were formerly a part of the Soviet bloc consider intellectual properties as a part of communal resource, because when people contribute a new idea or a product, it is considered the property of the government.

The Prominence of China in the Greatest Number of Publications • The rise of China as a global leader in publications in academic journals is also associated with the rise of instances in plagiarism. • Communism is thought to have influenced a belief in intellectual property as a communal resource of the country[21] • Also, there exists a widespread practice of “imitating the master”[22]

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Despite these advances, academic dishonesty Although there had been efforts to eliminate it, still plagues the university. In the 1990s, the many universities have been hampered by academic dishonesty rates were as bad as, and academic dishonesty. Some claim that the rates in some cases, worse than they were in the of infractions of academic integrity increased 1960s.[11]:1 The acknowledgement of this ethics than they were 40 years ago. Scholars point crisis is inspiring many universities to focus toward establishing a proper moral compass, more on promoting common values of inciting many universities to define and practice academic integrity. – Wikipedia on Academic academic integrity. – Paraphrased version Integrity prepared by the presenter

PLAGIARISM DETECTOR Helping you to stay under the radar by giving you extra chances to redeem yourself

Just how effective are they?

Let’s put these detectors under scrutiny… PLAGIARISM DETECTOR Helping you to stay under the radar by giving you extra chances to redeem yourself

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DON’T STEAL MY WORK!

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Facilitating Academic Dishonesty The Impact of Social Networking Services (SNSs) : : Pirate Sites

High School Plagued by Academic Dishonesty[16]

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C H E C K L I S T O F TOOLKITS FOR THE HIGH SCHOOL CHEATER • Wolfram Alpha ✔ • Tutoring services ✔ • Private Facebook Groups ✔ • Calculator ✔ • Solutions Manual ✔

Do social networking services (SNSs) encourage students to cheat? • Telegram, Facebook Messenger, KiK, Snapchat, and so on could be vessels to transferring massive amounts of information, sometimes anonymously • In my previous undergrad school, some students formed a “homework club” on Facebook which was a subset of the volunteering student group (my personal experience at a different university) • Scanned pages of homework circulated in a community service fraternity

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Pirated Scientific Journal Articles and Library Genesis • Initially conceived as a part of repository for scientific journals, sci-hub is the largest online piracy sites that provides its users with free, previously purchased “paywall” scientific journal articles. https://sci-hub.tw/ • Libgen has developed to focus more on books. http://libgen.is/

Was the stockpile of pirated journals justified? • Kantianism: largely Yes, but depends. • Act Utilitarianism: Yes. • Rule Utilitarianism: No. • Social Contract Theory: No. • Virtue Theory: No. The general conclusion is that we should not pirate scientific journal articles.

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Conclusion and my thoughts

Conclusion

• Academic dishonesty is assuming many forms as technology is advancing towards multiple policy vacuums. These vacuums must be addressed as quickly as possible. • Incidents of academic dishonesty seem to have been increasing. We need measures to control these infractions, as well as filtering out disinformation; that is, we need to differentiate truth from falsehood. • As responsible citizens, we need to educate the public about the gravity of breaking academic integrity early.

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Our choice must be a combination of… [24]

Reactive Approach that Proactive Approach that punishes previous plagiarism prevents future plagiarism

Proactive Approach

• To get rid of paper mills, Instructors should take back exams after students are done taking them.[10] • As Misha Glenny said, applying “the shared values and standards” to early stage of academic life and a properly oriented “moral compass” could be important in guiding students to the right direction. • Elaborate rules and guidelines written in syllabus to raise awareness on cheating can be helpful, but orienting students in the right direction at a young age is even more important

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Proactive Approach, continued

• The country can gradually eliminate midterm exams from the high school curriculum • Give equal treatment, and remove comparisons • Create a collaborative learning environment like Finland, which scores consistently high on the PISA tests (an international standardized test to assess mastery of topics). [23] • Creativity cannot be born in rote memorization • Removing competition will hopefully curb rampant plagiarism • Replacing tests with active discussions does not necessarily equal removing high standards. Finland placed within the top ten for PISA scores.

Solutions to Problems and Preventive Actions against Academic Dishonesty • Teachers and professors must spell out the honor code on the syllabus and practice it strictly. [24] • The values of maintaining an ethical point of view must begin at a lower level of education

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Solutions to Problems and Preventive Actions against Academic Dishonesty • Follow University of Minnesota’s Absolute Scale for grading. • Implementing an absolute scale rather than a relative scale for grading so that students have fewer opportunities to engage in sabotaging and facilitating academic dishonesty • Students will become more collaborative and less cutthroat • Knowing that there is no such thing as a relative grading curve, students will (hopefully) realize that their performance will not affect others, and vice versa

Bibliography

[1] “Reasons Students Plagiarize or Cheat.” Academic Integrity, Rochester Institute of Technology, www.rit.edu/twc/academicintegrity/reasons-students-plagiarize- or-cheat. [2] “Homewood Undergraduate Academic Ethics Policy.” Policies & Guidelines, The Office of Student Affairs, studentaffairs.jhu.edu/policies-guidelines/undergrad -ethics/. [3] Jensen, L. A., Arnett, J. J., Feldman, S. S., and Cauffman, E. 2002. “It’s wrong, but everybody does it: Academic dishonesty among high school and college students.” Contemporary Educational Psychology, Vol. 27, p. 209–28. 229–241. [4] Albrecht, W. S., C. C. Albrecht, C. O. Albrecht, and M. F. Zimbelman. 2009. Fraud Examination, Third Edition. South-Western Cengage Learning. Ohio. [5] Payne, C. “High school students cheating less, survey finds.” USA Today. 25 Nov, 2012. [6] Moon, Louise. China's College Entrance Exam Is Tough, but Is It the Worst in Asia? South China Morning Post, 9 June 2018, www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2149978/inside-asias-pressure-cooker-exam-sytem-which-region-has-it-worst. [7] Smith, C.P., Ryan, E.R., Diggins, D.R.. “Moral decision making: cheating on examinations.” Journal of Personal and Social Psychology. Dec 1972. Vol 40, Issue 4. p. 640-60. [8] DeSilver, Drew. U.S. Academic Achievement Lags That of Many Other Countries. Pew Research Center, 15 Feb. 2017, www.pewresearch.org/fact -tank/2017/02/15/u-s-students-internationally-math-science/. [10] Wiede, Kate Vander. “Course Hero: Study Aid or Cheating?” Course Hero: Study Aid or Cheating? Arts & Sciences Support of Education Through Technology University of Colorado Boulder, www.colorado.edu/assett/articles/coursehero. [11] “How to Hack Your School's Server to Download Final Exam Answers.” Hack Like a Pro, WonderHowTo, 18 June 2013, null-byte.wonderhowto.com/how -to/hack-like-pro-hack-your-schools-server-download-final-exam-answers-0147465/. :: on how to download final exam answers [12] “How to Perform Directory Traversal & Extract Sensitive Information.” How To, WonderHowTo, 29 June 2018, null-byte.wonderhowto.com/how-to/perform -directory-traversal-extract-sensitive-information-0185558/. [13] Wei, Stephanie. How Your College Choice Affects Your Career. NerdWallet, www.nerdwallet.com/blog/nerdscholar/college-and-career-study/.

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Bibliography

[14] Oransky, Ivan. Remaining Zhiguo Wang Retractions Will Be in the Journal of Cellular Physiology. Retraction Watch, 20 Oct. 2011, www.retractionwatch.com/2011/10/20/remaining-zhiguo-wang-retractions-will-be-in-the-journal-of-cellular-physiology/. [15] “Melania Trump Faces New Plagiarism Row over Cyber-Safety Booklet.” BBC News, BBC, 8 May 2018, www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44038656. [16] Morin, Amy. Creative Ways That Teens Are Using Technology to Cheat. Verywell Family, 14 Aug. 2019, www.verywellfamily.com/how-teens-use-technology- to- cheat-at-school-4065364. [17] Reid, James. “Is Social Media Encouraging Students to Cheat?” The Educator K/12, 28 Nov. 2017, https://www.theeducatoronline.com/k12/news/is-social -media-encouraging-students-to-cheat/244150 [18] Roberts, J.A., Wasieleski, D.M. Moral Reasoning in Computer-Based Task Environments: Exploring the Interplay between Cognitive and Technological Factors on Individuals’ Propensity to Break Rules. J Bus Ethics 110, 355–376 (2012). [19] Nalepa, Monika. Melania Trump and the Culture of Cheating in Eastern European Schools. The Washington Post, 20 July 2016, www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/07/20/melania-trump-and-the-culture-of-cheating-in-eastern-european-schools/. [20] Chirikov, Igor, and Evgeniia Shveleva. “Does the University System Encourage Dishonesty?” Does the University System Encourage Plagiarism? University World News, 5 Oct. 2018, www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20181003110755919. [21] “China's Plagiarism Problem.” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 11 July 2012, www.forbes.com/2010/05/26/china-cheating-innovation-markets-economy -plagiarism.html#3251cbd678ea. [22] Gray, Gregory C. A Primer on Plagiarism: Resources for Educators in China. Taylor & Francis, www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00091383.2019.1569974.[j] “Social Networking Service.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 3 Apr. 2020 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_networking_service. [23] Hancock, Lynnell. “Why Are Finland's Schools Successful?” Smithsonian.com, Smithsonian Institution, 1 Sept. 2011, www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/why-are-finlands-schools-successful-49859555/. [24] McCabe, D. “It Takes a Village: Academic Dishonesty and Educational Opportunity.” Liberal Education, Association of American Colleges & Universities, 30 Dec. 2014, www.aacu.org/publications-research/periodicals/it-takes-village-academic-dishonesty-and-educational-opportunity.