Trent Consultants News Epidemic Of Student Cheating Can Be Cured

“We know when kids cheat, why kids cheat and how kids cheat,” stated Eric Anderman, a recognized expert on student cheating and professor of educational policy and leadership at Ohio Say University.

“We know how to motivate kids so that they are much less likely to cheat. The only problem is that what we know about reducing cheating often isn’t place into practice in schools,” Anderman said.

Anderman discussed the latest research on cheating in schools and how to eliminate it during his presidential address August 8 at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association in Toronto.

Anderman is ending his term as president of APA’s Division of Educational Psychology.

There’s no doubt that cheating among students is widespread and has been growing. In some studies, up to 80 percent of high-achieving high school students and 75 percent of college students admit to cheating, a percentage that has been rising the past 50 years.

In one study, Anderman and his colleagues found that 21 percent of students who state that cheating is “unacceptable” still engage in cheating behaviors.

“What we know for sure is that students cheat a lot,” Anderman said. “Parents don’t think their kids will do it, but many do. I’ve seen that in my research, and also in the time I spent as a teacher.”

Studies have shown that boys cheat more than girls. Students with high-driving “Type-A” personalities are more likely to cheat. And there is tiny relationship between cheating and moral development, research shows.

New research by Anderman and his colleagues finds that students with impulsive tendencies are more likely cheat.

In two studies from 2004, Anderman and his colleagues found that cheating also tends to increase when students make the transition from elementary school to middle school, and then again from middle school to high school.

That’s not surprising, he said.

“During those transitions, instructors start changing how they speak to students. While early in school, instructors accentuate how learning is fun, as students get older instructors start saying things like ‘Now it’s serious. Your grades matter.’ That’s directly related to cheating,” Anderman said.

Anderman stated how instructors present the goals of learning in class is the key to reducing cheating. But this is the knowledge that is rarely place into practice in classrooms.

Research has consistently shown that cheating is more likely to occur in classrooms that focus on performance – getting the ideal doable grades, doing the ideal on tests.

Cheating is less likely to occur when the goal for students is “personal mastery” of the material – in other words, learning and understanding what is being taught.

Federal mandates under “No Child Left Behind,” with its emphasis on test scores, send exactly the wrong message to students and instructors and actually encourage cheating, Anderman said.

“These standard tests aren’t going to go away, but we don’t have to speak about them in the classroom as the eventual outcome and goal,” he said.

“This produces anxiety and stress in both instructors and students, and that’s what leads to cheating.”

Ironically, students might actually do superior if the focus in classrooms was on individualized mastery and not on the tests. Students will learn better, remember the material longer, cheat less, and still do just as well, if not better, when they do standard testing, according to Anderman.

Schools should work to help instructors change the goals in classrooms from test-taking to mastering the materials, and help them communicate effectively to their students.

“It doesn’t help when instructors always speak about ‘the test’ and reminding students that something ‘will be on the test.’ The goal should be learning, and not test-taking,” Anderman said.

“You can change the goal structure in classrooms. If you change that, you will likely reduce cheating.” Adapted from materials provided by Ohio Say University, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

Trent Consultants Psychology Clinic. Dedicated to the study, diagnosis, and treatment of mental, emotional and behavioral disorders. Trent Consultants has a variety of programs for parents who want to give their kids a headstart in life. Trent Consultants website www.trentconsultants.org Email: childcare@trentconsultants.org