ACADEMIC DISHONESTY IN WRITING FORUMS 1

As availability and accessibility increases, many students are opting to take more courses

online. In Students’ Perception and Behavior of Academic Integrity: A Case Study of a Writing

Forum Activity the researcher not only studied the students’ perception of academic dishonesty

but also behavior when posting to a forum and why students participate in academically

dishonest activities.

Students in an English learning class were given a survey and asked to deem activities as

not cheating, a minor violation, or a major violation and were assessed on whether or not they

participated in a dishonest activity in the forum. Of the ten listed activities, the majority of

students surveyed said that taking another student’s work to post, copying all work from an

academic source, and preparing content for another student were major violations whereas

adapting content from another student, receiving unauthorized aid, reusing their own ideas again

to post in a different topic, and copying some sentences from academic work were not cheating

(Ekahitanond, 2014). Of the listed dishonest behaviors, students most often participated in

copying some sentences from academic sources and least in copying all sentences from academic

sources (Ekahitanond 2014). Students who engaged in misconduct mostly did it to ensure

getting good grades or due to an overwhelming amount of assignments (Ekahitanond, 2014).

These findings are significant to my discipline as within language learning students often

find ways to make it easier, often by dishonest means. This information tells me that I should

use online writing forums in the target language to engage students in current vocabulary and

grammar structures, so as to deter dishonest activities. I would also grade based on participation

and effort rather than accuracy within the forum to encourage authentic work as well as offer as

much feedback as possible on formal assessments and stress the importance of having students

do their own work in order to increase proficiency.

ACADEMIC DISHONESTY IN WRITING FORUMS 2

References

Ekahitanond, V. (2014). Students’ perception and behavior of academic integrity: A case study

of a writing forum activity. Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education, 15(4), 150–

161. Retrieved from

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