Universities, high schools, and middle schools all embrace academic integrity – honestly presenting one’s work free of plagiarism, unauthorized collaboration, and falsified data – as fundamental to their enterprise. Yet recent studies have shown that cheating and other forms of dishonesty are rampant and increasing. “Ask a high school or college student about cheating,” writes Regan McMahon in the San Francisco Chronicle, “and before you can finish the sentence, the person will blurt out two things: ‘Everybody does it,’ and ‘It’s no big deal.’”

We have special experience with this issue here at Duke University where a 1995 self-study found substantial evidence of dishonesty across the university. Following the public release of these results, Duke set about experimenting with ways to reduce cheating and promote integrity. The Institute played a leadership role in the university’s strengthened focus on academic integrity, including through the creation of a new honor code and code signing ceremony. The results of a 2005 follow-up survey were both gratifying and puzzling: while there was less cheating in some areas, cheating persisted at significant levels in others.

Why some forms of cheating have declined, why others remain persistent, and how parents, schools, and peers influence academic and other forms of integrity remain unclear. Furthermore, there is some indication that trends in cheating are changing: some suggest, for instance, that stronger students looking to get ahead cheat as much as the weaker students once thought to be the prime offenders.

Institute Senior Fellow and behavioral economist Dan Ariely’s work has helped shed light on these questions and on the drivers of dishonesty in general. He conducted a number of experiments that tested the levels to which people cheat given a variety of circumstances. In some tests, he found that social elements affect dishonesty. When students were led to believe that another person from their institution was cheating, overall cheating increased. Knowing someone in their organization was being dishonest created a social justification for people to allow themselves to do the same.

In other experiments, Ariely asked participants to try to recall the Ten Commandments or sign an honor code before giving them a chance to cheat. After doing either of these things, participants did not cheat at all. Simply thinking about moral standards at the moment of temptation significantly changed their behavior.

Most efforts to promote integrity and to reduce cheating reflect philosophically-based strategies of ethical development. Yet we have relatively little scientific evidence to bolster such approaches. Ariely’s findings offer a new opportunity to address these deficiencies and provide an entry point for a new conversation between scientists and humanists.

Here at the Institute, we are bringing the philosophical traditions to bear on the kind of work behavioral economists and others are doing, allowing us to ask the big questions about the nature of integrity and how people actually behave. To that end, we’ve begun a new research project in collaboration with scholars from across the university, which brings philosophers, ethicists, economists, and social scientists together to explore what behavioral economics can tell us about integrity while simultaneously asking how historical, cultural, and philosophical conceptions of integrity influence scientific inquiry.

Specifically, we aim to

• expand the discussion of dishonesty to consider a broad range of situational and social influences
• create models of the individual decision process that are informed by psychology and neuroscience
• carry out a set of experiments to examine academic integrity and cheating
• conduct a series of surveys to understand the relationship between academic integrity and other forms of integrity
• propose and seek to implement new ways in which Duke and other institutions can reduce cheating and promote integrity

Beyond promoting academic integrity, our research seeks to explore whether or not academic honesty spills over into other areas of daily life. If a student is likely to cheat on an exam, does that mean he is also likely to cheat on his girlfriend, or lie to his parents, or fudge his qualifications on a job application? Is academic integrity similar to or different than other forms of integrity? If we can develop effective means of promoting academic integrity does that mean we are making students more honest across other domains of their lives?

Ultimately, we expect our findings to shed light on the relations among mind, heart, and will and to directly address whether and how integrity can be inculcated. As we immerse ourselves in these new avenues of exploration, we will continue our efforts to help foster higher degrees of academic integrity here at Duke. [See below.]

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The University has expanded the opportunities for exposure to the honor code, known as the Duke Community Standard (DCS), during students’ first days on campus in an effort to make discussions of integrity and academic honesty more meaningful and effective. Here are the various touchpoints that took place during Orientation Welcome Week 2009.

Tuesday:
Professor Peter Feaver, Dean Sue Wasiolek, and Honor Council Chair Adam Hinnant welcome the class of 2009 and explicitly discuss the DCS and expectations for new students.

Wednesday:
Expectations are reinforced from a community perspective by President Brodhead and Dean Steve Nowicki during the New Student Convocation.

Parents hear about the DCS and its academic implications in separate meetings with academic deans.

Academic advisors include the DCS in their discussions with groups of undergraduate students.

Friday:
Head Football Coach David Cutcliffe discusses the athletic community’s obligations to uphold the DCS.

Saturday:
Students participate in faculty-led tours during which all things Duke, including the DCS, are discussed.

Sunday:
Dr. Maya Angelou offers advice to new students; the DCS is discussed during her introduction. After her speech, students are invited to pledge their commitment to the DCS in a public signing ceremony outside Duke Chapel.