An Exploration of Academic Ethics in College

An Exploration of Academic Ethics in College

For the subject of this field observation paper I have chosen to observe the social concept of cheating at the collegiate level. More specifically, I am attempting to explore the influence of situational ethics on cheating. I chose this topic because I have experienced many different views on cheating during my academic career, but I have never been able directly surveyed my peers on their views and positions on cheating. For my observation I am going to be surveying a group fifteen students who live in my dorm at Vista Del Sol as well as fifteen random students from around the ASU campus.

Prior to this observation I had many expectations about the outcome of my study. My first expectation was that when confronted about cheating; the majority of students would admit to cheating, at one point or another, during their time in college. I based this expectation on many of my own personal experiences in college, as well as the information that I obtained through an article by Donald McCabe in our course text. In his article McCabe includes statistics from a survey done in 1990 about cheating in college that shows over sixty seven percent of college students surveyed admitted to cheating at least once as an undergraduate student.

Secondly I expected to see a brotherhood of sorts among students, wherein I expected to see students refraining from turning in others that they caught cheating, because they sympathize with the offenders. This expectation was based on many things including personal experiences where I have ignored signs of other cheating in classes I have been in, Movies where students band together to beat the “man” by organized cheating on tests, and -of course- the textbook where McCabe states that only four percent of the students surveyed would turn in another student for cheating.

The last expectation that I had before starting my observation was, that when I asked the students who already admitted to...