Business schools and cheating

http://chronicle.com/daily/2009/02/11172n.htm?utm_source=at&utm_medium=en

Turns out that Business students are more likely to cheat than other students, in part because Business School cultures seem not to demonstrate as much concern about these issues as other academic cultures do.

Interestingly, I was just reading about prisoner dilemmas (where it’s in people’s individual interests to cheat, even though when all cheat, it hurts the group as a whole). These are also known as “tragedy of the commons.” After lots of study by game theorists, the “rules” to help restrain such cheating are five.

1) Make sure it’s clear who is “playing the game” (in this case, the students).
2) There must be clear rules about what is permissible and forbidden actions (not always easy in the digital age).
3) A system of penalties for violation of these rules must be clear and understood by all. These penalties should also be graduated (no “one strike and you’re out”) because there’s often a lot of room for “error” in any system.
4) A good system to detect cheating must be in place (if possible so that the group involved can help police itself automatically). Sometimes, this means that the rules on what is forbidden may need to be written more according to what can be detected.
5) Use the “users” to help create the rules, because while they all may have an incentive to cheat, they also all have an incentive to design a good system up front.