Influence of attitudes toward curriculum on dishonest academic behavior.
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OBJECTIVES: The objective of this study was to examine possible associations between students' self-reported behaviors and opinions towards academic dishonesty, and their attitudes towards curriculum, assessment, and teaching within the pharmacy program. METHODS: A questionnaire was developed and distributed to undergraduate (pre-licensure) students at 4 schools of pharmacy in Canada, including students enrolled in the international pharmacy graduate program. RESULTS: More than 80% of respondents indicated they had participated in one or more of the act of academic dishonesty described in the questionnaire. A weak to moderate correlation was found between students' attitudes towards pharmacy education and their self-reported behaviors related to academic dishonesty. CONCLUSIONS: This study confirmed previous findings suggesting widespread academic dishonesty as well as a hierarchy of values with respect to students' perceptions regarding severity and importance of academic dishonesty. Despite methodological limitations inherent in examining academic dishonesty, there is a definite need to continue to examine this important issue. While this study indicated only a moderate correlation between attitudes towards curriculum and dishonest behaviors, the problem of academic misconduct is multifactorial and will require ongoing study. (+info)
Characteristics, prevalence, attitudes, and perceptions of academic dishonesty among pharmacy students.
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OBJECTIVES: To ascertain background factors that influence pharmacy students' willingness to cheat, describe attitudes regarding methods of cheating, assess prevalence of cheating and determine atmospheres that may aid in preventing academic dishonesty. METHODS: Third-professional year PharmD students at 4 institutions participated in a survey administered by a class representative. RESULTS: Of the 296 students who completed survey instruments, 16.3% admitted to cheating during pharmacy school. Approximately 74% admitted that either they or their classmates had worked on an individual assignment with a friend. Students who cheated during high school or in a prepharmacy program were more likely to cheat during pharmacy school (p < 0.0001). Those who possessed a bachelor of science (BS) degree prior to pharmacy school were less likely to cheat (p < 0.0001). CONCLUSIONS: Academic dishonesty is prevalent among pharmacy students. While few respondents directly admitted to cheating, many admitted to activities traditionally defined as dishonest. (+info)
Repeated questions, deception, and children's true and false reports of body touch.
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Four- to 7-year-olds' ability to answer repeated questions about body touch either honestly or dishonestly was examined. Children experienced a play event, during which one third of the children were touched innocuously. Two weeks later, they returned for a memory interview. Some children who had not been touched were instructed to lie during the interview and say that they had been touched. Children so instructed were consistent in maintaining the lie but performed poorly when answering repeated questions unrelated to the lie. Children who were not touched and told the truth were accurate when answering repeated questions. Of note, children who had been touched and told the truth were the most inconsistent. Results call into question the common assumption that consistency is a useful indicator of veracity in children's eyewitness accounts. (+info)
What does the brain do when you fake it? An FMRI study of pantomimed and real grasping.
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Given that studying neural bases of actions is very challenging with fMRI, numerous experiments have used pantomimed actions as a proxy to studying neural circuits of real actions. However, the underlying assumption that the same neural mechanisms mediate real and pantomimed actions has never been directly tested. Moreover, the assumption is called into question by neuropsychological evidence suggesting that real actions depend on the dorsal stream of visual processing whereas pretend actions also recruit the ventral stream. Here, we directly tested these ideas in neurologically intact subjects. Ten right-handed participants performed four tasks: 1) grasping real three-dimensional objects, 2) reaching toward the objects and touching them with the knuckle without hand preshaping, 3) pantomimed grasping in an adjacent location where no object was present, and 4) pantomimed reaching toward an adjacent location. As expected, in the anterior intraparietal area, there was significantly higher activation during real grasping than that during real reaching. However, the activation difference between pantomimed grasping and pantomimed reaching did not reach statistical significance. There was also no effect of pantomimed grasping within the ventral stream, including an object-selective area in the lateral occipital cortex. Instead, we found that pantomimed grasping was mediated by right-hemisphere activation, particularly the right parietal cortex. These results suggest that areas typically invoked by real actions may not necessarily be driven by "fake" actions. Moreover, pantomimed grasping may not tap object-related areas within the ventral stream, but rather may rely on mechanisms within the right hemisphere that are recruited by artificial and less practiced actions. (+info)
Should discrepant accounts given by asylum seekers be taken as proof of deceit?
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BACKGROUND: In order to recognise a refugee in a receiving state, decision makers have to make a judgment based on background information and the account given by the individual asylum seeker. Whilst recognising that this is a very difficult decision, we examine one of the assumptions made in this process: that an account which is inconsistent is probably fabricated for the purposes of deceitfully gaining asylum status. We review some of the psychological processes at work when a person applies for asylum, and report a study offering empirical evidence of some of the reasons why accounts of traumatic experiences may be inconsistent. METHODS: In the study reported, 39 Kosovan and Bosnian (UNHCR) program refugees in the UK were interviewed on two occasions about a traumatic and a non-traumatic event in their past. They were asked specific questions about the events on each occasion. FINDINGS: All participants changed some responses between the first and second interview. There were more changes between interviews in peripheral detail than in the central gist of the account. Changes in peripheral detail were especially likely for memories of traumatic events. Participants with higher levels of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) were also more inconsistent when there was a longer delay between interviews. INTERPRETATIONS: We consider this and similar studies in the light of asylum decision making, proposing that these decisions, often a matter of life and death to the applicant, must be based not on lay assumptions, but on established empirical knowledge. (+info)
The creation of industry front groups: the tobacco industry and "get government off our back".
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We investigated how industries use front groups to combat public health measures by analyzing tobacco industry documents, contemporaneous media reports, journal articles, and press releases regarding "Get Government Off Our Back," a coalition created by the tobacco industry. RJ Reynolds created Get Government Off Our Back in 1994 to fight federal regulation of tobacco. By keeping its involvement secret, RJ Reynolds was able to draw public and legislative support and to avoid the tobacco industry reputation for misrepresenting evidence. The tobacco industry is not unique in its creation of such groups. Research on organizational background and funding could identify other industry front groups. Those who seek to establish measures to protect public health should be prepared to counter the argument that government should not regulate private behavior. (+info)
Localisation of increased prefrontal white matter in pathological liars.
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We examined white matter volumes in four prefrontal subregions using structural magnetic resonance imaging in 10 pathological liars, 14 antisocial controls, and 20 normal controls. Liars showed a relatively widespread increase in white matter (23-36%) in orbitofrontal, middle and inferior, but not superior, frontal gyri compared with antisocial and normal controls. This white matter increase may predispose some individuals to pathological lying. (+info)
The latent structure of cognitive symptom exaggeration on the Victoria Symptom Validity Test.
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Previous studies have focused on the ability of cognitive symptom validity tests to identify simulated malingering or distinguish between clinical samples of individuals at low or high risk of cognitive symptom exaggeration. However, no published studies have examined the latent structure of negative response bias on cognitive tests: measures of cognitive symptom exaggeration may evaluate a continuum of poor effort/invalid responding or a dichotomy of adequate versus inadequate effort. The present study examined whether Victoria Symptom Validity Test (VSVT) indices evaluate a latent dimension or category of response distortion. The VSVT and personality data were obtained from 300 individuals who participated in neuropsychological evaluations as part of standard clinical care. Results indicated that VSVT accuracy scores measure a latent category of inadequate/adequate effort. Individuals classified as taxon members showed significantly poorer performance IQ and memory relative to individuals not classified as exhibiting distortion. The base rate of the identified cognitive symptom exaggeration taxon was estimated to be approximately .13-.14 in the present sample. Likelihood ratios are presented to assist clinical detection of individuals exhibiting the category of cognitive symptom exaggeration. (+info)