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Moral Slippage: How Do High School Students "Justify" Internet Plagiarism?
Dominic A. Sisti M.Be.
Visiting Research Associate
Center for
Bioethics, University of Pennsylvania &
Ph.D. Student, Philosophy Michigan State University
Project Summary
The Internet has become the research tool of choice for all students from elementary school through postgraduate programs. (Pew 2001) Indeed, it is quite possible that most students now lack a fundamental knowledge of library based research methods, Congressional numbering or even the Dewey Decimal system. Use of these conventions of library science has been supplanted by the innovation of web based search engines like Google.com. Students no longer riffle through long drawers of index cards to find resources; or even run searches against databases on CD or tape. Rather, students are now able to instantaneously access millions upon millions of "resources" with a few keystrokes and a click. This type of research, while haphazard, may in some cases be perfectly appropriate and ultimately helpful in completing an assignment. The overwhelming accessibility of written work- at one time it was unimaginable that millions of documents on a single subject matter could be accessed in less than one second- has propelled plagiarism to the top of the list of academic integrity infractions. The Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary defines plagiarism as "to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own; use (another's production) without crediting the source." In my mind, plagiarism refers to a continuum of activities in which a person lifts text verbatim or ideas with out proper reference to the source of the material, sometimes intentionally other times inadvertently.
While search engines may provide content and opportunity for relatively "innocuous" forms of plagiarism such as cutting-and-pasting of words, sentences, or paragraphs, other internet based "research" techniques are not so innocent. Entire research papers are available for a price on websites like cheathouse.com. (Clayton 1997) It is there that a philosophy student can download a paper entitled, "But What Do You Mean? An Essay on Ludwig Wittgenstein's Linguistics and Logical Theories" or a literature student might buy, "The Grapes of Wrath - The Biblical Symbols." Similar other websites ironically offer and guarantee "non-plagiarized papers" for the bargain basement price of $14.95 per page. These websites have spawned a virtual arms race pitting paper-download sites and the students who use them against teachers bent on authenticating term papers who use plagiarism detection applications such as turnitin.com. (Based on sheer number, user demand, and sophistication, it seems the paper-download sites are winning the race.) (Culwin & Lancaster, 2002)
As an outgrowth of my institution's high school bioethics education project (www.highschoolbioethics.org), I plan to conduct an empirical study of how students justify Internet-based plagiarism. When students recognize what they are doing is plagiarism, is wrong, and that they are violating ethical and legal norms and regulations, what do they tell themselves? Do students who plagiarize engage in moral slippage? Do students who plagiarize do so openly in groups (i.e. as a result of peer pressure or group think) or is internet plagiarism a more secretive individual activity? Answering these questions will help to formulate responses to plagiarism in policy and educational initiatives.
My project will proceed in three phases. During Phase I (months 1-4) I will collect literature and data from past studies of moral slippage in environments such as professional workplaces, institutions of higher education, etc. I will also do research into the social and psychological dimensions of moral slippage as it occurs in these settings, including reviewing studies on moral development.
Concurrently, I will enlist the help of a senior faculty member at the Center for Bioethics to assist me in the development of a survey to assess typical explanations used by high school students who plagiarize work from the internet. I will narrowly define my inclusion criteria to focus on students who have clearly plagiarizing and have admitted either to buying and using term papers on the internet or to "copy-and-paste" plagiarism of a single paragraph or more from the internet. By including only clear examples of plagiarism, I will be able to zero-in on those who know what they are doing is plagiarism and elicit their explanations more reliably.
I will develop the survey as an online form that will have a single secure access point. The online form will interface with a database, which will be used to eventually save, manage, and analyze the data that are collected. The online form will recognize unique users, but will not capture any individual information about those users. Assuring anonymity will be crucial for survey authenticity and success as well as exemption from institutional review board (IRB) approval.
Phase II (months 5-8) will begin with the administration of the survey and management of survey data. Administration of the survey will be done in partnership with a subset of approximately 120 teachers from our High School Bioethics Project. A group of 15 of these teachers will be selected to administer the survey to their classes. Approximately 300 students will be surveyed. At the onset of survey administration, I will conduct an informal on-site informed consent session with each teacher's class. I will explain the project to students, assure them that the data will remain anonymous, and demonstrate the online survey form. Thereafter, teachers will distribute the survey link to their students, who will complete the survey in class or at home.
During Phase III (months 9-12), I will analyze the survey data. Again in collaboration with a senior faculty member from the Center for Bioethics, I will develop reports of the results, which will be presented to the Center for Academic Integrity Scholars' Working Session and the Templeton Research Symposium. These reports will be concatenated and submitted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal. Finally, I will present the final report to partner teachers of the high school bioethics project at the project's annual meeting. I will craft a set of key points for teachers to use in developing policies and lesson plans on plagiarism, as well as help in their monitoring of plagiarism. All data and reports will be disseminated on our project's website (highschoolbioethics.org) and offered for free to teachers worldwide.
Understanding not simply the prevalence of internet plagiarism but also the variety of explanations used by students to justify their plagiarism is crucial to curtailing its practice. The long-term impact of my project will contribute to the efforts of faculty and administrators of secondary and post-secondary schools in creating effective policies and education on academic integrity.
Biosketch:
Dominic A. Sisti is a researcher at the University of Pennsylvania Center for Bioethics, an ethicist at Holy Redeemer Health System in Philadelphia, and an adjunct instructor at Villanova University. Dominic received his master's degree from the University of Pennsylvania (Bioethics, 2000) and his Bachelor of Science degree from Villanova University (Biology, 1996). He serves on several ethics committees and is currently working to develop the Center's High School Bioethics Project (PI- Prof. McGee) (see highschoolbioethics.org). Dominic is a co-editor of Health, Disease, and Illness: Concepts in Medicine (with Profs. Caplan & McCartney, Georgetown University Press, June 2004).