Throughout the duration of society, education has withheld high prestige amongst people worldwide as it is a symbol of success and achievement. Education is the act or process of acquiring knowledge, a field that has only grown in complexity and ambition. Learning has also skyrocketed in demand due to the growing drive of students to improve their knowledge and overall intelligence level. As a result of this incessant competition, a major issue has arisen regarding the morality and integrity of students within the school system. Academic dishonesty, or cheating, is a form of immoral deceit in which an individual does not truthfully complete an assignment to his/her ability. Cheating ranges from minimal to extreme, anywhere from glancing at a neighbor’s paper to plagiarizing another person’s work and claiming it as one’s own. But the commonly asked question amongst teachers and higher educators is what the driving factor is that is urging students to associate themselves with these unethical behaviors. Students have lost sight of the true purpose of education and learning in itself, to gain knowledge in helping them pursue a career of interest. The morality of integrity has been compromised in its plentitude due to the fact that students have gauged how to cheat the system to their advantage. Academic dishonesty has been analyzed and recorded for years, proving that students are aware and willingly will admit that they have participated in such acts of misconduct. Through a series of extensive research, a common theme of environmental factors seems to be a popular solution to this ambiguous problem. The prevalence of cheating in society needs to be actively addressed among students and educators in order to prevent future consequences; Cheating is a result of extrinsic pressures in society including high academic standards, expectations in the classroom, and social norms and behaviors. 

As society progresses in intricacy and complexity, the desire to the best of the best only grows in popularity. The classroom has become an environment of competition as well as a point of determination for success or failure. In response to this, cheating has become the cumulative resort as “75% to 98% of college students report having cheated in school” (Anderman). Cheating is commonly a route of corruption that students turn to when they are overwhelmed by the high stress associated with the demands of achievement. In a collective source of psychological evaluation, Eric Anderman discusses the principle origins of cheating by highlighting the benefits of “mastery goals” as opposed to “extrinsic goals” (Anderman). Mastery goals can be defined as comprehensive knowledge or skill in a subject or accomplishment. When students are faced with the decision to cheat, they have to weigh their values and decide what withholds more importance, their achievement or their intelligence. Teachers can ultimately make this decision for their students by giving multiple tests throughout the course and centering their tests around mastery instead of memorization. Students’ grades should also always be privately shared in order to avoid embarrassment and feelings of stupidity. By shifting educational standards in favor of comprehension, students are forced to prove that they know and understand the material presented to them, in turn “cheating doesn’t serve much of a purpose” (Anderman). If schools were to adapt their performance criteria to the learning styles and abilities of students, cheating wouldn’t be an issue and ultimately not an option because the material would be mastered by the student. 

The art of teaching has developed into a fast-paced and self-sufficient system of expected achievement and success. Teachers are given guidelines and requirements to follow in their teaching styles but they are very specific in what must be emphasized in the content. Students have had to adapt their behaviors and expectations, whether it be positive or negative, in order to achieve the standards, set by school systems and educators. They either have to choose to increase the amount of time dedicated to studying and completing assignments or take the easier route, cheating. Academic dishonesty has taken a negative toll on the classroom environment itself, creating a pessimistic stigma that radiates to the success of the students. Through a series of proven and exhaustive research, it has been confirmed that “instances of academic dishonesty in the classroom increased” as a result of “limited discipline and awareness” (Eatmon). Teachers are fulfilling the requirements to teach the necessary content to the students and the students are successfully relaying the information, but there is a lack of awareness on the educator’s part. This has created a shift in morality, “the notions of right and wrong” are no longer applicable to modern school systems and an unfavorable relationship between the teacher and student (Gross). The external influences and overall atmosphere of the classroom have adversely influenced students to participate in the immoral behaviors of cheating. In order to reverse these acts of impropriety, a proposition must be put into place regarding the responsibility of peer misbehavior. Cheating is disrupting the inherent values of education and degrading the quality of hard work, in turn the “trust, openness, and honesty” must be restored in the academic environment (Petress). Through this reversed motivation to reduce cheating, academic dishonesty will be reported more frequently and become a major determination of responsibility.

Social norms are the ultimate determinant factor amongst students as they feel obligated to abide by the expectations of their peers. Cheating has become a socially accepted behavior, and somewhat a trend, in school systems due to the shift in values amongst the current generation of students, as well as future generations. Students have figured out how to succeed, excluding the effort and time associated with hard work by using the school system to their advantage. The worst part about these acts of deceit and dishonesty is that students are unaware of the immoral connotation correlated with such actions and behaviors. The acceptance of cheating in today’s society is a consequence of “different, post millennial, value orientation” rather than wrongful willingness (Gross). The school system needs to reaffirm the meaning of morality and integrity within the school system in order to repress acts of dishonesty. Therefore, educators can use social trends to prevent cheating as “students are a product of their culture” (Gross). Another important issue associated with social influences includes the use of cognitive enhancers and the growing casual stigma attached. These professionally prescribed medications withhold the purpose of “improving attention and boosting alertness and concentration,” all beneficial actions when it comes to studying or completing an assignment (Dawson). Students are turning to these drugs to help them cram for an exam, when in fact they have no business associating themselves with these prescriptions in the first place. They are unaware of the possible future medical issues that could arise as a result of drug abuse, only strengthening the argument against this trend. This shows the direct effects of external influences in terms of societal pressures as the use of cognitive enhancers is a growing craze, encouraged by the obligation to fit into society.

Standardized testing has become the major source of evaluation due to its efficiency and accuracy that has advanced rapidly in the past few years. It is an effective source of assessment that “fairly and comprehensively measures student performance” in an aspect that is uniformly impartial amid all types of students (Walberg). It allows students to show the extents of their mental capacity in a variety of subjects and skill sets, in an unbiased sense. This holds not only the student accountable for their acquisition of knowledge, but educators and the school system as a whole for success or failure.  The cost associated with standardized testing is also an appealing attribute that government funding favors due to its low expenditure and adequate time frame. Research has proven that the costs of standardized tests are estimated to be “less than 0.1% of total spending” within the K-12 education system, a very attractive numeric value budget wise (Walberg). But this standpoint in favor of testing holistically reduces the purpose of learning as students will only be focused on doing well on such tests. This eliminates the skill of mastery within the education system, the entire goal of learning in itself. Students’ main objective in school overall is to succeed and show proof of that success, usually referencing grades or test scores. If standardized tests are the only measurable tool of intelligence, knowledge and content will simply be memorized as opposed to obtained and mastered. Testing can be viewed as a short-term indication of intellect, but when applicability comes into the picture, nearly all material will be vague and/or lost completely.  For the betterment and advancement of society, academic standards need to be shifted to focus on mastery and comprehension in order to reassure that students are actually learning. The external pressures associated with attaining a high test score or a good grade are consuming the true intentions of education, thus standardized testing should be less prevalent in the life of a student.

Morality is a constant controversial issue in society that is viewed in many different aspects dependent upon personal beliefs and values. Cheating is a form of academic dishonesty that has lost the morality of integrity within the education environment. It is regularly debated as to what causes students to cheat, whether it be internal or external factors, and after extensive and thorough research the origins behind such deceitful behavior lie in favor of external pressures. The high demands of schooling today are putting students in an unfortunate situation where they have to decide to dedicate all of their time to school or choose the alternative and easier pathway of cheating. More often than not, some form of academic dishonesty becomes involved. This is creating a deficient and inadequate learning environment for both students and teachers, which is then reflected in overall performance. The social norm has also strongly enforced and verified the acts of cheating due to its popularity and lack of decency both in and outside of the classroom. Forms of cheating have even resorted to the misuse of drugs, an act of illegality, in which students are completely unaware of the effects such prescriptions could have on them. Conclusively, cheating is an ongoing epidemic that will only grow in prevalence and complexity if it is not addressed and preventative measures are put into place. The extrinsic influences of high academic standards, a negative stigma in the classroom, and pressures of societal norms are the primary principles of motivation to engage in dishonest behavior.
