Aim To provide insights into the students' attitude towards academic integrity and their perspective of academic honesty at Croatian medical schools.Methods A cross-sectional study using an anonymous questionnaire containing 29 questions on frequency of cheating, perceived seriousness of cheating, perceptions on integrity atmosphere, cheating behaviour of peers and on willingness to report misconduct. Participants were third-year and fifth-year students from all four Croatian Schools of Medicine. Outcome measures were descriptive statistical correlates and differences in students' self-reported educational dishonesty, perceptions of (...) cheating behaviour and medical school integrity atmosphere.Results Of the 1074 students enrolled in the third and fifth year, 662 completed the questionnaire. A large proportion of the students admitted using some method of cheating and 78% admitted engaging in at least one form of misconduct. About 50% had a lenient attitude towards six acts of academic dishonesty. Only 2% reported another student for cheating. Risk factors for cheating were strongly correlated with students' perceptions of peer cheating behaviour, peer approval of cheating, low perception of seriousness of cheating and inappropriate severity level of exams and teaching materials.Conclusions Cheating is prevalent in Croatian medical schools and academic dishonesty is seen as acceptable behaviour among numerous future Croatian doctors. (shrink)

Aim To provide insights into the students' attitude towards academic integrity and their perspective of academic honesty at Croatian medical schools. Methods A cross-sectional study using an anonymous questionnaire containing 29 questions on frequency of cheating, perceived seriousness of cheating, perceptions on integrity atmosphere, cheating behaviour of peers and on willingness to report misconduct. Participants were third-year (preclinical) and fifth-year (clinical) students from all four Croatian Schools of Medicine. Outcome measures were descriptive statistical correlates and differences in students' self-reported educational (...) dishonesty, perceptions of cheating behaviour and medical school integrity atmosphere. Results Of the 1074 students enrolled in the third and fifth year, 662 (62%) completed the questionnaire. A large proportion of the students (97%) admitted using some method of cheating and 78% admitted engaging in at least one form of misconduct. About 50% had a lenient attitude towards six acts of academic dishonesty. Only 2% reported another student for cheating. Risk factors for cheating were strongly correlated with students' perceptions of peer cheating behaviour, peer approval of cheating, low perception of seriousness of cheating and inappropriate severity level of exams and teaching materials. Conclusions Cheating is prevalent in Croatian medical schools and academic dishonesty is seen as acceptable behaviour among numerous future Croatian doctors. (shrink)

Objectives To investigate high school cheating experiences and attitudes towards academic misconduct of freshmen at all four medical schools in Croatia, as a post-communist country in transition, with intention of raising awareness of academic honesty. Design and method Students were given an anonymous questionnaire containing 22 questions on the atmosphere of integrity at their high school, self-reported educational dishonesty, their evaluation of cheating behaviour, and on their expectations about the atmosphere of integrity at their university. Setting All schools of medicine (...) of Croatian universities . Main measures Descriptive statistics and differences in students' self-reported educational dishonesty, perception of cheating behaviour, and perception of the high school integrity atmosphere. Results Of the 761 freshmen attending the four medical schools, 508 completed the questionnaire: 481 Croatian and 27 international students. Of the Croatian respondents, almost all self-reported engaging in at least one behaviour of educational dishonesty, and 78% of respondents admitted to having frequently cheated in at least one form of assessed academic misconduct. Only three students admitted to having reported another student for cheating. For most of the questions, there was no significant difference in the responses among Croatian students. However, significant differences were found in most responses between Croatian students and their international counterparts, who were significantly less likely to engage in dishonest behaviours. No individual factor was found to correlate with the incidence of self-admitted dishonest behaviour. Frequent cheaters evaluated academic dishonesty significantly more leniently than those who did not cheat. Conclusion Academic dishonesty of university students does not begin in higher education; students come to medical schools ready to cheat. (shrink)