Is There a Relationship Between Honor Codes and Academic Dishonesty?

This investigation compared “character building” colleges recognized by the John Templeton Foundation for their character development programs and with honor codes with those that did not have formalized character development programs (traditional colleges) or honor codes. The researcher administered a researcher-designed questionnaire (Academic Honesty Questionnaire) to 695 students representing six colleges and universities randomly selected. Of the six institutions, three colleges and universities of differing population sizes were selected that had incorporated honor code systems The three remaining institutions of differing sizes were considered traditional colleges and did not utilize honor code systems. The level of academic dishonesty was correlated to the presence of an honor code system to determine if possible relationships existed. In addition, the size of the institution and the gender of the student were also considered to determine if differences existed among the construct variables. Significance was found in various subscales for five of the six research questions. Even though no significance was found in the difference in the level of academic dishonesty between institutions with or without honor code systems, a significant difference was found in the perception of student cheating between the two types of institutions. Students from honor code institutions perceived that the amount of academic dishonesty at their institutions was lower. No significant difference was found in the level of student cheating regarding the size of the institution. However, the study found that students from the large-sized universities perceived that they were more likely to get away with cheating than students from the small and medium-sized institutions. Finally, while no significant difference was found