A new form of academic misconduct: the relationship among individual factors, attitudes, experience, and intentions toward Internet plagiarism

The popularity of Internet usage and the diverse and rich information available online make it easier for students to engage in academic misconduct, especially Internet plagiarism (IP). Therefore, this study investigated the IP intention of Chinese students and analyzed the influence of gender, educational level, achievement goals (AG), low self-control, acceptance, and plagiarism experience on it. A total of 551 students from high school to university participated in this study. It was found that male students had more IP experience than female students, and college students had more IP experience and higher IP intentions than high school students. Correlation analysis showed that all variables in this study were related to each other. Regression analysis showed that AG, low self-control, plagiarism acceptance, and past experience jointly predicted IP intention with a high level of predictive explanatory power (64%). Specifically, students with a dominant mastery approach had lower IP intentions, whereas students with a more impulsive personality, more acceptance of IP, and more IP experience had higher IP intentions. Considering these findings, this article puts forward suggestions to reduce IP.

Automated summary

This study investigated the intention of Chinese students to engage in Internet plagiarism (IP) and analyzed the influence of gender, educational level, achievement goals, low self-control, acceptance, and plagiarism experience. The findings showed that male students had more IP experience than female students, and college students were more likely to have IP intentions than high school students.