An Analysis of Medical Students' Perceptions of Academic Ethics

Objectives The purpose of this study is to identify and characterize the prevailing state of medical students' per-ceptions of their own and their classmates' academic ethics. Methods For the purpose of this study, we conducted in an online survey method for all six academic years at a single medical school and a total of 217 response data were analyzed. The data collected were analyzed using de-scriptive statistics, t-test, and ANOVA. Results Medical students rated their own academic ethics at 4.46 and their peers at 3.96. Female students rated themselves higher than male students, but rated their peers lower. This gender difference resulted in a statistically significant gap in scores between self- and peer-ratings. Scores showed an upward trend with increasing grade levels and academic stages. In particular, peer scores showed statistically significant differences by phase, and the gap scores between self- and peer-ratings were also statistically significant across different academic phases. Students in the criterion-referenced rating system rated themselves and their peers higher than students in the norm-referenced rating system, although the difference was not statistically significant. Conclusions The results of this study serve as a basic framework for the development of educational strategies aimed at improving and increasing perceptions of academic ethics among medical students.