Levels of Cheating Under Conditions of Informative Appeal to Honesty, Public Affirmation of Value, and Threats of Punishment

As a means of delineating conditions conducive to minimal classroom cheating, 135 boys and girls in the fourth, fifth, and sixth grades were given an opportunity to cheat on a “General Achievement Test” under Control, Informative Appeal to Honesty, Public Affirmation of Value (not cheating), and two Threat of Punishment conditions. A majority cheated in the first two conditions, but a significant decrease from the Informative Appeal level occurred in all the last three conditions; and among these three, there was no difference. In view of other studies and developmental theory, Public Affirmation of belief in not cheating is posited as the preferable classroom method of minimizing cheating. Methodological procedures for follow-up studies are proposed, with special emphasis on the necessity of ascertaining the experimental variables’ personal meanings to the subjects.