Penalties for academic dishonesty in a Greek dental school environment.

The aim of this study was to investigate the opinions of the faculty and students of the University of Athens Dental School in Greece regarding the appropriate penalty for specific academic offenses. In addition, faculty and student opinions were compared. A questionnaire was distributed to officially registered seniors and full-time faculty members, and 177 individuals responded anonymously and voluntarily. The respondents were asked to select one from a set of nine penalties for each of fifteen hypothetical academic offenses and three cases with extenuating circumstances. Non-parametric Mann-Whitney U tests and a Wilcoxon signed-rank test, depending on the nature of variables, were used to detect significant differences in penalty scores between faculty and students. A p-value of <0.05 was considered statistically significant. The penalty scores for the fifteen offenses ranged from a mean of 2.23±1.55 to 7.25±2.64. Faculty respondents gave more severe penalties than students did for all offenses, and the finding was statistically significant (p<0.05) for eleven of the fifteen offenses. Where extenuating circumstances were added, the penalty selection altered in two of the three cases. A significantly more lenient penalty was selected by both faculty and students in these two cases. The results of this study suggest that faculty members are harsher than students for the same offenses and that extenuating circumstances can sometimes significantly change recommended penalties.