Tehran University of Medical Sciences, School of Medicine, Department of Public Health, Tehran, Iran.
Med Educ. 2013 Feb;47(2):144-53. doi: 10.1111/medu.12085.
Medical students, as tomorrow's doctors, are responsible for their patients' health; cheating may affect their academic knowledge and clinical skills. The main purpose of this study was to investigate the frequency of and attitudes towards academic disintegrity among medical students at Tehran University of Medical Sciences (TUMS).
Anonymous questionnaires including questions about various types of academic disintegrity were distributed among medical students during the clerkship and internship phases of the curriculum. Randomised response technique (RRT) was used to maintain the responders' privacy. Because the study design guaranteed the confidentiality of respondents, the TUMS Institutional Review Board declared that formal ethical approval was not required.
A total of 124 students were enrolled in this study, of whom 63 were in the clerkship phase and 61 were in the internship phase. Of these respondents, 29% (n = 36) were male. The most frequently reported type of academic disintegrity was found to be 'impersonating an absent student in a class' (93%) and the least frequent to be 'legitimising absences by using bribes' (5%). Only a small number of interns considered 'buying hospital shifts', 'selling hospital shifts', 'impersonating an absent student' and 'helping others to cheat in examinations' as representing academic disintegrity. Approximately one third of participants stated that the RRT increased their confidence in anonymity and 90% of students found the use of RRT not difficult.
Academic integrity is widely disrespected in different ways among medical students. Effective policies and interventions are required to control these misbehaviours in future doctors in order to optimise medical practice. Almost all respondents found it not difficult to use the RRT; the technique proved to be an effective and easily applied method of eliciting truthful responses to sensitive questions and represents an alternative to conventional anonymising techniques.
作为未来的医生，医学生对患者的健康负责；作弊可能会影响他们的学术知识和临床技能。本研究的主要目的是调查德黑兰医科大学（TUMS）医学生学术不端行为的频率和态度。
在课程的实习和实习阶段，向医学生分发了包含各种类型学术不端行为问题的匿名问卷。采用随机响应技术（RRT）来保护应答者的隐私。由于研究设计保证了应答者的机密性，TUMS 机构审查委员会宣布不需要正式的伦理批准。
共有 124 名学生参加了这项研究，其中 63 名处于实习阶段，61 名处于实习阶段。在这些应答者中，29%（n=36）是男性。最常报告的学术不端行为类型是“在课堂上冒充缺席的学生”（93%），而最不常见的是“通过贿赂合法化缺勤”（5%）。只有少数实习生认为“购买医院轮班”、“出售医院轮班”、“冒充缺席的学生”和“帮助他人在考试中作弊”是学术不端行为。大约三分之一的参与者表示，RRT 增加了他们对匿名的信心，90%的学生发现使用 RRT 并不困难。
医学生以不同的方式广泛不尊重学术诚信。为了优化医疗实践，需要制定有效的政策和干预措施来控制未来医生的这些不当行为。几乎所有的受访者都发现使用 RRT 并不难；该技术是一种有效且易于应用的方法，可以对敏感问题进行真实的回答，是传统匿名技术的替代方法。
