Game Theory and Academic Dishonesty
Over the course of the pandemic, I saw myself as well as many of my classmates struggle with the consequences of other students being academically dishonest. It felt as though no matter what I did to prepare, study, and ask for help, I knew that I would likely never measure up and be able to succeed because I refused to cheat. So, for this blog post and in keeping with the lecture topic of Game Theory, I was interested in researching why students feel like they need to cheat and the mathematical payoffs involved. The article cited below opens by discussing all of the potential ways cheaters can benefit from the good intentions of fellow students, regardless of how severe the cheating occurring may or may not be considered. Specifically, the paper discusses how academic dishonesty ultimately is a network of payoffs between students and their teacher to measure levels of effort from each player (or node in a network). This modeled circumstance/question of academic dishonesty is shown through multiple aspects of the Economics of Crime, such as a higher probability of favor shown towards the offensive side (which, in this case, would be if one of the students cheated but the other did not).
This paper relates to course content first and foremost because the issue of academic dishonesty presented is done so in a manner that is within the realm of game theory. There are many ways in which this issue could be presented as a game theory, examples include the prisoner’s dilemma and elements of the Economics of Crime (as previously mentioned). Due to the various ways in which the two students could be classified (both cheating, one cheats and the other does not and vice versa) as well as the level of effort the teacher could put into being attentive to academic dishonesty, there are many game theories at stake in this example. The attitudes each student has towards academic dishonesty and facing its consequences, and thus how important it is to the teacher to punish students who participate in academic dishonesty replicates many aspects of the prisoner’s dilemma game theory. To conclude, placing issues of strategy such as cheating and academic dishonesty within the scope and frame of game theory is a fascinating way to examine these phenomena and how they occur in the lives of students.
https://www.scielo.br/j/rbe/a/dvTjrMLJxTtGvdW43fxKxRp/?format=pdf&lang=en