Using the Elaboration Likelihood Model, multimedia and modern culture to promote academic honesty

Abstract

Many students act as if academic honesty is an arcane nicety that does not apply in the world outside academia. At the same time, academic dishonesty, including plagiarism, is recognised as a chronic problem. This paper reports on a project that was undertaken to combat these problems. The project adopted a positive rather than punitive approach and used multimedia resources, examples from popular culture and the Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) (Petty & Cacioppo 2000) to foster student engagement with academic honesty within a classroom setting and the adoption of its practices with assessable tasks. As academic honesty, or rather its negation through dishonesty, continues to occur, an innovative approach was required. The ELM is a model of how individuals process information, but it has not been used often as a framework for introducing new teaching and learning resources within educational institutions. The evaluation of the resulting resources by academic staff and students suggests that whilst this approach of using resources inspired by the ELM will not alone eradicate academic dishonesty, it will contribute to an understanding and acceptance by students of the need to pursue academic honesty. Furthermore, the resources have created sufficient momentum to see them adopted in subjects in other degree courses as well as emerge as a foundation for other similarly styled projects at the home institution.