Scientific Ethics in Teaching of Social Sciences in Iran

Abstract

The ethic of education is a set of professional rules and regulations agreed upon by the scientific community that obliges actors to comply with codes of conduct in the science education process. This article is asking about levels and types of academic dishonesty and recognizing factors affecting it in Iran’s social sciences education. The data were collected using semi-structured interviews with Ph.D. students of public Universities in Tehran were analyzed with qualitative content analysis. Research findings show that academic dishonesty and factors affecting it are evident in the education of social science at two levels of micro and macro. At the micro or actor’s level, individual characteristics and personality traits of students and professors impact on the occurrence of academic dishonesty. Moreover, at the macro or structural level, the way of distribution of resources and rules in the education paves the way for and facilitates the occurrence of academic dishonesty. Consequently, dishonesty in the education of Iran’s social sciences and factors affecting it can be explained in the light of a structuration approach.