Making our Measures Match Perceptions: Do Severity and Type Matter When Assessing Academic Misconduct Offenses?

Traditional approaches to measurement of violations of academic integrity may overestimate the magnitude and severity of cheating and confound panic with planned cheating. Differences in the severity and level of premeditation of academic integrity violations have largely been unexamined. Results of a study based on a combined sample of business students showed that students are more likely to commit minor cheating offenses and engage in panic-based cheating as compared to serious and planned cheating offenses. Results also indicated there is a significant interaction between severity and type (planned vs. panic) of cheating. We hypothesized serious and planned cheating offenses would be related to justifications and found the largest differences were between panic and planned. Finally, panic and minor cheating were associated with two self-control-related personality traits. Implications for cheating research are discussed.     

Process Management Self-Efficacy: Scale Development and Validation

Managers, responsible for the work of others, are crucial for organizational success. A key function of managers is coordination and management of process(es) to ensure task completion (Bounty & Drucker-Godard in Human Relations, 72(3), 565-587, 2019; Mintzberg, 2009). Self-efficacy beliefs related to process management are likely to predict how well an individual manages processes. Thus, process management self-efficacy beliefs are crucial to managerial performance and, consequently, to organizational success. The lack of a scale to measure process management self-efficacy is a significant oversight, which this study attempts to remedy. In study 1, using data from four separate samples, we developed a process management self-efficacy scale (PMSES). To provide preliminary evidence of construct validity, we conducted studies 2 and 3. Using data collected from managers, their supervisors, and co-workers, results of study 2 indicated that managers’ process management self-efficacy was related to task performance evaluated by their superiors and to contextual performance rated by their co-workers. In addition, process management self-efficacy predicted additional variance in task and contextual performance, beyond a measure of generalized self-efficacy. In study 3, managers’ process management self-efficacy beliefs were related to their subordinates’ performance. We discuss implications for theory, research, and practice.