







































Humanitas: Indonesian Psychological Journal  

Vol. 21 (1), August 2025, 157-168 

ISSN:  2598-6368(online); 1693-7236(print)                                                                 

       humanitas@psy.uad.ac.id             http://journal1.uad.ac.id/index.php/Humanitas            https://doi.org/10.26555/humanitas.v22i1.1514 

The role of perfectionism traits and affect in predicting academic 

dishnonesty of college students 

Abdurosid Nur Ali, Wuri Prasetyawati 

Faculty of Psychology, Universitas Indonesia, Depok, Indonesia 

Corresponding author: abdurosidnurali@gmail.com 

 

This is an open access article under the CC BY-SA license. 

 

Introduction 

Unethical behavior by individuals has led to a decline in trust in educational institutions and 
companies. Several unethical acts such as corruption, sabotage, exploitation and others are 
often encountered by educational institutions and companies. The use of technology in 
scientific writing is also encountered, such as ChatGPT (Parker et al., 2023). Even though the 
effectiveness of using ChatGPT as a tool exhibits mixed stances. Some students may 
appreciate its aid in academic task or some express concern in plagiarism, academic 
dishonesty, and potentially erode the genuine learning experiences. Inappropriate use of 
artificial intelligence in scientific writing will lead to fraud, since it does not employ proper 
citation and repetitive sentences (Dinçer, 2024; Taiye et al., 2024). Some individuals may 
have planned to commit unethical acts from the beginning to take advantage of opportunities 
that benefit themselves (Brief et al., 2001), some individuals have good intentions at the 
beginning and then engage in unethical acts after some time. 

ARTICL E  INF O  

 

ABSTRACT  

 

Article history 

Received: 2 June 2025 

Revised: 30 June 2025 

Accepted: 30 June 2025 

 This study aimed to investigate the relationship between 

perfectionism traits and affect on academic dishonesty in college 

students. This study involved 98 students as participants who were 

voluntarily filling out the survey after the final exams. Data were 

collected using the academic dishonesty questionnaire, the 

multidimensional perfectionism scale, and the positive-negative 

affect scale. Data were analysed using a correlation and comparative 

approach. The study found that only the socially prescribed 

perfectionism domain positively correlated with academic dishonesty 

in college students. The effect of socially prescribed perfectionism 

was diminished by the presence of emotions while controlling several 

demographic variables as covariates. Positive affect shows a greater 

effect on reducing the possibility of academic dishonesty occurrence. 

It highlighted that perfectionism may not be directly associated with 

academic dishonesty and limitations of self-report as a measure of 

dishonesty in college students. 

 
     

 
Keywords 

Academic Dishonesty  

Affect  

Cheating 

Multidimensional 

Perfectionism 

Students 

 

 

 

mailto:humanitas@psy.uad.ac.id
http://journal1.uad.ac.id/index.php/Humanitas
https://doi.org/10.26555/humanitas.v22i1.1514
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An unethical or illicit behavior is an action that can have an adverse effect on others 

and is prohibited or unacceptable to society (Jones, 1991). According to Brown (2008), 

forbidden, immoral, illegal actions can be categorized into seven groups, namely: (1) doing 

evil for personal gain (bribery, corruption, and theft), (2) conflict of interest, (3) 

unprofessional service (official misconduct), (4) poor administrative systems, (5) improper 

officer placement systems, (6) misusing regulations, and (7) complaints. Students as 

individuals in the academic world are not free from unethical behavior, namely academic 

dishonesty. 

In 2016, it was reported that 77% of students admitted to committing academic 

dishonesty, and in 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic, it was still rising to the point of 

concern (Herdian et al., 2021; Winardi et al., 2017). 31.3% were in the form of plagiarism, 

31.6% in the form of cheating, and 37.1% in the form of collaboration. But, what’s academic 

dishonesty? Academic dishonesty, according to McCabe et al. (2012) is the involvement of 

someone who performs at least one specific behavior that should not be done to get better 

grades. There are nine specific behaviors called cheating, namely (1) Copying sentences 

from writing without writing the source, (2) Including sources that are not actually used on 

assignments in the bibliography column, (3) Plagiarism of public writings, (4) Getting exam 

questions and answers before the exam takes place from other people, (5) Copying other 

people's answers during the exam, (5) Copying other people's answers during the exam, 

whether known or unknown to the person who is the source of the answer, (6) Working on 

assignments with others on assignments that are instructed to be done independently, (7) 

Claiming by changing names on assignments that are actually done by others, (8) Giving 

answers to other people during the exam, and (9) Using paper or sources that are not allowed 

to answer questions during the exam (McCabe et al., 2012). 

Individuals who commit acts of academic cheating feel it is permissible to have an 

advantage over others due to low or minimal instructions from the instructor, such as 

individual assignments that allow them to be done in groups. Shalvi et al. (2011), states that 

unethical behavior occurs because there is room to justify their actions. Individuals who are 

given more than one opportunity increase the likelihood of committing unethical acts. Mazar 

et al. (2008) found that individuals will act unethically (lie) in the presence of greater 

rewards. (Kilduff et al., 2016) prove that unethical actions can also occur due to rivalry or 

competition with peers to increase self-esteem and status. Forms of unethical behavior in the 

educational context are plagiarism and academic fraud, such as cheating and exploitation. 

Carrell et al. (2008) found that academic fraud perpetrators will increase at each grade. 

Individuals with similar characteristics will gather and behave according to the group's 

morals (Carrell et al., 2008; Yam et al., 2014). This shows a shift in moral values, that 

cheating becomes permissible. External influences, such as peers, dilute moral values so that 

individual self-control decreases to behave in accordance with the norms or rules set by the 

teacher/university. Students were required to sign declarations of ‘academic honesty’ on 

submitting assignments, confirming that all sources consulted have been acknowledged 

(Ashworth et al., 1997). These sets of rules were mutual; the institution and students drew 

up rules differentiating correct and impermissible practices in assessments, such as cheating 

and plagiarism. Students also benefit from this agreement to act morally and experience 

genuine learning. Even though the institution enforces this rule, students still engage in 

academic dishonesty throughout their academic years. In Indonesia, some internal factors 

that can inhibit cheating are religious beliefs, self-efficacy, and the desire to get higher grades 

(Farisandy & Putri, 2024; Salma et al., 2023). However, some previous studies have not 

considered internal factors, namely personality and emotions, as traits that shape individual 

character (Williams et al., 2010). Several studies on personality have been conducted to 



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examine its relationship with unethical behavior (Curtis et al., 2022; Day et al., 2011; 

Malesky et al., 2022), but trait perfectionism research in Indonesia still does not have a 

consistent relationship (Błachnio et al., 2022; Siaputra, 2013). 

Perfectionism is a behavioral tendency for individuals to strive for unrealistic results 

according to their abilities (Baumeister & Vohs, 2012). In educational institutions, 

individuals with perfectionist tendencies will be motivated to achieve maximum grades. In 

the world of work, individuals will tend to try to get the best assessment on each key 

performance indicator (KPI). Perfectionist tendencies are not only driven by individuals, but 

many types of perfectionism are practised. Hewitt & Flett (1991) explained that 

perfectionism does not only focus on individual cognition, but there are implicit factors that 

also become other factors that encourage individuals to have perfectionist tendencies. Some 

of the existing perfectionism factors are self-oriented perfectionism (SOP), socially 

prescribed perfectionism (SPP), and other-oriented perfectionism (OOP). The two 

dimensions of environmentally motivated perfectionism (SOP and OOP) also need to be 

measured in determining whether individuals have perfectionist tendencies. 

Self-oriented perfectionism is the discrepancy between the actual self and the ideal 

self. The tendency of perfectionism is directed towards the self by evaluating the self and 

trying to avoid failure. Other-oriented perfectionism is the tendency for individuals to set 

unrealistic standards for others, position others as perfect, and constantly evaluate others' 

performance. This tendency is outwardly directed. Socially prescribed perfectionism is the 

individual's tendency to acquire standards and fulfil expectations from others. Expectations 

given by others are always tried to be fulfilled by the individual, resulting in discrepancies 

between the actual self and the self desired by others. These three dimensions can be 

categorised into two comprehensive groups in research, namely perfectionistic concern (or 

can be called maladaptive perfectionism) and perfectionistic striving (positive striving 

perfectionism) (Dunkley et al., 2006; Stoeber, 2014). 

Perfectionism is the tendency of individuals to try to meet unrealistic standards 

according to their abilities. This tendency can arise adaptively or maladaptively. To meet 

these unrealistic standards, individuals may involve themselves in unethical actions, for 

example, cheating and plagiarism. Individuals' involvement in cheating is an attempt to 

protect their self-concept, which has high standards (Mazar et al., 2008). Individuals who 

believe they can achieve their standards can be called adaptive or personal standards 

perfectionists, whereas individuals who cannot are called maladaptive or self-critical 

perfectionists (Slaney et al., 2001; Yang et al., 2016). Individuals with maladaptive 

perfectionist tendencies are likely to experience fear of failure, negative affect, anxiety, and 

depression. They may use maladaptive coping techniques to deal with daily problems, and 

when they often feel excessive negative feelings they will exhibit aggressive behaviors 

directed at themselves or at others when receiving negative appraisals (Chester et al., 2015; 

Levine et al., 2017). 

Various forms of negative perfectionist tendencies will make individuals engage in 

unethical behavior (Levine et al., 2017). Individuals who strive to meet the expectations of 

their environment may engage in unethical behavior, such as cheating, exploiting loopholes, 

and other actions to achieve the standards set by their environment. Yip & Côté (2013) shows 

that the emotions felt by individuals also cause their involvement in making decisions. The 

decision that may be made is to take unethical actions, such as cheating. 

Affect as a form of emotions is a mental state involving evaluative feelings, which a 

person feels good or bad, or likes or dislikes what is happening (Ekkekakis, 2013). These 

emotions could be shown in positive or negative. Positive emotions such as pride, happiness, 

excitement, gratitude, awe, love, and compassion. Negative emotion such as anger, anxiety, 



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envy, guilt, disgust, shame, and sadness. The emotions that individuals feel make them more 

focused on themselves or focused on others in making decisions. When individuals feel 

emotions that involve themselves, they will reduce their attention to others and start 

behaving unethically, in this case individuals will engaged in academic dishonesty 

(Kouchaki, 2015). Increased feelings of negative emotions in college students are positively 

associated with increased attitudes and behaviors towards cheating (Tindall et al., 2021). In 

contrast, Zhong (2011) found that individuals when feeling emotions involving others will 

give unbalanced judgments. Individuals will tend to behave in accordance with the norm, 

individuals will speak honestly. These results are similar to Curtis (2023), negative emotions 

act as a buffer in predicting fraud. By feeling guilt and shame, students try to avoid cheating. 

Individual emotional conditions can reinforce or reduce the occurrence of student academic 

dishonesty. 

Based on the explanation above, this study aims to conduct a preliminary study to test 

the relationship between perfectionism with academic dishonesty by replicating (Krone & 

Rouse, 2012) research. In this study, we hypothesize there is relationship between 

perfectionism traits and emotional tendencies with academic dishonesty by students.  

Method 

These studies used quantitative research approaches by distributing a survey.  Self-oriented 

perfectionism, socially prescribed perfectionism, other-oriented perfectionism, positive 

affect and negative affect were predictors of academic dishonesty in college students. 

Participants 

Participants were collected through convenience sampling in courses in Universitas 
Indonesia and Universitas Muhammadiyah Malang representing a public and private 
university. The 4 selected courses are descriptive statistics, quantitative research 
methodology, psychometry, and psychology measurement tool construction. 168 
undergraduate students in these courses were asked to participate in the study. 98 (58%) of 
the students chose to complete the survey. The 98 students who participate are aged between 
18-25 years old with average age of 21 years old (SD = 1.28). Most respondents (74%) were 
between 20 (n=51) and 21 (n=22) years old. Most participants were female (56%). 67% 
participant were from private university students. 

Instruments 

Academic dishonesty will be measured using the academic dishonesty instrument developed 
by Faradiena (2019) modifying McCabe & Trevino (1993) and Iyer & Eastman (2008) 
instruments. This instrument consists of 11 items. “I smuggle a cheat sheet during test”; 
“Copying materials and claiming it to be my own”. Statements are responded by choosing 
one of four rating scales, (1) never, (2) once, (3) twice, and (4) more than twice. The academic 
dishonesty instrument has an internal consistency of 0.89. 

Perfectionism tendency was measured using the Indonesian Multidimensional 
Perfectionism Scale developed by Safitri & Preston (2020) based on the theory of Hewitt & 
Flett (1991). The IMPS consists of 45 statement items. “It makes me uneasy to see an error 
in my work” (SOP); “The people around me expect me to succeed at everything I do” (SPP); 
“The people who matter to me should never let me down” (OOP). Statements are responded 
to by choosing one of seven rating scales, (1) strongly disagree to (7) strongly agree. The self-
oriented dimension has an internal consistency of 0.87, other-oriented 0.63, and socially 
prescribed 0.75. 



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Positive Affect and Negative Affect Scale (PANAS) is one of the instruments to 
measure individual emotions. The instrument uses PANAS (Watson et al., 1988) which has 
been adapted by Akhtar (2019) into Indonesian. PANAS consists of two dimensions of affect, 
positive affect of 10 items (interested, enthusiastic, determined) and negative affect of 10 
items (distressed, alert, ashamed). Items are in the form of one word that describes the 
subject's feelings. Items can be responded to by choosing one of five rating scales, (1) Almost 
never to (5) Almost always. The positive affect dimension has an internal consistency of 0.86 
and negative affect of 0.85. 

Procedure and Data Analysis 

The survey was distributed through course e-learning system. The survey can be filled in by 
students through the google form. Forms are distributed during the final semester exams to 
survey students' college experience. This survey consisted of multiple-choice and Likert-type 
items. The instruments used were academic dishonesty, multidimensional perfectionism 
scale, and PANAS. All instruments were presented in Bahasa Indonesia. Students who did 
not completed the survey were excluded. The data was analysed using JASP software and all 
statistical analyses were performed at the 0.05 level of significance. We ran correlational and 
comparative analyses to investigate the relationship between variables and the difference 
from each group. 

Results  

Table 1 

Means, standard deviation, reliability, and correlations between variables 

 
 M SD α 1 2 3 4 5 

Academic Dishonesty 12.18  6.95 0.84      

Self-oriented perfectionism 67.86 12.49 0.89  0.08     

Other-oriented perfectionism 53.62  9.52 0.73 -0.08 -0.68 ͨ    

Socially prescribed perfectionism 56.18  8.07 0.62   0.23ᵃ  0.66  ͨ  0.53  ͨ   

Positive affect 40.64  6.86 0.88 -0.44 ͨ 0.13 0.18 0.15  

Negative Affect 23.42  8.47 0.92   0.45  ͨ 0.13 0.10  0.36  ͨ -0.74  ͨ

a) p < 0.05; b) p < 0.01; c) p < 0.001; α = Cronbach’s alpha reliability 

 
Based on the results of the correlation test between variables, it was found that only 

socially prescribed perfectionism was significantly correlated to academic dishonesty 
variable. The greater pressure or expectancies from the environment could lead individuals 
to engage in academic dishonesty. Only positive emotions are negatively correlated with 
academic dishonesty, the higher the positive emotions that individuals feel academic 
dishonesty will decrease. The relationship between self-oriented and socially prescribed 
domains is quite strong (r > 0.5). Conceptually, the object of perfection resides in the 
participant or is directed at the participant. See Table 1. 

Multiple regression analysis conducted based on the correlational result. There is a 
negative effect of positive affect on academic dishonesty, while controlling the gender, age, 
year in college, and university F (7.90) = 5.71, p<0.001). Variance explained by the model 
was 30.8%. The effect of socially prescribed perfectionism and negative affect were 
diminished by the presence of positive affect. See Table 2. 

 

 



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Table 2 

Multiple regression analysis on academic dishonesty 

 
 β p-value R R-squared 

Gender (reference: male) -0.08 0.35 0.55 0.31 

Age  0.24 0.02   

Year in College  0.02 0.83   

University (reference: public)  0.11 0.25   

Socially Prescribed Perfectionism  0.14 0.17   

Positive Affect -0.32 0.02   

Negative Affect 0.19 0.19   

T-test and ANOVA was conducted to see if there were differences in individual 
involvement in academic dishonesty. There was no significant difference in engagement in 
academic dishonesty by male or female participants, t (96) = 0.67, p = 0.51. The researcher 
wanted to see if college level would drive students’ engagement in academic dishonesty. 
Results showed no difference between first, second- and third-year students in their 
involvement in academic dishonesty, F (2.95) = 1.92, p = 0.15 (Figure 1). These findings 
show that each year they would likely to engage in academic dishonesty through several 
means. Since the freshmen already engage in academic dishonesty, it will be most likely to 
participate in unethical behavior in their further academic years. 

Figure 1  

Comparison of academic dishonesty on academic year and university 

 

Discussion 

This study aimed to examine the relationship between perfectionism tendencies and 
emotions towards academic dishonesty. Only socially prescribed perfectionism domain 
showed significant correlation with academic dishonesty. This result has similarities with  
the research of Nathanson et al. (2006), no significant relationship was found. Although 
respondents committed academic dishonesty, perfectionism trait that come from selves has 
not been able to prove the relationship directly. These findings also imply the greater role of 
environment shaping how individuals behave. High expectations from others could push 



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Abdurosid Nur Ali et.al (The role of perfectionism traits and affect in predicting academic dishnonesty of…) 

individuals to engage in academic dishonesty. Ashworth et al. (1997) academic dishonesty 
that occurred were done consciously to achieve benefits and has a small chance of being 
discovered or caught by supervisors. Students also take these actions a way to meet 
university expectations. In the process of cheating, individuals also feel a sense of guilt that 
may prevent themselves from cheating or a shift in moral values to feel it is not a problem. 

Social factors become a greater influence for student to engage in academic 
dishonesty. Students may felt pressure particularly from parents, peers, and scholarship 
committees (Heriyati & Ekasari, 2020). Pressure from parents and peer are the main 
contributor that changed students’ behavior to act morally. Socially prescribed perfectionism 
is shaped by expectation from parents or peers as a social aspect (Hewitt & Flett, 1991). In 
the finding, only socially prescribed perfectionism could directly predict academic 
dishonesty. It shows that student could not control themselves to act with integrity. But the 
academic dishonesty does not only happen because of pressure. Opportunities and 
rationalization would construct a ‘fraud triangle’ (Becker et al., 2006). Opportunities to act 
immorally by cheating or plagiarism happen because lack of monitoring from the professor 
or the presence of technology. Heighten the supervision during the exams and in lectures 
would lower the potential of academic misconduct. Academic dishonesty also would likely 
to happen if students rationalized or perceived unfair competitions (Lewellyn & Rodriguez, 
2015). 

In addition, emotions and academic dishonesty have a significant relationship. Tindall 
et al. (2021) proved that negative emotions can increase the potential for academic fraud. 
The relationship between positive emotions and academic dishonesty in this study. When 
individuals feel positive emotions, it could reduce the potential for academic dishonesty. 
Individuals who feel interested, enthusiastic, and excited may not involve themselves in 
cheating and plagiarism. But also, the individuals who feel negative emotions, it could 
amplify the potential for academic dishonesty. Individuals who feel fear, anxiety, jealousy, 
and shame may involve themselves in cheating. Every negative emotion could justify the 
unethical behavior to protect their self-identity. 

Positive emotions negatively predict academic dishonesty. It indicates that individuals 
who were feeling enthusiastic could reduce the potentiality of dishonesty. These findings 
against Vincent et al. (2013) that found individual who’s experiencing positive affect to a 
greater extent may facilitate moral disengagement which promote a dishonest act. The 
feelings of being watched by others could affect the person ability to process moral. Either 
the urge to act morally to protect positive self in a long term or act unethical to take a short-
term sense of fulfilment (Gino, 2015). 

An interesting finding in this study is that there is no significant difference between 
male and female individuals, all of whom have been involved in academic dishonesty 
activities. This finding is also supported according to Chala (2021), woman consider 
cheating to be an unethical act, but their involvement is not much different from the male 
group. We also tested whether the level of study influenced participation in academic 
dishonesty. The involvement of first, second- and third-year students did not have a 
significant difference, although visually there was a difference (Figure 1). This finding is 
quite different from the research of Daneil et al. (2020) where third year students (seniors) 
are more likely to commit fraud than first- and second-year students. This possibility can 
occur because students in the early days of college are still adapting to the system. The habit 
of committing academic fraud at a higher level is trying to maintain high grades from 
previous evaluations. 

In early academic year, maintaining expectation for the students by lecturers or 
teachers whom enforcing academic integrity would shape how they behave throughout the 
semester. Since based on our findings, academic dishonesty is associated with social 
expectations (socially prescribed perfectionism). Teachers could set a realistic goal for each 
student, together. Social factor such competitiveness between students also happens within 



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class or lecture. Being in larger competition pool such as class could increase cheating by 
influencing one’s expectation of other’s cheating (Chui et al., 2021). Teachers or lecturers 
could divide them into smaller groups to minimize the potential of academic dishonesty. 
This also would reduce the perceptions of cheating as socially acceptable, which leading to 
more cheating (Eriksson et al., 2015). 

Not only maintaining the expectation of the students, by managing their emotions, 
such as shame and guilt would reduce the intentions to engage in specific form of academic 
misconduct (Curtis, 2023). When students could face shame and guilt as a valid emotion 
even before doing an unethical behavior. Students that feeling enthusiastic and active while 
learning or doing tests less likely to act immorally. Creating fun activities such as interactive 
games, that would increase the positive emotions of the students could minimize the 
possibility of academic dishonesty and keeping them engaged (Costley, 2019; Sutherland-
Smith & Dawson, 2022). 

Despite of the findings above, some limitations in this study lead to results that may 
not be significant, namely: (1) The use of self-report measurement tools is not strong enough 
to measure unethical behavior so that behaviorist measurements need to be used through 
experiments, (2) the construct of perfectionism which is understood is still limited to a linear 
relationship, it is possible that there is a maximum point of academic dishonesty that occurs 
due to perfectionism at a moderate level, so that the relationship between perfectionism and 
academic dishonesty is quadratic, and (3) the withdrawal of the number of samples needs to 
be balanced to prove that there are differences in academic dishonesty at certain academic 
levels. Future research is expected to pay attention to the three things that are the limitations 
of this study. It is also reported in Pascual-Ezama et al. (2015), self-reported treatment has 
higher amount of lying. By employing more concrete tools to measure academic dishonesty, 
not by using self-report questionnaire that would likely to be bias or faking good on the 
responses by students. 

Conclusion 

Perfectionism has not shown a significant relationship with academic dishonesty in college 
students. Individual motivation to be perfect may be able to predict academic dishonesty due 
to other factors. The highest potential for academic dishonesty could occur if individuals had 
a high and low perfectionism or moderate level of perfectionism. 

Acknowledgment 

Authors thanks to all participants who willingly took part in this study. 

 

Declarations 

Author contribution. First author: idea conceptualization, literature review, data collection 
and writing the article. Second author: guide the research framework, review, and improve 
the manuscript.  
Funding statement. This research was conducted with independent funding from author. 
Conflict of interest. The authors declare no conflict of interest. 
Additional information. No additional information is available for this paper. 
 

 

 

 



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