The Relationship between Cheating and Machiavellianism in Students

Accounting students should be honest in all aspects of their education such as assignments and research. They should follow ethical criteria. Professional associations emphasis on teaching of ethics in accounting student's curriculum. The objective of this study is to specify effect of Machiavellian characteristic on cheating between accounting students. This research is a descriptive-correlation survey. Population of this study includes all B.A. accounting students of Islamic Azad University. The sample of this research has been included 233 students. Data are collected by using questionnaire. Data analyzed by using Ttest, Pearson correlation and multiple regressions. Results of the study show that there is a direct relationship between cheating and Machiavellianism. Gender, level of interest in discipline and age are effective factors on cheating. Gender has a direct relation with cheating; it means that when student is a boy then cheating is increasing. But, level of interest in discipline and age has a negative relation with cheating. Variables such as occupation, married situation, type of diploma and grade point average have not any significant relation with cheating. If the results can be generalized to the whole country, it can be mentioned as a serious educational and ethical problem. The results of this study attract higher education policy makers to do fundamental action about teaching profession’s ethics in terms of accounting student’s education.