Awareness of Faculty Members with the Concepts and Examples of Academic Misconduct; Study Case: Islamic Azad University, Yadgar Imam Khomeini Branch

The purpose of this study is to identify the level of awareness among the faculty Members of Islamic Azad University, Yadgar Imam Khomeini Branch, with the concepts and examples of scientific misconduct.

The method of this research is descriptive, survey in terms of execution, and practical in terms of purpose. Research data was collected using a researcher-made questionnaire. The validity of the questionnaire was verified by a group of expert professors and its reliability was confirmed with Cronbach's alpha of 0.788 Calculated. The statistical population includes all faculty members of Islamic Azad University, Yadgar Imam Khomeini Branch, who work full-time with this branch. Due to the large number of faculty members, the studied sample was calculated using Cochran's formula according to the expertise of the faculty members, and according to the nature of the problem and the research hypotheses, it was selected using stratified-random sampling method. Data analysis was done in two parts: descriptive statistics and inferential statistics (Kruskal-Walli’s test) using SPSS version 20 software.

Based on the results, the level of knowledge of faculty Members with the concepts and examples of Scientific misconduct (fabrication, falsification and plagiarism) is above average and in a relatively favorable condition. However, among these three components, their awareness of the concept of fabrication was less than the other two components.

Based on the results, there is no significant difference between the knowledge of the concepts and examples of research misconduct (Fabrication, falsification, plagiarism) with the specialty, scientific and academic rank of faculty members; and the most important proposed solution to reduce scientific misconduct is to create and holding mandatory training courses to familiarize faculty members and students with the concepts and examples of research misconduct.