The effect of moral foundations in predicting scientific integrity with the mediation role of religious orientation

The current study was conducted aiming to assess the effect of moral foundations on academic integrity through the mediation of religious orientations.

This was a cross sectional study on 544 (413 females & 131 males) convince sample of students of Tehran universities in Iran. The required data were collected using a multi-part questionnaire including demographic information, the Moral Foundation Questionnaire (MFQ), the Circumplex Religious Orientation Inventory (CROI), and the Academic Dishonesty. Then data were analyzed using Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) and bootstrap test was used to check the mediating role of variables.

The mean age of participants was 23.96 ± 6.43 years ranging from 17 to 53. The results showed that there was a positive and significant correlation between academic integrity and moral foundations (r=0.14, p<0.01). Also the correlation between academic integrity and religious orientation were significant (r=-0.18-0.21, p<0.01). Based on the findings moral foundations and academic integrity had a statistically significant direct relationship (P<0.001), but through the mediation of religious orientation, this relationship was not significant, which indicated that there was a full mediation effect.

The findings suggest that religious orientation mediates the relationship between moral foundations and academic integrity. In general, it seems that by increasing moral foundations, religious orientation could be affected and in turn academic integrity will be increased.