Detecting and preventing “multiple-account” cheating in massive open online courses
Name
1508.05699.pdf
Description
Submitted version
Size
1.89 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
565ea3b4112b068762a448a82225a6b8
Author(s)
Northcutt, Curtis G
Ho, Andrew D
Chuang, Isaac L
Date Issued
2016
Journal
Computers and Education
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Citation
Northcutt, Curtis G., Andrew D. Ho, and Isaac L. Chuang. "Detecting and Preventing "Multiple-Account" Cheating in Massive Open Online Courses." Computers and Education 100 (2016): 71-80.
Version
Original manuscript
Abstract
© 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. We describe a cheating strategy enabled by the features of massive open online courses (MOOCs) and detectable by virtue of the sophisticated data systems that MOOCs provide. The strategy, Copying Answers using Multiple Existences Online (CAMEO), involves a user who gathers solutions to assessment questions using a "harvester" account and then submits correct answers using a separate "master" account. We use a small-scale experiment to verify CAMEO and estimate a "lower bound" for its prevalence among 1.9 million course participants in 115 MOOCs from two universities. Using conservative thresholds, we estimate CAMEO prevalence at 1237 certificates, accounting for 1.3% of the certificates in the 69 MOOCs with CAMEO users. Among earners of 20 or more certificates, 25% have used the CAMEO strategy. CAMEO users are more likely to be young, male, and international than other MOOC certificate earners. We identify preventive strategies that can decrease CAMEO rates and show evidence of their effectiveness in science courses.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Terms of Use
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike
Persistent DSpace Link
DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1016/J.COMPEDU.2016.04.008
