Introduction.

Academic honesty is an ethical requirement for any medical practitioner. However, dishonest academic behaviours are practiced around the world, increasing concern about the lack of skills of students in their professional future.

Aims.

To evaluate the academic conduct of the FCS medical students, and to analyse students' perceptions about academic conduct.

Subjects and methods.

Questionnaires translated and adapted from previous studies were given to students from 1st to 6th grade. Statistical analysis was performed (descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA and Pearson's correlation) and differences between groups were considered significant if p < 0.05.

Results.

580 (68.3%) students completed the questionnaire. It was found that students claim to practice dishonest academic behaviour infrequently, with a mean value of all analysed behaviours less than 3 (‘sometimes'). However, the most common dishonest attitudes are ‘asking a colleague to sign for themselves the class attendance record', ‘change a class attendance record' and ‘copy answers by a colleague during an exam'. Students who participate in more dishonest behaviours are male, attending a more advanced academic year, have a lower final grade and are involved in extracurricular activities (p < 0.05). The conducts that students consider to be more serious are the least likely to practice, with a very strong negative correlation (r = –0.96).

Conclusion.

Despite the prevalence of dishonest behaviour that students declared to practice be very low, it is necessary to raise awareness among students for its consequences during the course and in their future professional activity.

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