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I'm pleasantly surprised to see the audience on HN be aware and considerate of the socio-cultural differences. To add a few other points to the list - 1. The

I'm pleasantly surprised to see the audience on HN be aware and considerate of the socio-cultural differences. To add a few other points to the list - 1. The pressure is also to literally survive, and can sometimes extend to their families. It's not uncommon to find Indian students coming to the US to alleviate their families' financial condition by studying here and consequently getting a job here. A lot of times their families would have mortgaged their apartments/houses to get a loan to fund the education. I was such a student about 3 years ago. If I would have failed, not only would my parents not have an apartment anymore, but it would also be difficult for us to survive as a family (my parents earn very little). I realize this was a calculated risk and no one forced me(us) into it, but it was very pressuring regardless. 2. While cheating is frowned upon at a run-of-the-mill Indian university, it's not dealt with as severely as at American universities. Consequently it can be a little like you were careless enough to be jaywalking in a foreign country you're visiting and finding out they're going to imprison you for it later. 3. The immigration rules here don't help as well. You have a limited amount of time for which you can stay in the US after finishing up studies to find a job. Failing to find a job in that time results into having to go back. Sometimes you have to go back even if you found a job but didn't get through the H1 lottery. Let me firmly state that having said all of that, I don't condone this behavior, and am unreservedly against it. I'm just glad people here on HN already have additional perspective into why this happens and I'd just like to add to it since I feel I can.

freshyill 10y ago
American universities are very upfront about their strict academic honesty policies, so it's not really analogous to jaywalking.
- impish19 10y ago
  That's what my point is - in your head, you might think you're doing something that's less of an offense. But it's not.
- Balgair 10y ago
  Maybe, maybe not. As with most very diverse things: it depends. Yes, googling for the honesty policies is easy, if you know they are typically referred to as the 'honor code.' I would imagine that a fair percentage of US and foreign students would be confused as to what 'honor' has to do with cheating though ("Like, chivalry is dead, bro"), but that is not an excuse. And to be fair, even though the honor codes are strict, does not mean that the cheating is not rampant. A friend's wife taught a lot of Chinese nationals as a grad student and she said that they cheated a lot. However, that was not due to maliciousness or ignorance. They knew it was 'not kosher' to cheat, but back in China it seems that these kids has the same 'don't cheat' policy but if you believed in that, you were totally screwed and the cheating was seen as a necessary evil by people at all levels of society. You had to hide it, but everyone knew everyone else did it. Now to these 17/18 year old kids newly in the US, they did not expect the system to really be any different (think back to yourself at that age). And typically it is not. You only get punished if you get caught. There really are no downsides for them. Yeah, sure, some scapegoat is made every once in a while, but how is that different than the way China works anyways? The only difference here is that you don't have to bribe as much. I mean, the average grade at Harvard is an A- [0], how could you NOT think that cheating is rampant at the very highest levels? Sure, they call it 'grade inflation', but a rose by any other name smells just as sweet. [0]https://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2015/05/27/harvard-class-with-a-average-not-worried-about-grade-inflation https://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2015/05/27/harvard-cl...
  - argonaut 10y ago
    Students are told about the honor codes. It's not something you have to look up. Grade inflation has nothing to do with cheating - that's just more FUD. If a class curves to a B, and everyone cheats, the average grade is still a B.

freshyill 10y ago

American universities are very upfront about their strict academic honesty policies, so it's not really analogous to jaywalking.

impish19 10y ago
That's what my point is - in your head, you might think you're doing something that's less of an offense. But it's not.
Balgair 10y ago
Maybe, maybe not. As with most very diverse things: it depends. Yes, googling for the honesty policies is easy, if you know they are typically referred to as the 'honor code.' I would imagine that a fair percentage of US and foreign students would be confused as to what 'honor' has to do with cheating though ("Like, chivalry is dead, bro"), but that is not an excuse. And to be fair, even though the honor codes are strict, does not mean that the cheating is not rampant. A friend's wife taught a lot of Chinese nationals as a grad student and she said that they cheated a lot. However, that was not due to maliciousness or ignorance. They knew it was 'not kosher' to cheat, but back in China it seems that these kids has the same 'don't cheat' policy but if you believed in that, you were totally screwed and the cheating was seen as a necessary evil by people at all levels of society. You had to hide it, but everyone knew everyone else did it. Now to these 17/18 year old kids newly in the US, they did not expect the system to really be any different (think back to yourself at that age). And typically it is not. You only get punished if you get caught. There really are no downsides for them. Yeah, sure, some scapegoat is made every once in a while, but how is that different than the way China works anyways? The only difference here is that you don't have to bribe as much. I mean, the average grade at Harvard is an A- [0], how could you NOT think that cheating is rampant at the very highest levels? Sure, they call it 'grade inflation', but a rose by any other name smells just as sweet. [0]https://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2015/05/27/harvard-class-with-a-average-not-worried-about-grade-inflation https://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2015/05/27/harvard-cl...
- argonaut 10y ago
  Students are told about the honor codes. It's not something you have to look up. Grade inflation has nothing to do with cheating - that's just more FUD. If a class curves to a B, and everyone cheats, the average grade is still a B.