Ethical codes

Few studies have explored the relationship between non-cognitive factors in different educational settings and with different age groups. The purpose of this study is to determine whether there is a relationship between Study Habits (SH) and Commitment to Ethical Codes (CEC) and their ability to predict the academic performance of language learners in schools and universities (547 students aged under 18 – above 35 years old). The instruments used are adapted versions of questionnaires which were made into one survey tool with each measure in distinct sections. The results showed a significant relationship between SH and CEC displaying a positive relationship in all age groups (a highest relationship in the age group of 18-22, P< 0.05) and in both male/females with male participants reported having the highest relationship (P< 0.05). The study concludes that CEC needs to be considered and assessed during school years with additional training to language learners to help them learn or modify SH to increase their performance at the time of entry into university.  

The study aimed to investigate the Iranian EFL teachers’ knowledge of educational ethical codes in academic settings through the employment of a newly-designed questionnaire, developed by the researchers. To this end, six university professors as experts were invited to participate in an unstructured interview related to the issue under study. The preliminary themes were extracted from the relevant literature and the experts’ opinions through qualitative analysis. Next, the initial questionnaire items were generated and approved by three experts. The reliability of the constructed questionnaire was calculated using Cronbach's alpha. Afterwards, the 40-item questionnaire was administered to 400 EFL teachers resulting in the elimination of eleven items through exploratory factor analysis. Five factors were drawn from the responses of teachers through EFA representing their knowledge of educational ethical codes. Additionally, the confirmatory factor analysis revealed that the five extracted components of the newly developed questionnaire including educational, affective, socio-cultural, behavioral, and professional ethics factors were all acceptably loaded on their constructs at an acceptable level, and the scale can successfully determine EFL teachers’ knowledge of ethical codes in educational settings. The findings of the study have valuable implications for teachers, students, teacher trainers, educational policymakers and administrators.