Teachers’ social perceptions of corruption

Abstract

The study of social perceptions of corruption among teachers is important, as it helps to identify the causes (motives) of corrupt behavior. Social perceptions are a special form of everyday collective knowledge and express an attitude to the reality in which we live. Social perceptions can have different internal justification. They can be either determined by the current situation or based on values and principles by which the person lives. Identifying causes (motives) of corruption activity is associated with measures to prevent and counteract criminal activity in the education sphere. In the field of education, any manifestations of corruption are perceived very negatively. Corruption contributes to the emergence of distrust in the academic achievements of students. As an employee of a state educational institution, a teacher deals with both subject teaching and character education, and it can be assumed that corrupt activities become a dilemma where personal interests (economic factor) come into conflict with the public ones. The use of social perceptions to study social phenomena helps to reveal the everyday (habitual) knowledge and representations as they are used by respondents. The study employed an associative experiment and then a prototypical analysis. The following data was obtained: the core of the social perception of corruption among teachers contains the elements ‘making money’ followed by the elements ‘greed’, ‘gifts’ and ‘deception’. The highest rank was obtained for the perception-association ‘abuse of official position’. The official position includes obligations and rules of official conduct — accordingly, the use of official position means the use of the social and legal status of an employee established in the legislation. The periphery contains such perceptions as ‘extortion’, ‘gratitude’, ‘reward’, ‘giving a bribe’, ‘receiving a bribe’, etc. The zone of changes includes ‘crime’, ‘violation of the law’, ‘punishment’, ‘bad thing’, etc. A bribe as gratitude, a bribe as reward and a bribe as mediation reflect actions related to corrupt behavior. Teachers’ social perceptions of corruption reflect the contradictory nature of the phenomenon, and the content of social perceptions is related to economic interest. The specifics of teachers’ perceptions of corruption are related to the possibility of receiving (earning) money. The leading motive is selfinterest, profit and improvement of the financial situation.