Plagiarism Deterrence in CS1 Through Keystroke Data

Abstract

Recent work in computing education has explored the idea of analyzing and grading using the process of writing a computer program rather than just the final submitted code. We build on this idea by investigating the effect on plagiarism when the process of coding, in the form of keystroke logs, is submitted for grading in addition to the final code. We report results from two terms of a university CS1 course in which students submitted keystroke logs. We find that when students are required to submit a log of keystrokes together with their written code they are less likely to plagiarize. In this paper we explore issues of implementation, adoption, deterrence, anxiety, and privacy. Our keystroke logging software is available in the form of an IDE plugin in a public plugin repository.