Strategic Interactions in Academic Dishonesty: A Game-Theoretic Analysis of the Exam Script Swapping Mechanism

This paper presents a novel game theoretic framework for analyzing academic dishonesty through the lens of a unique deterrent mechanism: forced exam script swapping between students caught copying. We model the strategic interactions between students as a non cooperative game with asymmetric information and examine three base scenarios asymmetric preparation levels, mutual non preparation, and coordinated partial preparation. Our analysis reveals that the script swapping punishment creates a stronger deterrent effect than traditional penalties by introducing strategic interdependence in outcomes. The Nash equilibrium analysis demonstrates that mutual preparation emerges as the dominant strategy. The framework provides insights for institutional policy design, suggesting that unconventional punishment mechanisms that create mutual vulnerability can be more effective than traditional individual penalties. Future empirical validation and behavioral experiments are proposed to test the model predictions, including explorations of tapering off effects in punishment severity over time.