What Prevents Students from Reporting Academic Misconduct? A Survey of Croatian Students Vanja Pupovac 1 & Stjepka Popović 1,2 & Vedran Blažina 3 # Springer Nature B.V. 2019 Abstract Academic misconduct is widespread in all cultures, and factors that influence it have been investigated for many years. An act of reporting peers’ misconduct not only identifies and prevents misconduct, but also encourages a student to think and act morally and raises awareness about academic integrity. The aim of this study was to determine factors that prevent students from reporting academic misconduct. A ques- tionnaire to assess views on reporting the academic misconduct of a colleague was developed and sent to all students enrolled at the University of Rijeka, Croatia. Results indicate that a tendency to protect fellow student and to comply with other opinions is the most influential factor that prevents students from reporting peers’ misbehavior. Furthermore, scientific discipline, gender, and age are all significant factors in students’ intention to report peer misconduct. Understanding the factors that influence students’ willingness to report academic misconduct enables faculties, administrators and students to strengthen the ethical culture in the academic community. Keywords Academic misconduct . Academic integrity . Academic dishonesty . Reporting academic misconduct Journal of Academic Ethics https://doi.org/10.1007/s10805-019-09341-5 Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s10805-019- 09341-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Vanja Pupovac vanja.pupovac@uniri.hr Stjepka Popović stjepka.popovic@uniri.hr 1 Faculty of Medicine, Department of Social Sciences and Medical Humanities, University of Rijeka, Brace Branchetta 20, 51000 Rijeka, Croatia 2 Faculty of Health Studies, Department of Public Health, University of Rijeka, Viktora Cara Emina 5, 51 000 Rijeka, Croatia 3 Faculty of Medicine, University of Rijeka, Brace Branchetta 20, 51000 Rijeka, Croatia