Encouraging student ethical behavior through ethical climate in higher education

Received Dec 30, 2020 Revised Apr 3, 2021 Accepted May 15, 2021 This study investigated the direct and indirect effects of learning styles, ethics education, and ethical climate on student’s ethical behavior. The samples were obtained through a proportionate random sampling technique so that 273 students had taken the courses of conservation education, professional ethics for teachers, and business ethics. The data were collected using questionnaires and analyzed using path analysis. The research findings showed that learning styles and ethical education could directly influence ethical behavior. At the same time, the ethical climate did not have a direct influence on ethical behavior. The ethical climate could not mediate the effect of learning styles and ethics education on ethical behavior. It means that learning styles and ethical education contribute significantly to the formation of good behavior and student’s characters. It is supporting a learning styles approach suggests that it offers benefit to students.


INTRODUCTION
To nurture students into an individual who can cope with challenges in their adult life, the university has to identify and develop a way for students to reach their maximum potential. Even though it is essential, there is also a struggle to manage student development [1]. One says that cognitive development will lead to greater output, while others believe that a character-based approach emphasizes that ethical and moral virtue will give more effective results [2]. Despite its conclusiveness, there are many interests in ethical conduct and how to stimulate it through education.
The aim of the educational program, in this case, is university, is to improve students's ethical awareness and help them to have the ability to see the difference between right and wrong. Therefore, when they graduate, they can become managers, accountants, and teachers, or anything they want and be the better version of themselves. One way or example for the university to achieve this kind of output is developing a curriculum that required students to take a course in business ethics [3], [4]. A developing student who has high virtue is one of the most critical missions for university. Unfortunately, there is not a complete understanding of how to help students develop ethical behavior. The absence of knowledge regarding student development on ethical behavior will lead them to practice fraudulent behavior such as cheating, plagiarism, and other dishonest behaviors. In fact, in a well-known business school, the level of fraud is very high [5]- [7]. It has become crystal clear that further research on ethical behavior on the student is quite urgent. Some researchers found that external factors such as student environment turn out to be factors that affect the student's ethical behavior [8]. The results show that the student admitted to dishonest behavior reports their class to be more communal, less individualized than those who did not report unethical behavior. This situation occurs since the ethical climate provides opportunities for students to cheat. Somebody can interpret that the level of sensitivity of students in the class to ethics is shallow. Another external variable affecting student ethical behavior is shown by [9], who argue that teaching styles will vary depending on the person who does the teaching will reflect student ethical conduct. Although external factors have attributed to ethical behavior, another result from a different research perspective has shown that individual elements can affect student ethical conduct [10]. Align with prior argument. We can conclude that within university or any educational environment, we can nature student ethical behavior by external factors such as ethical climate and ethics education and individual characteristics such as learning styles [11].
Nowadays, the spotlight on educational literature has focused on the learning styles of students. In a way, student learning styles separated into three criteria, diverges, assimilators, convergers, and accommodators [9], [11]. Student's learning cannot be an oversight as it is also an influential factor to student's ethical behavior. The interaction between learning styles and students conducting ethical behavior does not appear studied yet. The researcher decided that any education method that applies to the student should be fit with student learning preferences. While we can separate the student learning preferences into two stems, the experiential and non-experiential [12], to decide which method is the most effective way to approach each learning preference and its effect on ethical behavior is still undecided. The experiential learner will likely engage in ethical behavior by gaining experience in the formal classroom, such as attending business ethics class [13]. For non-experiential learning, ethical climate, a value or practice within organizations that pertain to morals and virtue, has shown to affect ethical behavior [14], [15]. As mention in social learning theory, people will behave following what sure of value is acceptable by their environment by observing and gathering information on their surroundings (i.e., ethical climate) [1].
The difference with previous research is the focus of ethics education in higher education, conservation education, professional ethics of economics teacher, and business ethics. It provides an overview of the success of ethics education to shape pre-service teachers, entrepreneurship, manager, and accountant character. Good character will support the development of good behavior. It can minimize fraud tendency and cheating. So, they have character and pleasing personalities in the workplace. Besides, our research contributes to strengthening the student's behavior that can improve character. One of them is through enhancing students learning.
We believe that learning styles on ethical behavior will vary depending on the student's ethical climate and ethics education. While many questions regarding the relation of learning styles to student ethical behavior, we attempt to shed light on how learning styles on students, interacting with ethics climate and ethics education in university, affect student's ethical behavior. This study investigated determining the direct and indirect effects of learning styles, ethics education, and ethical climate on student's ethical behavior.

Learning styles, ethics education, ethical climate, and ethical behaviors of students
The application of learning methods to student learning styles significantly influences academic success [9]. Based on humanistic learning theory about the learning stages, the active experimentation stage describes how knowledge was created through experience transformation in the fourth stage. Individuals differ in their preferences using learning styles because of passion, specific life experiences, and current environmental demands, which produce different learning styles for other students [16], [17].
The research conducted by [9] suggested that various levels of learning space also affect different levels of learning. When it comes to ethics, formal learning is learning in the form of active experimentation. Therefore, students can solve conflicts that often occur in individuals. They suggest that deep learning is very well used in ethical learning. They use the experience as a source of learning and solving conflicts that often occur in individuals, both conflict with peers and the environment. To stimulate deep learning, students must be forced out of their comfort zone to encourage students to be actively involved in learning. To enable deep learning, students engaged in a type of learning that is less frequently used and, in a sense, out of their comfort zone [13]. Learning styles can have a relationship with ethical education and ethical climate to influence student's ethical behavior ultimately. Learning style, student ethical behavior can be formed by individual factors and contextual factors such as the ethical climate of higher education. Based on the explanation above, the research hypothesis is as; H1: There is a direct effect of learning styles on student's ethical behavior.
The ethical climate typology that was conceived for the private sector adapted to the public sector (higher education). Ethical climate is the shared perception of ethically correct behavior and how ethical issues should be handled). Deep learning theory [18] states that for the non-experiential learner, observing the environment, and then decided whether the academic integrity existed or not will reinforce the will to act according tothe ethical standard. The prior research shows that learning style that matched with the experience of students who took the ethics education class will positively impact student conducting ethical behavior [19]. Bandura explained that people learn through observing others' behavior, attitudes, and outcomes of those behaviors. Most human behavior is learned observationally through modeling from observing others. One forms an idea of how new behaviors are performed. On later occasions, this coded information serves as a guide for action. Based on the explanation above, the research hypothesis is as; H2: There is an indirect effect of learning styles on students' ethical behavior through ethical climate. Deep learning theory [9] suggests that each individual has different preferences in their learning place. Learning is defined as the place where learning occurs, regardless of formal or informal learning experience [20]. Formal learning takes place in a controlled setting such as ethical education taught in university. Ethical education that exists in learning largely determines the formation of student ethical behavior. The purpose of ethics education is to develop a higher level of moral awareness and moral maturity in students [13]. The student will get ethics education as one of the subjects in their class and grasp the theoretical framework regarding ethical conduct to cope with the ethical dilemma that one day will face in the business world. Following the results of [9] in-depth learning about ethics strongly influences ethical behavior. In-depth learning is a form of habituation to ethical behavior in students. The students believed that the business ethics class they participated in would bring benefits as their time experiences used as a basis for ethical behavior in business and work [21]. The research conducted by [5], [22] also found a positive relation to ethics education on student ethical behavior. Ethical education the formation of student ethical behavior can be mediated by ethical climate in the classroom. For instance, cheating behavior that makes students get friends' answers can bring unethical behavior, so cheating behavior eliminated in the individual. The lack of knowledge and habituation to ethics instilled early so that later when graduating, can have a good character. Based on the above explanations, the hypotheses of this study are as follows. Based on the description above, the research hypothesis is as; H3: There is a direct effect of ethics education on students' ethical behavior.
According to social learning theory, people will behave following what sure of value is acceptable by their environment by observing and gathering information on their surroundings (i.e., ethical climate) [23]. As the student received ethics education in classes, the interactions with peers outside the classroom will also lead the student to conduct ethical behavior. While ethics education is a form of formal learning [24], ethical behavior achieved when the students also experience informal learning such as ethical climate [25]. Thus we believe that there will be an indirect effect of ethics education to ethical behavior through ethical climate. Based on the explanation above, the research hypothesis is as; H4: There is an indirect effect of ethics education on student's ethical behavior through ethical climate.
Learning involves the process of socializing individuals with classes. Consequently, they interact with each other. Learning theory explained that the ethical climate is a learning space [26]. It means that learning is an interaction between individuals and the social environment. Students develop experiences and share them with their groups based on their experience providing support for ethical climates as learning spaces because they define [13]. Climate is one of the most influential contexts. An ethical climate is a shared perception of what ethical behavior is suitable and how ethical issues are addressed. Research has shown that situational factors, such as the existence of a code of ethics, adherence to authority or conformity with groups, and shared perceptions organizational policies and practices, can have a strong impact on the ethics of individual behavior [27]. In the university, the fraud has long been recognized as one of unethical behavior [28]. Fraud can be a dishonest decision. The individual unethical behavior depends on social norms implied by other members' dishonesty [29]. Therefore, peers and perceptions about fraud can contribute to an ethical climate that will affect student's academic dishonesty.
According to social learning theory, ethical behavior from individuals derived from how they process the information of what type of behaviors are acceptable by their society through observation of others in their surroundings [30]. Moreover, individuals are influenced by their formal experience and informal factors and social norms or what is considered acceptable by their significant others [31]. The ethical climate will send a signal to the student within a class that ethical behavior is mandatory. When the student discovers that unethical behavior is prohibited and punished, they are less likely to perform from such behavior [32]. Thus, we believe that ethical climate will likely affect the ethical values and behavior on the student. Based on the explanation above, the research hypothesis is as; H5: There is a direct effect of the ethical climate on student ethical behavior.

RESEARCH METHOD 2.1. The type of research and the samples
This research was used quantitative approach. The population of this research is all students of the Faculty of Economics who have taken the subject of conservation education, professional ethics for teachers,

Research variable
The first variable in this study is the learning style, which is student's learning style in the learning process. The indicators are kinesthetic, aural, visual, and read/write developed using the research instrument [32]. This is twenty-two questions within this questionnaire which use a seven-point Likert scale (very strongly disagree=1, strongly disagree=2, disagree=3, neutral=4, agree=5, strongly agree=6, and very strongly agree=7), and we applied this scale on all of our questions. The second variable is ethics education, namely moral awareness to produce students who have a particular character, while the indicators are thieving, sexual abuse, and hiding other friend's fault, developed from the research of [17], [28]. The ethics education questionnaire consists of nine questions. The third variables are ethical climate, namely student's perceptions of what happens ethically correct and how ethical issues must be related to cheating and free indicators developed from the research of [17], [28]. Ethical climate questionnaire consists of nine questions. The Fourth variable is ethical behavior following social norms that are generally accepted with the right and good actions. The measurement for these variables developed from the research of [17], [28], which use ten questions within the questionnaire.
In Table 2, we present the correlation matrix to confirm the validity of the variables we used. The criteria used to determine the validity of the questionnaire refer to the previous description that the factor loading is greater than 0.05 to 0.06, which is considered sufficient as the criteria for meeting convergent validity. Based on the results of the simultaneous equation structure analysis on the combined loadings and cross loadings table, it is known that each indicator in the learning style, ethics education, ethical climate, and ethical behavior variables has a bigger loading factor equal to 0.05 and each is significant (p<0.001).
Furthermore, the consistency level of the measuring instrument is tested followed by testing the instrument reliability. The measurement of reliability is conducted by one shot or one measurement, where the measurement is done only once. Then the results are compared with other questions or measuring the correlation between the answers to the questions. Testing is done by looking at the Cronbach Alpha value. If the Cronbach Alpha value is> 0.70, then the instrument is reliable. A summary of the results of the pilot test instrument reliability testing is in Table 3.

Data analysis technique
Data were collected by distributing the questionnaires. The questionnaires were distributed using google forms. The result was analyzed by using path analysis. Path analysis was used to give an interpretation or quantitative interpretation for the relationship between several variables and models. The aim of path analysis is to determine direct and indirect influences among the number of variables. For testing the hypothesis, it can be seen from the p-value (probability value). If the p-value is less than 0.05, it means that hypothesis is accepted. If the p-value is more than 0.05, it means that hypothesis is rejected.

Results
The hypothesis test results can be known from the regression weight table, as shown in Table 4. There are two accepted hypotheses known from the significance values in column P, which are less than 0.05. The three-star sign indicates that the p-value is less than 0.001. Meanwhile, there are three rejected hypotheses seen from a significance level of more than 0.05.  Then, to find out the influence between variables can be seen from the standardized regression weights table. As mention in Table 5, the estimate column shows how much influence between variables. It is known that learning styles significantly affect ethical behavior by 16%, and ethical education affects ethical behavior by 60.1%. To find out the results of whether there is an indirect effect in the model formed, it was tested using the significance of the indirect effect using the Sobel test. From the results of the double test on the second hypothesis (H2), there is an indirect influence of learning styles on ethical behavior of students through ethical climate to obtain a probability value (two-tailed probability) 0.50 (more than 0.05) so that it can be concluded that this hypothesis 2 rejected. There is no indirect influence of learning styles on student's ethical behavior through ethical climate. Meanwhile, the results of the double test on the fourth hypothesis (H4), namely the existence of indirect ethics education influence on ethical behavior of students through ethical climate obtained a probability value (two-tailed probability) 0.85 (more than 0.05) so that it can be concluded that the fourth hypothesis (H4) this was rejected. This means that there is no indirect ethics education influence on student's ethical behavior through ethical climate. Table 6 shows a summary of all hypotheses results that have been submitted.

Analysis 3.2.1. The direct effect of learning styles on ethical behavior
Based on the results, the learning styles have directly affected ethical behavior. The results of this study are in accordance with the study of [9], which resulted in findings that to enable deep learning; students must be involved in a type of learning that is less often used and of their comfort zone so that learning styles can influence student ethical behavior. Descriptively, student learning styles are suitable, and the ethical behavior of the students is also good. It can conclude that if learning styles are good, it will affect students' ethical behavior to be better. Students' learning styles through visual, aural, read or write, and kinesthetic learning can form student ethical awareness to compile and reflect the ethical nature of past actions. Therefore, it is likely that students always behave ethically.

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It is in line with humanistic learning theory, which states that there are four stages of learning, namely the stage of concrete experience, the stages of active and reflective observation, the conceptualization stage, and the active experimentation stage. The connection with the results of this study is that it starts with students at the stage of concrete experiences that they see and feel when experiencing various learning styles, then thinking about how various learning styles and developing learning styles suit students. When deep learning styles are appropriately regarded and applied, students can apply knowledge to ethical behavior acquired in everyday life [13], [33].
Individuals differ in their preferences using learning styles because of passion, certain life experiences, and current environmental demands, which produce different learning styles for different students [9], [34]. They suggest that various levels of learning space also affect different levels of learning. When it comes to ethics, the right learning is learning in the form of active experimentation. So that students can solve conflicts that often occur in individuals. The deep learning is very well used in ethical learning. They use the experience as a source of learning and solving conflicts that often arise in individuals both conflict with peers and the environment [1], [11]. To stimulate deep learning, students must be forced out of their comfort zone to encourage students to be actively involved in learning.

The indirect effect of learning styles towards ethical behavior through ethical climate
Based on the result of the study, learning style does not have any effect on ethical behavior through an ethical climate. It means learning style does not influence ethical behavior when it is mediated by an ethical climate. Descriptively, learning style and ethical behavior of students have been good, but not for the ethical climate. From the result of the study, it can be concluded that learning styles do not have any indirect influence on ethical influence through ethical climate. Learning styles as individual factors have usually been owned and formed by the long-term experience felt by students so that the student's learning type have been emerged and internalized. The learning styles showed by each student are also different, so that the ethical behavior shown is various.
Therefore, the ethical climate in the classroom is not able to change students' ethical behavior [6]. When students have found their suitable learning styles, the ethical behavior shown will also be good regardless of whether the ethical climate in the classroom is good or not. In addition, students who have bad learning styles, their ethical behavior will also be bad even though the ethical climate in the classroom has been good [27], [29]. The result of the study is in line with the humanistic learning theory in which this theory includes only the internal interaction by individual, started from the step of concrete experience, active and reflective observation, conceptualization, and active experimentation so that the ethical climate is not able to mediate the learning styles towards the ethical behavior since the ethical climate is regarded as the factor outside the individual who is not following the humanistic theory [33], [35].

The direct effect of ethic education towards ethical behavior
Based on the result of the study, ethical education directly affects ethical behavior. The research is in line with the study of [8], which stated that deep learning about ethics has a strong effect on ethical behavior. The deep learning is able to form of customary learning of student's ethical behavior. The students believe that business ethics class that they follow will benefit because the experience they get can become a base for ethical behavior in business and work. Descriptively, student's ethic education is good. It concluded that good ethical education would improve ethical behavior.
Ethic education got by students through the Introduction to conservation, business ethic, and professional ethics and teacher's personality, can create the sensitivity and ethical dilemma felt by the students so that they can form their moral awareness so that they can arrange and reflect the ethical characteristics that they get, and then apply the ethical learning they get in daily life [28]. The suitable choice of learning style made in order to stimulate a deep understanding so that the experience they get can exacerbate their understanding and ethical behavior [22], [36]. The relation with this study started by students in the concrete experience stage who can see and feel when they got an ethic subject, and then the students are started to enter the next stage, which is the observation about how this ethic education is essential to learn [4], [5]. Then, students will develop the ethical education. They are then inactive experimentation stage so that they will be interested in practicing the ethical concept they get in their daily lives.

The indirect effect of ethic education towards ethical behavior through ethical climate
Based on the study result, ethics education does not affect ethical behavior through an ethical climate. The student's ethic education and ethical behaviore good, but the ethical climate is not. The result of this study concluded that if ethical education has no indirect effect on ethical behavior through the ethical climate. Ethical education that students get through formal education is similar; every student must take the Conservation Education, Business Ethics (for non-education students), and personality ethic and teacher profession (for education students). However, the capability and desire to apply each theory is different [13].
When students get the ethic education and they can accept and understand well, so that ethic education that they get will try to be applied by students in their daily life so that their ethical behavior is good, no matter if the ethical climate in the classroom shows the good or bad situation. The existence of formal ethic education that students get has been enough to grow and form good ethical behavior without influenced by the good ethical climate [37]. The ethical climate is not able to mediate ethic education towards the ethical behavior because the ethical climate is regarded as a factor outside the individual who does not follow the humanistic learning theory [31].

The direct effect of ethical climate towards the ethical behavior
Based on the result of the study, ethical climate does not affect ethical behavior. It is predicted due to the stronger ethical behavior influenced by the capacity and student's ego, not from the outside factor, such as ethical climate, in line with the study of [37] who stated that someone's ego is related theoretically to moral behavior. The ego strength is defined as the ability to rule his own self, specifically about the endurance toward the encouragement and determination to follow someone's belief. Individual capacity for self-arrangement is related to the relevant result ethically [19]. Descriptively, the ethical climate is not quite good, whereas ethical behavior has been good. The result of this study concluded that the ethical climate has no effect on ethical behavior. Based on the existing phenomena, ethical behavior is an action done by individuals and only related to the individual him/herself, not by other people.
The ethical climate in the classroom is not able to influence the student's ethical behavior. It is predicted because most of the students have strong self-belief along with the ethic internalized so that the environment does not influence them. Individual ethical behavior is difficult to be changed in the short-term, even though there is an outside influence such as ethical climate in the classroom. When students have had the self-belief on their good ethics, they will show good ethical behavior. Therefore, the influence outside the individual, such as ethical climate (cheating in the classroom) cannot change and form the student's ethical behavior [6], [38]. In this section, it is explained the results of the research and, at the same time is given a comprehensive discussion. Results can be presented in figures, graphs, tables and others that make the reader understand easily. The discussion can be made in several sub-chapters. Learning style and ethics education can directly influence ethical behavior while the ethical climate has no direct effect on ethical behavior. The study also shows that ethical climate cannot mediate the influence of learning style and ethics education toward ethical behavior. This research explains the humanistic learning theory from [9], which stated that learning style and ethical education could influence the success of individual learning, both cognitive and behavior [39], [40].

CONCLUSION
Learning styles and ethic education had a positive and significant effect on ethical behavior. However, when those independent variables were mediated by ethical climate the effect was insignificant. Learning styles and ethical education contribute significantly to the formation of good behavior and student's character. Deep learning ethics has a strong influence on ethical behavior. Moreover, learning styles and ethics education play an essential role in shaping student's behavior. The ethical climate of the university is an informal learning space where students can be good members of the climate and gain concrete experiences, in a sense the practical application of vicarious learning. We consider the theory and evidence supporting ethical behavior students with vicarious learning styles and ethic education. This is supporting a learning style approach that suggests that it offers benefits to students. The students can get the good character that used in the class, workplace, and society. Based on our findings, we recommend more research into the interaction of teacher attitude and ethical climate-related to several outcomes linked to developing more ethical students.
The limitation of this study is we are not using any control variables. The independent variables that we use in this research are mean to be tested. We highly recommend that any attempt to re-examine the same model with ours add control variables such as the learning environment, the lecture, or the peer person to ensure that the model is robust.