If you cheat at social video games, you might also be more likely to cheat the Internal Revenue Service, take a handicapped-only parking spot illegally or swipe towels from your hotel room.

That’s the conclusion of a survey conducted for Seattle’s PopCap Games that makes a connection between using a bot or other means to cheat while playing social games such as Bejeweled, and cheating in the real world.

The survey found that social game cheaters are nearly 3.5 times as likely to be dishonest in the real world than gamers who don’t cheat.

Here are some more results from the survey:

--53 percent of people who cheat in social games report cheating on tests at school.

--U.K. cheaters are significantly more likely to cheat on their taxes than U.S. cheaters (58 percent versus 33 percent).

--51 percent of people who cheat at social games report stealing towels, cups or other items from hotels (compared to just 14 percent of those who said they don’t cheat at social games).

--51 percent of people who cheat at social games report parking in handicap spaces despite not being eligible (compared to only 12 percent of those who don’t cheat in social games).

--49 percent of people who cheat at social games report cheating on a committed relationship.

--47 percent of people who cheat at social games report stealing packets of sugar, butter or jam from a restaurant.

--43 percent of people who cheat at social games report stealing magazines from a waiting room.

-- U.S. gamers who live in the Midwest are the most likely to cheat in comparison to other regions (29 percent).

“It’s not surprising that online cheating parallels real-world cheating, even if people are just experimenting with the possibilities,” said Dr. Mia Consalvo, of Concordia University. “With more of our daily systems and processes moving online, and being divorced from human contact (downloading music, filing taxes online) the risks either appear to be lesser, or they don’t feel like crimes.”

The survey was conducted by Information Solutions Group for PopCap Games.

The information comes from 1,201 online surveys. To qualify for participation, individuals must play social games for more than 15 minutes a week. This social game playing audience consisted of 101 cheaters and 1,100 non-cheaters.