What is Plagiarism and How to Avoid It?

Academic writers need to use material from other writers to support their own ideas. Failure to integrate this material appropriately can lead to plagiarism, a form of academic misconduct. This video explains what plagiarism is, gives types of plagiarism, gives some examples of acceptable and unacceptable source use, lists reasons why students plagiarise, and suggests ways to avoid plagiarism.

Plagiarism, which means using words or ideas of other writers without giving proper acknowledgement, can be categorised according to the intent of the writer into intentional plagiarism (also called deliberate plagiarism) and unintentional plagiarism (also referred to as textual or accidental plagiarism).

Reasons why students plagiarise include: time difficulties; lack of understanding of what plagiarism is; lack of citation skills; inability to paraphrase appropriately; lack of good note-taking skills; and a belief that the plagiarism will not be detected.

Methods to avoid plagiarism include: training in citation and paraphrasing skills; improving time management skills; familiarisation with appropriate citation requirements; learning how to take effective notes; and avoiding Internet sources.

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[joemariecandido]

It encourages us to make our broader mind in making our own way of sharing own's expertise and intellectual abilities.

[babissk]

So I wrote a eight page MLA format research paper about Cristiano Ronaldo. I found this really helpful book and I used it to write my research paper. Obviously when I found a very helpful sentence I quoted it with the authors name. I also cited a lot of sources on my works cited page. I also had to have a cover page with my name, class, teachers name, and also the title. In total I had 11 pages on my research paper. I used the book a lot and I used details and I put it into my own words. After my class and I submitted our research papers, my teacher graded all of them in a couple weeks. Now a month and a half later, she says she hasn’t officially submitted our grades because a lot of us did bad and plagiarized. Also, I am in the honors English class, but the other students in my class only did 1 page or maybe two. Only like seven people in our class did at-least seven which was the requirement. Back to the grading, my teacher said that she has this app which she could put our research people and see a certain percent. She said that one student had 94% plagiarized. I am worried that I had like 50% plagiarized without even knowing. I put all the work into my own words, cited my sources, and put “” marks on the best quotes. Do you think I will be okay or I will have plagiarized work.

[sueargent]

The emphasis on paraphrasing (changing word class, word order etc) doesn't help. The key word is 'integrate'. Students need to develop their own stances on the subject and integrate the ideas of cited authors.

[kjyong]

so if i copy other people word and cited it, does it still count as plagiarism?