Plagiarism

Plagiarism has always been an issue in academic life. With the advent of the web it is becoming an even greater issue. I have summarized very briefly some of the main issues. These ideas were collected from several web sites which are linked at the bottom.

Stephen Wilhoit defines plagiarism in "Helping Students Avoid Plagiarism" :

• Buying a paper from a research service or term paper mill.
• Turning in another student's work without that student's knowledge.
• Turning in a paper a peer has written for the student.
• Copying a paper from a source text without proper acknowledgment.
• Copying material from a source text, supplying proper documentation, but leaving out quotation marks.
• Paraphrasing material from a source text without appropriate documentation.

Wilhoit, Stephen. "Helping Students Avoid Plagiarism." College Teaching 42.4(1994):161+. Academic Search Elite. EbscoHost. Goshen College Good Library.17 March 2003.

Preventing Plagiarism

• Include a precise statement on your syllabus concerning plagiarism.
• Provide a series of deadlines or checkpoints for topic proposals, note taking, bibliographic sources, outline, rough drafts, etc.
• Educate students as to
  • what plagiarism is -- academic integrity quizzes can be found at these sites
    • University of Southern California
    • Villanova University
  • how to research (do not assume students know how to search and use library and web resources)
  • what plagiarism looks like - show examples of plagiarism
    • Writing Center at Indiana University
    • online quiz developed by Ted Frick, Indiana University
  • proper note-taking, documenting
• Collect written work from students at the beginning of the semester to have a sample of their writing styles.
• Ask students to include photocopies or print outs of title pages of sources used or a database search.
• Rethink the term project. Use unique formats for final presentation, e.g., newsletter, powerpoint, web site, in-class presentation, etc.
• Require an annotated bibliography.
• Use an in-class writing assignment when paper is handed in. What did they learn from their research? Where did they locate most of their resources? This can provide a writing sample.
• Require students to follow a specific outline that you have designed.

Detecting Plagiarism

• Note unusual vocabulary or writing style for that student.
• Note whether sources are current. (Paper mills often contain older bibliographic sources.)
• Can the student discuss the ideas in the paper and follow up on sources cited? Ask them to summarize the paper on the final exam.
• Compare with the original assignment. Has it followed the requirements?
• Note paragraphs or sentences seemingly out of context.
• Are most of the materials cited not located in the Good Library?
• Plagiarized.com includes sample essays for use as an exercise in detecting plagiarism.

Tracking down Plagiarism

• Use search engines. Use more than one engine since no one engine indexes all sites. (Google, Alta Vista, HotBot, Dogpile, etc.) Type in unusual phrases or unique keywords. Or use the words "term paper" or "research paper" and the subject.
• Search library full text databases or other online reference sources. Again type in unusual phrases or unique keywords. Be familiar with the databases in your discipline but don't forget general databases like Academic Search Elite which is popular with students. This not only has some full text articles but also good abstracts which are easy to cut and paste. (The library has many full text databases.)*
• Know where full text book reviews are located. Try online book stores, like Amazon.com or H-Net Reviews (scholarly review journals) or BookSpot with links to other book review web sites.
• Be aware of the many term paper sites. (Kimbal Library, Coastal Carolina University has a list of more than 250 paper mills.)
• Try a detection site. Most require subscriptions.
• See Yahoo! Business & Economy: Shopping & Services: Writing & Editing: Academic Services: Research & Term Papers.

The above ideas were taken from various websites. Check these out for more details:

• A Faculty Guide to Cyber-Plagiarism (University of Alberta)
• Anti-Plagiarism Strategies for Research Papers (Robert Harris, Ph.D.)
• Cut-and-Paste Plagiarism: Preventing, Detecting and Tracking Online Plagiarism (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)

Read these:

• Ashworth, Peter and Philip Bannister. "Guilty in Whose Eyes? University Students' Perceptions of Cheating and Plagiarism in Academic Work and Assessment." Studies in Higher Education 22.2(1997):187. (available on Academic Search Elite)
• Bugeja, Michael. "Busting the New Breed of Plagiarist." Writer's Chronicle Sept 2000. 11 Nov 2002. <http://awpwriter.org/magazine/writers/bugeja1.htm>.
• Kloss, Robert J. "Writing Things Down vs. Writing Things Up." College Teaching 44(1996):3-7. (available on Academic Search Elite)
• Long, Phillip D. "Plagiarism: IT-Enabled Tools for Deceit?" Highlights from Syllabus Magazine. January 2002. SyllabusWeb. 8 Feb 2002.
• Vernon, Robert F., Shirley Bigna, Marshall L. Smith. "Plagiarism and the Web." Journal of Social Work Education 37.1(2001):193. (available on Academic Search Elite)
  

Statement from Goshen College Student Handbook on Academic Integrity

Statement from Goshen College Catalog on Academic Integrity

Statement from Faculty Handbook 2002 on Academic Integrity

 

"...there are so many easily reached term-paper sites that any student who has access to the Web can get a full-text paper on almost any topic in minutes, and often for free.:

O'Leary, Mick. "The Web Banishes Term-Paper Blues." Information Today 16.3(1999):14-16. Academic Search Elite. Palni SiteSearch. Goshen College Good Library. 30 January 2002.

 

*The library subscribes to the following full text databases: Academic Search Elite, AccessScience, ACS, Biography Resource Center, Business Source Premier, Encyclopedia of Animals, ERIC (digests), Health Source, Informe!, JSTOR, Lexis-Nexis, LitFinder, Masterfile, NetLibrary, Newspaper Source, Project Muse, Processional Development Collection.

updated 7/24/2003