Modified: 2007-01-21
Plagiarism is using a written or other intellectual work of someone else and claiming it as your own. Plagiarism is a serious ethical breach. One problem in academic institutions is that many students do not know what constitutes plagiarism, nor do faculty always provide a clear definition (Murray, 2002a).
Martin (1994) identifies four types of plagiarism of interest to students: (1) word–for–word plagiarism, (2) paraphrasing plagiarism, (3) plagiarism of secondary sources, and (4) plagiarism of ideas. You can prevent these types of plagiarism in your work by knowing that they are wrong and actively avoiding them. Certainly, plagiarism caused by carelessness or incompetence is curable by skill building. For example, many students do not realize that cutting and pasting from the Web without acknowledging the original author is plagiarism. In response, some instructor use new tools that detect plagiarism from Web sources (Young, 2001).
Why are we so concerned about plagiarism? One reason is that we want to teach correct scientific procedures. Properly acknowledging the work of fellow scientists is important not only as a basic procedural characteristic of science but also as a safeguard for science itself. Science suffers when research results are plagiarized. Healthy science requires that all people trust scientific results. Another reason is to protect the scientists who think up research ideas, conduct studies, and publish data. They are valuable to society. Plagiarizers threaten scientific procedures, public confidence in science, and scientists’s livelihoods. So, learn what plagiarism is and how to avoid it. Cite previous scientific work properly.