Is Plagiarism Cheating or an Attempt to Understand Writing - Assignment Example

Is Plagiarism Cheating or an Attempt for Students to Understand Writing? Abstract Plagiarism is a very serious offense in most colleges and universities. Professors frown on it and students can received very poor grades or be expelled from college for plagiarism. Most students have no idea that they are plagiarizing when they do it, but they are penalized for it just the same. This paper gives an understanding from a student's point of view as to what plagiarism is and why it is done. Also, the paper will suggest that most students who plagiarize do not see it as cheating or they do not do it on purpose. Is Plagiarism Cheating or an Attempt for Students to Understand Writing? The topic of plagiarism has become an important part of academic work in every field. Professors complain that students blatantly cheat by handing in papers that have been written through cutting and pasting information from the Internet. Many professors are using programs like Turnitin to stop students from cheating. However, most students coming to college for the first time, have no idea how to write an academic paper in an academic style. They also may not know how to ask questions about it or when they do, they may not receive the answers from the professor that they need. Although most students have a fear of plagiarism, most are not attempting to cheat. Instead, they are attempting to figure out what the professor wants in the way of writing and present a paper that will give them a passing grade. From the students' point of view, cheating is not an issue; learning to write in an academic style is the issue. Many students went through high school not thinking of going to college. They may have written a few term papers, but nothing that would merit their knowledge of an academic style in college. Unfortunately, most college professors expect that students come to class understanding how to write a paper. If they do not, the professor assumes that the student will go to the writing center and learn how to do it. However, writing centers are not created equal and they do not always have students who know how to write in APA style, so the student can fail again to gain the knowledge they need. The use of different styles of writing can be difficult for students also. Generally, they must distinguish between APA and MLA styles, depending on what the professor requires This can also cause problems for a student because they may not have been exposed to these styles in the past. In order to understand the role of plagiarism in academic honesty, it is important to understand what it is and how it works. Literature Review Definition of Plagiarism According to Craig, Federici, and Buehler (2010) plagiarism has become an important aspect of academic work in college. Many students are crafty and find ways to cheat but this is not always the case. According to Plaigiarism.org, there are several situations that are considered plagiarism. These include: 1. Handing in a paper that someone else did and saying that it is your paper. 2. Coping the ideas or specific words that someone else has done and not giving them proper credit. 3. Using a quote from somewhere and not putting in quotation marks or giving credit for the quote. 4. Giving the wrong information about a quotation. 5. copying too many words or ideas from a specific force that is made up of most information The most important aspect of writing a paper is to make sure that the sources that are used are properly noted. This happens when the writer understands the different types of plagiarism and how to work towards creating their best work. Types of Plagiarism There are several types of plagiarism that a student must be aware of in order to write their best work. These include, according to Rajeev (2010): Internet Plagiarism which is done by cutting and pasting information from websites and saying that the information is the student's. This type of plagiarism has become more important to understand because more students are doing it because it is easy and there are many term papers that can be found online. Full plagiarism happens when someone uses sources exactly like they are written and does not give credit to the original authors for the information. Partial plagiarism happens when an individual uses part of the information they have found at websites and part of their original information. They do not cite the information they have downloaded and pass it off as their own. Minimalistic plagiarism happens when an individual paraphrases awkwardly instead of understanding the process of paraphrasing. They take ideas, thoughts or opinions and paraphrase them in such a way that they have not developed their own information. An example of minimalistic plagiarism might be someone taking the concepts for Facebook and making them into another social website that looks and feels like Facebook, but is called something entirely different. People can also plagiarize themselves by taking papers that have been written for other courses and handing them in as "new" papers for the new course. Rajeev suggests that some authors of books do this as they redo their book and sell it to other mediums without letting the buyer know that it is the same work. Why People Plagiarize There are many reasons why people may plagiarize. The largest reason is because they do not understand that what they are doing is not correct. Some people feel that they are too busy and they need something done quickly, so they put together a research paper by cutting and pasting information they can find on the Internet. Sometimes this is a matter of time restraints. As an example, if someone works full time, goes to school full time and takes care of a family, they may feel that they do not have time to write all the papers they must write. In these cases, pulling something from the Internet or using someone else's paper may be easier for them. According to Singham (2006), it is rare that a student plagiarizes on purpose, but some people do it because they think that they will not get caught doing it. They perceive that the professor may or may not read every word of a paper and therefore they will not notice that the took someone else's work. Another reason that some people plagiarize is because they do not have strong writing skills. In this scenario, they may have tried to do a couple of papers on their own and found that their grade was not what they wanted. They turn to the Internet and they use several different sites to pull the information they need. When a student is conscientious about their work, they will not need to be worried about plagiarism because they will pace themselves enough so that they can get the work completed in time. Devlin and Gray (2007) add to this discussion by stating that inadequate admission criteria, teaching or learning issues, pressures, educational costs and pride in plagiarizing are other reasons why people plagiarize. Method In order to understand plagiarism on a different level, I designed a questionnaire that would ask ten students what they thought about plagiarism. I wanted to understand it from a student's point of view. I sent the questionnaire to students who were interested in helping me with the study. I asked eight questions on it as follows: 1. How long have you been a QIBT student? 2. Are you of non-English speaking background? 3. Do you find the teaching system difficult? 4. How well do you understand what plagiarism is? 5. Did you ever commit plagiarism? (If no, go to question 6). 6. What made you plagiarize? 7. Do you consider plagiarism as cheating? 8. What do you think QIBT can do so students don't need to plagiarize? I spent time with each student to ask them the questions. All of my questions were open ended questions. Analysis and Discussion The students in my study had different ideas about what should be considered plagiarism. They did not think that using their own work in another class should be counted as plagiarism because some papers can work for more than one class. Several thought they had an understanding before they participated, but they felt they had more knowledge of what plagiarism was once they participated. From the student's point of view, it was clear that those students who had plagiarized in the past did so because they did not understand something, they felt they had too much pressure, or they were not interested in the subject that the were supposed to write. Also, some students misunderstood some of the words that described the assignment and were too embarrassed to ask the teacher for clarification. Conclusion Although many professors feel that plagiarism is academic dishonesty, from a student's point of view I am not sure this is the case. I understand from the literature review that there are many situations in which plagiarism occurs but I saw that most of them were not something that a student can always control. As an example, a student cannot control the fact that they may not know about plagiarism when they enter college. They would have to have knowledge of this so that they did not do it which is not always easy. Unless a professor or a high school teacher tells the student about plagiarism, they would not understand it entirely. References Craig, P., Federici, E., & Buehler, M.. (2010). Instructing students in academic integrity. Journal of College Science Teaching, 40(2), 50-55. Retrieved December 3, 2010, from Research Library. (Document ID: 2178197861). Cole, J. (2005). Definition of plagiarism. Indiana University Bloomington. Retrieved December 2, 2010 from https://www.indiana.edu/~istd/definition.html Devlin, M. and Gray, K. (2007). In their own words: A qualitative study of the reasons Australian university students plagiarize. Higher Education Research & Development. 26 (2). 181-198. doi: 10.1080/07294360701310805 Plagiarism.org. What is Plagiarism? (n.d.) Retrieved December 1, 2010 from http://www.plagiarism.org/learning_center/what_is_plagiarism.html Rajeev, R. (2010). Different types of plagiarism. Buzzle.com. Retrieved December 5, 2010 from http://www.buzzle.com/articles/different-types-of-plagiarism.html Singham, M. (2006). On writing 3--Why do people plagiarize? Mano Singham's web journal. Case Western Reserve University. Retrieved December 5, 2010 from http://blog.case.edu/singham/2006/04/11/on_writing3_why_do_people_plagiarize Read More