This article is from the December 2003 issue of Update.
How widespread is plagiarism among the student population? Ruth Stubbings and Alan Brine look at the latest figures and ask why it seems to be on the increase and what can be done about it.
Plagiarism is currently attracting a good deal of attention in UK higher education (HE) and the press. For example in July the Sunday Times ran an article on the ‘Online essay boom’ taking place in the UK, and BBC Radio 4 announced the results of its survey of university registrars and the growth of plagiarism.
So what is plagiarism, is it on the increase and can libraries help prevent it? The Oxford English Dictionary defines plagiarism as ‘the wrongful appropriation or purloining, and publication as one’s own, of the ideas, or the expression of the ideas (literary, artistic, musical or mechanical etc.) of another’.
Discussions with academics, and the literature, indicate that there are many shades of grey in relation to plagiarism, including the definition and severity of the offence.1 If academic staff cannot agree a definition, how can we expect students to understand and avoid being plagiarists? Johnston provides an excellent summary of some of the ‘confusions and contradictions’ related to defining plagiarism.2
Over the last 20 years and particularly since the growth of the world wide web, concern has deepened that plagiarism is on the increase. Until very recently UK HE institutions were very reluctant to discuss plagiarism. For example in 2000 the view of the Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principles was that ‘there is no evidence of an increase in plagiarism’.3 This was despite anecdotal evidence from academic staff suggesting the opposite. Carroll and Appleton4 state: ‘In private conversations most academics will agree that acknowledged levels of academic misconduct in UK universities are only the tip of the iceberg.’ Now UK institutions are far more open about the problem and 31 universities responded to the BBC Radio 4 survey, most stating that they had seen an increase in the number of cases of plagiarism. Wider PC ownership and the growth of the internet are seen as important factors in this growth.
Many reasons have been put forward for why students plagiarise. They tend to fall into the unintentional and intentional categories. Students unintentionally plagiarise through poor study skills including time management, inability to find information, poor citation skills,5 lack of understanding of the assignment and ignorance of what plagiarism is. For those who plagiarise intentionally the reasons tend to be financial and pressure for good grades.
Why do students plagiarise?
A project was undertaken jointly by the LTSN-ICS and Loughborough University Library. The Beginnings project attempted to go beyond the scope of other UK research on cheating as it wanted to find out why individuals plagiarise in the first instance.
The project set out to:
- identify student study practices in relation to their assignments;
- determine current citation practices;
- determine the level of student undergraduate understanding of plagiarism;
- help students work out their own level of knowledge;
- provide online resources that would help students improve their understanding of plagiarism and avoid being a plagiarist.
A brief survey was conducted with first-year undergraduates from various disciplines across a number of institutions. The subjects surveyed were sport science and recreation management, library and information science and computing science.
To get some background information before the survey was designed, second- and third-year undergraduates were canvassed and a pilot study of the questionnaire carried out. The results indicate that, even after a number of years studying, students still do not understand plagiarism fully and what skills they need to avoid it. Comments from students included:
‘Not enough tuition on citing and referencing.’
‘Even the tutors do not seem to know what they are doing.’
‘I am terrified to cite an electronic site anymore as the last time I did I was marked down for it.’
‘I am thinking about my dissertation and still do not know how to reference properly.’
Students canvassed — mostly final-year students who could reflect on their experience and articulate their feelings — felt they did not have enough support in this area of their studies. One of the most startling points was that a number of students knew of others who had plagiarised and not been caught.
The survey consisted of 20 questions on preparing assignments and on students’ views of plagiarism. It was completed by 254 students from three institutions. Eighty-six per cent were in the age group 18-20. The ratio of male to female was 56 per cent to 44 per cent.
Students were asked what they initially did with an assignment. Sixty-two per cent stated that they filed it until nearer the deadline, while five per cent panicked and 17 per cent created a study plan straight away. It is therefore likely that time is a factor in whether students either intentionally or unintentionally plagiarise. The respondents were also more confident in the production of essays than reports and presentations and this may affect their study practices as well.
Information-seeking behaviour
Information-seeking behaviour was interesting. Eighty-nine per cent of respondents used books all the time or frequently for their assignments. Eighty-four per cent were using internet sites either frequently or all the time. Journals were a sad third, with only three per cent of the respondents using journals all the time or frequently.
Eighty-three per cent of students surveyed created bibliographies at the end of their assignments either frequently or all the time. Unfortunately 55 per cent of respondents did not know which citation system they were using. Despite being unsure of what method of citation they were using, 70 per cent had been shown how to create bibliographies at the end of assignments — pleasingly 56 per cent at university.
Citation behaviour
The survey provided a number of different scenarios of how people might cite the work of others both correctly and incorrectly, (see chart, top right).
We can see a gradient of behaviour, with students more likely to cite from books and the internet than journals (reflecting their use of information). They are also more likely to acknowledge ideas using speech marks than to paraphrase ideas. It is interesting to note that they also think it is more acceptable to copy paragraphs if they acknowledge where they came from. Although copying paragraphs with acknowledgement is not plagiarism, it is considered poor academic practice if there is little original thought included. It seems that students are aware of the need to cite other people’s work, but are not necessarily clear on how they should do this.
There were also differences in behaviour in each cohort of students. For example, students of information management (IM) and information and library science (ILS) are clearly familiar with using speech marks to indicate the work of another. It is also clear that ILS and IM students are mostly aware of the need to acknowledge another’s work, as can be seen in columns two and three in the chart (middle, right) which describes the behaviour of students when citing the work of others found on the internet. It is interesting that the computing science students gave a ‘nil’ response for ‘all the time’ to the questions relating to copying paragraphs and cutting and pasting data from the internet.
Copying from friends
The survey asked students if they copied all, or part, of assignments from others or allowed their own work to be copied. The answers to this question were refreshing. Only seven per cent of students allowed a friend to copy part of their assignments all the time or frequently, and only two per cent copied a friend’s. This is similar to results obtained by Rennie and Crosby6 but is much lower than the results obtained by Franklyn-Stokes and Newstead7 and Newstead et al 8 (see chart, bottom right).
If we include the occasional responses, the results rise to 44 per cent and 13 per cent respectively, which is closer to that found by Franklyn-Stokes and Newstead. It is interesting to note that students feel that they allow friends to copy their assignments more than they copy their friends’ assignments. The pros and cons of asking students to self-report must, of course, be carefully considered as students may adjust their response depending on whether they’re more concerned with being seen to be keeping to the rules or conforming to their peer-group behaviour. However, the survey was carried out anonymously, so that students could not be traced, so there should have been no reason for them to fabricate their answers. The reasons given by students for copying part or all of an assignment were that they did not understand what was required or that they ran out of time.
Students reported that 74 per cent of them had discussed plagiarism with teachers or lecturers. Sixty-four per cent had had discussions at university. When asked directly whether they had plagiarised, 40 per cent indicated that they had occasionally plagiarised part of an assignment and four per cent had frequently done so. These figures are similar to those for copying assignments and it should be considered whether when answering this question they took into account their citation behaviour. Of more concern is the fact that when asked if their friends plagiarised, the figures for occasionally plagiarising were 46 per cent, but the figures for frequently plagiarising rose to 23 per cent. The question needs to be asked whether students are reflecting their own behaviour or their friends’.
Finally the survey asked the respondents to state whether they agreed with certain definitions of plagiarism.
- Only nine per cent strongly agreed and 45 per cent agreed that including a few re-worded sentences from books or journals in an assignment without acknowledging the original author is plagiarism.
- Sixty-one per cent strongly agreed and 33 per cent agreed that copying sentences or paragraphs from books or journals without acknowledging the original author is plagiarism.
- Fifty-eight per cent strongly agreed and 34 per cent agreed that cutting and pasting information from the internet into an assignment without acknowledging the original author is plagiarism.
- Thirty-nine per cent strongly agreed and 46 per cent agreed that copying part of a friend’s assignment is plagiarism.
- Sixty-eight per cent strongly agreed and 22 per cent agreed that copying a whole friend’s assignment is plagiarism.
The results of our research indicate that students have a basic understanding of plagiarism and citation. However, they are not aware of the intricacies of citing work correctly and need further guidance, especially in relation to paraphrasing other people’s work. There is also an element of plagiarism that is caused by leaving assignments until nearer the deadline and students not understanding what a particular assignment entails. Thus a percentage of plagiarism could be avoided if institutions explained to students what plagiarism is and enhanced their study skills, especially time management and information literacy, including citation.
What role should libraries play?
We believe that libraries can play an important role in providing advice for both staff and students on the prevention of plagiarism. For example, libraries can guide academic staff to those websites that discuss good practice in deterring plagiarism and to Carroll and Appleton’s good practice guide. Libraries can also link to the Jisc plagiarism detection service9 and provide hints on how to use search engines to find the original source of a plagiarised piece of work.
Libraries can assist students by teaching them how to avoid becoming a plagiarist. Most academic libraries offer training sessions on the mechanics of how to cite a reference and the use of bibliographic software. This could be expanded to include definitions of plagiarism, the use of speech marks and good practice in how to acknowledge the work of others, especially when paraphrasing.
References
1 C. Williams. ‘Plagiarism: the need for an institutional policy.’ Education Today, Vol. 43 (No. 1), 1993, pp. 22 - 25.
2 B. Johnston. ‘The concept of plagiarism. ILTHE (the Institute for Learning & Teaching in Higher Education) — Article and reviewed section (www.ilt.ac.uk/).
3 C. Cookson. ‘Universities to set computer trap for their cheats’. Financial Times, 15 July 2000.
4 J. Carroll and J. Appleton. Plagiarism: a good practice guide. Jisc, 2001 (www.jisc.ac.uk/pub01/brookes.pdf).
5 M.R. Lea and B.V. Street. ‘Student Writing in Higher Education: an academic literacies approach.’ Studies in Higher Education, Vol. 23 (No. 2), 1998, pp. 157 - 172.
6 S. Rennie and J. R. Crosby. ‘Are "tomorrow’s doctors" honest?’ Questionnaire study exploring medical students’ attitudes and reported behaviour on academic misconduct. British Medical Journal, Vol. 322 (February), 2001, pp. 67 — 68.
7 A. Franklyn-Stokes and S. E. Newstead. ‘Undergraduate Cheating: who does what and why?’ Studies in Higher Education, Vol. 20 (No. 2), 1995, pp. 159 - 172.
8 S. E. Newstead et al. ‘Individual differences in student cheating.’ Journal of Educational Psychology, Vol. 88 (No. 2), 1996, pp. 229 - 241.
9 Joint Information Systems Committee. Electronic Plagiarism Detection. 2001 (www.jisc.ac.uk/mle/plagiarism/).
Ruth Stubbings is Academic Services Manager at Loughborough University (r.e. stubbings@lboro.ac.uk) and Alan Brine is Manager, Information Science, LTSN-ICS, based at Loughborough (a.c.brine@lboro.ac.uk).