Transcript Preventing Plagiarism, Laurel Pritchard

Helping First-Year Students Avoid
Unintentional Plagiarism
Copyright Jason Love. Used with permission.
Why do students plagiarize?
 They don’t understand what constitutes plagiarism or how to avoid it
(Roig, 1997).
 They are attempting to paraphrase complex information they don’t
understand (Roig, 1999).
 They lack confidence in their writing skills.
 The internet makes plagiarism easier, and students perceive online
plagiarism as less serious (Selwyn, 2008).
Tackling the Complex Information Problem
 Students (n = 25) assigned to read a psychology journal article
 Instructions emphasized active reading
 All wrote a 1-paragraph summary of the article in class
 Half were allowed to look at the article while writing
 Half kept article out of sight
 Two independent, blind ratings using rubric for:
 Originality
 Accuracy
Results
*
Students who could look at the article while writing had significantly lower originality scores
(p < 0.05). Accuracy scores did not differ between groups.
Other Strategies:
 Give low-stakes practice assignments for recognizing and avoiding
plagiarism (Landau, Druen & Arcuri, 2002).
 Help students to develop “authorial identity” (Elander et al., 2010).
References
Elander, J., Pittman, G., Lusher, J., Fox, P., & Payne, N. (2010). Evaluation of an intervention to
help students avoid unintentional plagiarism by improving their authorial identity. Assessment
& Evaluation in Higher Education, 35(2), 157-171.
Landau, J. D., Druen, P. B., & Arcuri, J. A. (2002). Methods for helping students avoid plagiarism.
Teaching of Psychology, 29(2), 112-115.
Roig, M. (1997). Can undergraduate students determine whether a text has been plagiarized?
Psychological Record, 47(1), 113-122.
Roig, M. (1999). When college students’ attempts at paraphrasing become instances of potential
plagiarism. Psychological Reports, 84(3), 973-982.
Selwyn, N. (2008). ‘Not necessarily a bad thing…’: a study of online plagiarism amongst
undergraduate students. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 33(5), 465-479.