Running head: PLAGIARISM IN ACADEMIC SETTING 1
Plagiarism in an Academic Setting
Institution Affiliation
Date
PLAGIARISM IN ACADEMIC SETTING 2
Introduction
Plagiarism is one of the unethical practices in academia that has affected the quality of
research and publication, which intern affects innovation negatively. Plagiarism has had a
different definition from different scholars and scholarly bodies. For example, the Oxford
English Dictionary defines plagiarism as taking another person's idea and passing it as own.
According to Gasparyan et al. (2017), plagiarism refers to the misappropriation of other people's
intellectual property, such as research methods, ideas, scholarly text, and graphics. It is
considered as research misconduct due to the falsifications and fabrications aspects that it
encompasses. Regarding its etymology, plagiarism is derived from the Latin word "plagiārius"
(Kidnapper), which refers to literary piracy. In a more general term, it is presenting other
people's ideas, text, and methodologies in research without giving credit to them or without their
consent.
Factors promoting plagiarism
Various researchers have identified several factors that have contributed to the rise of
plagiarism in high education. Jereb (2018) has identified several factors that promote plagiarism
in his research. First, one of the identified factors is a lack of knowledge by students regarding
what plagiarism entails and the approaches that can be used to avoid plagiarizing academic
content. Jereb (2018) asserts that a lack of full understanding of what plagiarism constitutes has
been the major factor that students plagiarize. This is more common to new students in colleges
who are unfamiliar with university policies concerning plagiarism and ethics in academics.
Plagiarism, due to this factor, could be therefore unintentional, and students could, therefore,
avoid when taught ways to avoid it. Secondly, technological advancement is another factor
influencing plagiarism. Mass production of internet access gargets such as computers, tablets,
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and smartphones has eased the accessibility of information over the internet. Many students can
copy and paste the contents in documents without changing or quoting the primary source. The
third factor is students' desire to get higher scores in academics at the expense of mastering the
content of the subject being taught. Researchers have proved that students that are motivated by
grades have a high tendency to commit plagiarism to provide the right responses for questions in
a test or research, aiming at the ultimate goal to score high grades. Students who are motivated to
understand the concept of a subject under study have a lower likelihood of committing
plagiarism. Other studies such as that of Šprajc et al. (2017), pressure from family and society to
attain higher grades in academics, have led to victims of the pressure to commit plagiarism. The
need to get more top-grade to make them indulge in shortcuts in academics, including cheating
and plagiarism.
There are common mistakes that lead to plagiarism. One mistake that students make is
forgetting to paraphrase the literature works they use in their studies. Copy and paste strategy of
exact text is plagiarism, and it can be avoided when the content is paraphrased in a student's own
words, but the meaning should not be distorted. While paraphrasing academic content, it is
critical to observe the "five consecutive word" rule (Thomas, 2018). According to Thomas
(2018), when you have five consecutive words similar to another text, then you have committed
plagiarism. In some aspects, their names used that can be hard to paraphrase and still maintain
their meaning. To avoid the content being taken as plagiarized, the student can use quotations to
present the information while citing the authors of the information. Despite paraphrasing the
contents of one or different scholarly works, it is an academic ethic to cite the sources used to get
the information as references at the end of the research work.
Plagiarism detection tools and LUSON Honor Code
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There are different tools used in academia to detect misconduct in academic works in
terms of plagiarism. There exist those tools that can be used for free over the internet to check
for plagiarism as well as the proprietary plagiarism detection tools, which a user must pay to
access their services. They are software tools. In most cases, the exclusive plagiarism detection
software tools have been found to have greater capabilities compared to their free counterparts,
not only in highlighting the plagiarized contents but also identifying the sources that the
materials have been copied from. The plagiarism detection software applies artificial intelligence
such as natural language processing and machine learning classification in carrying out similarity
analysis between documents to find plagiarized worlds. The standard plagiarism tools include
Plagscan, Turnitin, Grammarly, Unicheck, iThenticate, among others. It is advisable to check
your document with software to find plagiarized content and correct it.
LUSON Honor Code aims at promoting ethics in academics for nursing students at the
University. It outlines what academic dishonesties that students can commit and the consequence
for the practice. The Honor Code defines academic dishonesty as plagiarism on research papers
and projects where a student has omitted quotations for text taken from other sources,
paraphrasing of passages without proper references, replicating other student's work, and self-
plagiarizing from own previous paper. During an examination, referring from a fellow student,
using information material not allowed by the instructor, selling, buying, or transmitting a copy
of exams is also academic dishonesty. Falsifying documents is another form of academic
dishonesty identified in the LUSON Honor Code. This entails unauthorized copying, production
or modification of the university document, or using another person in unauthorized form or
document signing. According to the honor code both, a student who assists and one assisted in
academic dishonesty are equally responsible and will suffer the same consequences. The penalty
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for such dishonesties includes the dismissal of the student and being awarded grade "F." Also,
students committing any of such dishonesty (violation of LUSON Honor Code) can suffer
permanent dismissal from school.
LUSON appeal process
To appeal to LUSON for readmission, a student should be familiar with the following
process. First, they must have been out of school for two or more years. Secondly, the student is
required to "submit a written appeal for readmission to the Associate Registrar for Academic
Success." Thirdly, dismissal due to academic dishonesty is not eligible for appeal. Fourthly, after
the submission, Associate Registrar for Academic Success shall consult with Director of
Graduate Student Affairs to find any conduct that makes the student ineligible for readmission
("Academic Policies - Graduate and Postgraduate," 2019). If the student passes the eligibility
criteria, the form will be submitted to be reviewed by vice Provost.
APA writing technique
American Psychological Association (APA) writing method is one of the popular forms
of academic writing format used worldwide. APA papers consist of a cover page that contains
the name of the student, name of institution, subject, and date. APA has five levels of heading
that are used in papers. Level one heading is centered and bold. Level two and three are flush lift
and boldface. Level four and five are indented boldface. Level three and five are in italic. The
headings are used in an orderly manner with the first level beginning as the rest follow. The
article should include a running head of the main topic the paper discusses. The texts are typed in
double space, and there should be no breaks in the paper. Mandernach, Zafonte & Taylor,
(2016), the in-text citation includes the name of the author (s) followed by the year of
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publication. The references are placed on the last page of the paper, and they are written in the
format of names of authors, year of publication, the title of the documents, and lastly, other
elements such as the link of the DOI.
Conclusion
Plagiarism is academic misconduct where one uses another researcher's work without
acknowledging them. Factors such as lack of knowledge, easy access to information through the
internet, desire to get excellent grades, and pressure from family and society influences
plagiarism. The use of quotation, citation, and references are formed acknowledging someone's
scholarly work, thereby avoiding plagiarism. Software such as Turnitin, iThenticate, Grammarly,
among others, are tools for detecting plagiarism. Plagiarism is a violation of the LUSON Honor
Code, which can have a punishment of being dismissed from the University. Students at LUSON
can follow the appeal procedure expect for those dismissed due to academic dishonesty.
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References
Academic Policies - Graduate and Postgraduate. (2019, November 21). Retrieved August 04,
2020, from https://www.liberty.edu/online/graduate-and-doctoral-academic-policies/
Gasparyan, A. Y., Nurmashev, B., Seksenbayev, B., Trukhachev, V. I., Kostyukova, E. I., &
Kitas, G. D. (2017). Plagiarism in the Context of Education and Evolving Detection
Strategies.JJournal of Korean medical science,J32(8), 1220–1227.
https://doi.org/10.3346/jkms.2017.32.8.1220
Jereb, E. (2018). Matjaž Perc, Barbara Lämmlein, Janja Jerebic, Marko Urh, Iztok Podbregar,
and Polona Šprajc. 2018. Factors influencing plagiarism in higher education: A
comparison of German and Slovene students.JPloS one,J13(8), e0202252.
Mandernach, B. J., Zafonte, M., & Taylor, C. (2016). Instructional Strategies to Improve College
Students' APA Style Writing.JInternational Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher
Education,J27(3), 407-412.
Šprajc, Polona & Urh, Marko & Jerebic, Janja & Trivan, Dragan & Jereb, Eva. (2017). Reasons
for Plagiarism in Higher Education. Organizacija. 50. 10.1515/orga-2017-0002.
Thomas, C George. (2018). Plagiarism and how to deal with it.
