Author: Imen Aggoune

Plagiarism

Plagiarism is one of the most dangerous intellectual crimes in academia, a form of theft
and an act of academic dishonesty. It is defined as the representation of another author’s ideas,
thoughts, and knowledge as one’s own without giving any credit to the original author. Those
who commit plagiarism face severe punishment and are subject to administrative sanctions and
disciplinary actions such as expulsion from school or work and financial penalties; some of
them may even risk being incarcerated for extended periods of time. There are many types of
plagiarism that people commit intentionally or unintentionally for several reasons; however,
there have to be ways for the academic community to avoid such unethical behaviour that might
end up adjudicated by courts due to the negative impact it has on academia.

There are mainly four types of plagiarism. The first type is direct plagiarism which is
the use of the exact wording and sentence structures of the original work without quotation
marks and citation. It is often committed by elementary and middle school students who are
either too lazy or too ignorant to credit the original authors. Second, self-plagiarism, a very
uncommon type that many students do not know, or in other words, do not care to know. Most
students and even scholars commit self-plagiarism without knowing that even copying from
one’s previous work is considered plagiarism. Nevertheless, even though it is their own work,
ideas, and thoughts, they do not have the right to resubmit their previous writings without
permission. The third type is mosaic plagiarism, sometimes called “patchwriting.” It is a kind
of paraphrasing that is done by borrowing a number of phrases, whether connected or
unconnected, from the original work without using quotations. Moreover, finding and using
synonyms for the original writer’s language while keeping the same sentence structure is also
considered mosaic plagiarism. This type of plagiarism is prevalent, and many students do not
even know it is punishable. Number four is accidental plagiarism. As the name denotes, this
type of intellectual theft is done unintentionally. That is, students often neglect to cite the source
of the original work; some of them may forget to use quotation marks. Nonetheless, many of
them commit accidental plagiarism out of ignorance; they simply do not know that giving credit
to the original authors is compulsory and not doing so is academically dishonest. All of the
four types are unethical and punishable; however, the degree and the seriousness of the penalty
vary from one type to another.

Students and scholars resort to plagiarism for a number of different reasons. The most
common one might be the desire to get good grades; competition brings out the worst side of
humans. Students might turn to dirty dishonourable means for an excellent grade. Also,
although people consider it an excuse more than it is a reason, not having time to produce
original work or, objectively speaking, poor time management can lead to plagiarism. Thus, it
would be effortless and unproblematic to go through some books and gather correct, well-
written passages that can guarantee a good mark. Furthermore, students may plagiarize because
they simply cannot write a research-based essay; they lack the required knowledge and
information to write one. Otherwise, they may be unable to conduct research with reliable
findings and results and thus resort to plagiarism as a better, easier, and faster option. Another
possible reason might be the lack of training and awareness of the rules and regulation and
university policies. Particularly, students do not see the need to cite sources or give credit to
original authors; they believe that knowledge is free and it is their right to use other people’s
language unconditionally. These might be the most common reasons why students and novice
researchers end up plagiarising; still, they can never be an excuse to exhibit such irresponsible
behaviour and steal what scientists and researchers spent nights, months, years, and even
decades to achieve.

Students must follow certain rules to avoid plagiarism. First and most importantly,
students must understand plagiarism and be aware of the rules and regulations of academic
writing and the consequences of violating them. Besides, they need to form a habit of citing
sources every time they write or conduct research, both in in-text citations and in the references
list, as well as keeping track of every source they extract from. Moreover, students and novice
researchers have to keep improving their paraphrasing and summarizing skills instead of the
repetitive use of direct quoting. In addition, rather than rewriting the same original ideas,
students have to be innovative and creative when writing an essay or doing assignments; they
have to include their own ideas, thoughts, and conclusions for the work to be original, credible,
and worth reading. Furthermore, students have to pay more attention to what teachers are
lecturing and enhance their note-taking skills to have a better understanding of the lesson
instead of just surfing what the internet provides. In short, despite being a challenging task,
following these tips can help students avoid plagiarism and create original, information-rich,
and academically acceptable work instead of creating a poorly written copy of a well-known
published paper.

Committing plagiarism may result in serious consequences. Students who deliberately

or accidentally steal intellectual property are subject to severe punishment, starting from a
failure on an assignment to financial penalties and imprisonment. Plagiarism is not always as
simple as copying a couple of sentences from a famous article on the internet; extreme
plagiarism cases such as stealing massive research data or a revolutionary idea is perilous.
People have gone unexpectedly too far to defend their ownership of ideas and inventions, too
far to make people pay fortunes or even start a war. Some employees have lost their jobs due
to intellectual theft; others were deprived of publishing any new or previous works. Suffering
academic failure, scientists have lost their credibility, and their careers have drastically reached
an end. University students must be aware of and fear such consequences and put into
consideration the seriousness of such disgraceful, irresponsible behaviour.

Plagiarism is a serious crime in academia. Teachers must know what makes students
resort to plagiarism, try to find solutions to the problem, and help students know and learn what
defines intellectual theft, what its types are, how to avoid it, and most importantly, what results
from such an unethical and immoral act and the punishment they might face upon breaking its
rules and regulations.