How to Paraphrase | Step-by-Step Guide

& Examples
Published on April 8, 2022 by Courtney Gahan and Jack Caulfield. Revised on June 1, 2023.

Paraphrasing means putting someone else’s ideas into your own words. Paraphrasing a source
involves changing the wording while preserving the original meaning.

Paraphrasing is an alternative to quoting (copying someone’s exact words and putting them
in quotation marks). In academic writing, it’s usually better to integrate sources by paraphrasing
instead of quoting. It shows that you have understood the source, reads more smoothly, and
keeps your own voice front and center.

Every time you paraphrase, it’s important to cite the source. Also take care not to use wording
that is too similar to the original. Otherwise, you could be at risk of committing plagiarism.

How to paraphrase in five easy steps

If you’re struggling to get to grips with the process of paraphrasing, check out our easy step-by-
step guide in the video below.

How to paraphrase correctly

Putting an idea into your own words can be easier said than done. Let’s say you want to
paraphrase the text below, about population decline in a particular species of sea snails.

Example: Source text“Like other marine animals living near heavily populated coasts, horse
conchs have lost considerable habitat to development and pollution, including favorite breeding
grounds along mud flats and seagrass beds. Their Gulf habitat is also warming due to climate
change, which scientists think further pressures the animals, based on the negative effects extra
heat has on other big mollusks” (Barnett, 2022).

Incorrect paraphrasing
You might make a first attempt to paraphrase it by swapping out a few words for synonyms.

Example: Incorrect paraphrasing

Like other sea creatures inhabiting the vicinity of highly populated coasts, horse conchs have
lost substantial territory to advancement and contamination, including preferred breeding
grounds along mud flats and seagrass beds. Their Gulf home is also heating up due to global
warming, which scientists think further puts pressure on the creatures, predicated
upon the harmful effects extra warmth has on other large mollusks (Barnett, 2022).
This attempt at paraphrasing doesn’t change the sentence structure or order of information, only
some of the word choices. And the synonyms chosen are poor:
  “Advancement and contamination” doesn’t really convey the same meaning as
“development and pollution.”
 Sometimes the changes make the tone less academic: “home” for “habitat” and “sea
creatures” for “marine animals.”
 Adding phrases like “inhabiting the vicinity of” and “puts pressure on” makes the text
needlessly long-winded.
 Global warming is related to climate change, but they don’t mean exactly the same thing.

Because of this, the text reads awkwardly, is longer than it needs to be, and remains too close to
the original phrasing. This means you risk being accused of plagiarism.

Correct paraphrasing
Let’s look at a more effective way of paraphrasing the same text.

Example: Correct paraphrasingScientists believe that temperature rises resulting from climate
change are negatively impacting horse conchs living in the Gulf of Mexico. Development and
pollution have also deprived them of important breeding grounds (Barnett, 2022).
Here, we’ve:

 Only included the information that’s relevant to our argument (note that the paraphrase is
shorter than the original)
 Introduced the information with the signal phrase “Scientists believe that …”
 Retained key terms like “development and pollution,” since changing them could alter
the meaning
 Structured sentences in our own way instead of copying the structure of the original
 Started from a different point, presenting information in a different order

Because of this, we’re able to clearly convey the relevant information from the source without
sticking too close to the original phrasing.

Examples of paraphrasing
Explore the tabs below to see examples of paraphrasing in action


Source text Paraphrase

“The current research extends the previous work by revealing
that listening to moral dilemmas could elicit a FLE [foreign-
language effect] in highly proficient bilinguals. … Here, it has
been demonstrated that hearing a foreign language can even
influence moral decision making, and namely promote more
utilitarian-type decisions” (Brouwer, 2019, p. 874).
The research of Brouwer (2019, p. 874)
suggests that the foreign-language effect
can occur even among highly proficient
bilinguals, influencing their moral decision
making, when auditory (rather than written)
prompting is given.
How to cite a paraphrase
Once you have your perfectly paraphrased text, you need to ensure you credit the original author.
You’ll always paraphrase sources in the same way, but you’ll have to use a different type of in-
text citation depending on what citation style you follow.

APA in- (Brouwer, 2019, p. 874)

text
citation

MLA in- (Brouwer 874)

text
citation

Chicago 1. Susanne Brouwer, “The Auditory Foreign-Language Effect of Moral Decision Making in
footnote Highly Proficient Bilinguals,” Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 40, no. 10
(2019): 874. https://doi.org/10.1080/01434632.2019.1585863.

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Paraphrasing vs. quoting

It’s a good idea to paraphrase instead of quoting in most cases because:

 Paraphrasing shows that you fully understand the meaning of a text

 Your own voice remains dominant throughout your paper
 Quotes reduce the readability of your text

But that doesn’t mean you should never quote. Quotes are appropriate when:

 Giving a precise definition

 Saying something about the author’s language or style (e.g., in a literary analysis paper)
 Providing evidence in support of an argument
 Critiquing or analyzing a specific claim

Paraphrasing vs. summarizing

A paraphrase puts a specific passage into your own words. It’s typically a similar length to the
original text, or slightly shorter.
When you boil a longer piece of writing down to the key points, so that the result is a lot shorter
than the original, this is called summarizing.

Paraphrasing and quoting are important tools for presenting specific information from sources.
But if the information you want to include is more general (e.g., the overarching argument of a
whole article), summarizing is more appropriate.

Example: Summarizing
Martin (2016) argues it is important to consider the impact of human architecture on the
evolution of other species. Stating that the indoor biome—the realm of species that live and
reproduce largely inside human-built structures—represents an understudied area for ecologists,
Martin makes the case for studying this biome as an essential way of understanding the world of
the Anthropocene.

Avoiding plagiarism when you paraphrase

When paraphrasing, you have to be careful to avoid accidental plagiarism.

This can happen if the paraphrase is too similar to the original quote, with phrases or whole
sentences that are identical (and should therefore be in quotation marks). It can also happen if
you fail to properly cite the source.

Paraphrasing tools are widely used by students, and can be especially useful for non-native
speakers who may find academic writing particularly challenging. While these can be helpful for
a bit of extra inspiration, use these tools sparingly, keeping academic integrity in mind.

To make sure you’ve properly paraphrased and cited all your sources, you could elect to run a
plagiarism check before submitting your paper. And of course, always be sure to read your
source material yourself and take the first stab at paraphrasing on your own.