Academic Integrity & Plagiarism

Even if you cite your work correctly, you need to be aware of how not to plagiarize. The Council of Writing Program Administrators defines plagiarism as follows:

                 In an instructional setting, plagiarism occurs when a writer deliberately uses someone else’s language,

                ideas, or other original (not common-knowledge) material without acknowledg­ing its source.

Plagiarism is the most frequent academic integrity violation. It is a serious issue, because properly citing sources is an essential component of academic research and discourse. Original ideas or concepts are considered to be a person's property, and not crediting the contribution of others is seen as ethically wrong. If you do not cite a source, you do not acknowledge the creator's rights and contributions and are committing intellectual theft.

By citing the sources you use for your research, you’ll be accomplishing three things:

• You’ll avoid plagiarizing and give proper credit to your sources, thereby demonstrating academic integrity.

• You’ll demonstrate the scope of your research and establish your credibility on your topic.

• You’ll provide your reader with a trail to follow to locate the sources you used so they can read more about your topic.

From: Defending and Avoiding Plagiarism: The WPA Statement on Best Practices. Council of Writing Program Administrators. Retrieved August 9, 2019 from: http://wpacouncil.org/positions/WPAplagiarism.pdf

Quoting

• Use quotation marks whenever quoting an exact phrase, sentence or short paragraph
• Longer quotations should not be included in quotation marks, but indented, as indicated by the citation style in use
• Always include a citation

Paraphrasing and Summarizing

• To correctly paraphrase or summarize, you must change both the language AND sentence structure
• Always include a citation

Citing

• Acknowledge ALL sources of borrowed ideas and materials, whether they are written, spoken, visuals or in any other format
• Make sure that the reader can clearly distinguish between your thoughts and information you borrowed by placing your citations in the appropriate place
• Properly format your in-text citations (or footnotes if using Chicago Style) and your reference list (also called works cited or bibliography)
• Cite your sources both in your text AND in your list of sources

Adapted from: Academic Integrity & Plagiarism. (2023, May 16). KPU. https://libguides.kpu.ca/c.php?g=718390&p=5129372