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Lecture 2 – Plagiarism and APA Referencing

Ali Robertson

Study Skills

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A what was the topic we discussed during the last study skills lecture?

Last study skills lecture

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Plagiarism represents a form of theft.Not necessary in the form of a physical item, like a car,

but something like an idea or intellectual property.

When someone writes something, like a book or an essay, it is their property.Their ideas are owned by them.

If we copy either, accidently or knowingly, someone else’s work we are breaking the rules of academia.Called academic malpractice

This study skills lecture – Plagiarism and how to avoid it using APA referencing

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What is citing?Citing is about telling the reader of your work

that the ideas you are presenting come from another source (e.g. book, journal or internet)

Citing shows in detail where the information you are using comes from.If you forget or purposefully do not cite other

peoples work it is plagiarism.

How to correctly cite your work

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Text – copying sections of text from books, lecture notes or websites (especially Wikipedia!).

Images - using pictures from websites. Copying diagrams.

Ideas – using an idea even though it may be re-written by you. Even changing the words (paraphrasing) may still be plagiarism if you don’t reference correctly.You must use the American Psychological

Association (APA) style of referencing.

Examples

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Acknowledge it – say where you got it from, using the APA standard referencing format.

If you use diagrams from texts or webpages, you must provide some personal input as well as referencing them. e.g. Label a diagram or refer to it in the text you write to accompany the diagram.

If you draw your own version of a diagram you

must still reference it.

How to use material you find?

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See www.alirobertson.net study skills.

Click on the Study Skills tab and then click on:

Example of good practice APA referencing

Work achieved a 1st class award at level 5, and shows concise referencing using the APA system.

Let’s look at an example of good practice referencing

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If you copy the work of another student, with or without their permission this is also academic malpractice.

If you research together with another student (which is a good thing) you must produce your own work, independently.

Do not show your coursework to other students.

Plagiarism is also copying from other students!

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Accidental plagiarism will usually result in your work receiving a zero grade, and may require you to resit the module.

Deliberate plagiarism can result in you being thrown off the course entirely.See student union advisory on academic

malpractice: http://www.chestersu.com/academic/academic-

malpractice/

Consequences of Plagiarism

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As of this academic year all student work will be put into a plagiarism detection device, called Turnitin.

Most of your assignments will be uploaded into IBIS before deadline day. IBIS will automatically submit the work to Turnitin.

It is extremely effective at detecting academic malpractice, as the following example shows.

Automatic Detection of plagiarism

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