Why Plagiarism Is One of the Greatest Threats to Student Success?

Understanding Plagiarism

Plagiarism, although considered unethical across various landscapes, is considered an unforgivable offence and a violation of academic integrity guidelines. Some people think that it refers to the act of simply copying information from the web and pasting it into your work. 

However, plagiarism doesn’t always work like that. It occurs in various forms. Students seeking shortcuts often end up doing it unintentionally.

Common Forms of Plagiarism in Academia

Here are the most common forms of plagiarism found in academic work:

• Direct copying involves verbatim use of someone else’s words without quotation marks and citation.
• Paraphrasing without credit is rewriting sourced ideas by changing words and shuffling structure, but failing to cite the source.
• Self-plagiarism occurs when someone submits their existing work without the necessary permission or citation to their previous submissions.
• Misuse of AI also leads to plagiarism, as this practice involves the presentation of machine-generated text as indigenous work without any addition or proper attribution.

Reasons Behind Students Getting Engaged in Plagiarism

The question that arises here is, “Why do students plagiarise?” The answer lies in various reasons that lead to this unethical practice. A few of them are mentioned below:

• Poor time management
• Failure to research the topic properly
• Inability to understand the given prompt
• Unfamiliarity with citation rules
• Belief that everyone does it
• Ignorance of academic integrity guidelines

Nevertheless, you don’t get the reason to get engaged in plagiarism because of excuses. Plagiarism is considered a breach of academic integrity, and institutions maintain a strict stance against it.

Why Plagiarism Poses a Threat to Student Success?

Plagiarism is considered one of the greatest threats to student success because it extends far beyond breaking rules. It directly impacts the growth and future of students and undermines the educational process. The consequences of plagiarism don’t remain restricted to sabotage of the academic process and career; they also lead to a tarnished reputation.

In essence, plagiarism subverts the fundamentals of learning and integrity and leads to immediate academic failure and long-term professional damage. It doesn’t affect grades only, but also harms character, credibility, and career. Here are some severe consequences of plagiarism:

Undermined Learning

The core purpose of academia is to make students capable of thinking critically, coming up with original ideas, and developing new skills that can help them excel in their domain in the long term. However, plagiarism subverts the learning process:

Students sidestep the chance of learning essential skills and improving them because of plagiarism.

Failure to learn the material causes knowledge gaps, leading to problems in advanced courses and the professional landscape.

Distance Between Students and Educators

Students found involved in the act of plagiarism end up losing the trust of their educators. Their instructors don’t take them seriously because they doubt their credibility. No matter how much effort they put into their work, their supervisors always remain skeptical regarding the authenticity and originality of their work.

Strict Academic Penalties

Institutions consider plagiarism a breach of academic integrity and maintain a strict stance against it. They often formulate a regulatory panel for investigation and imposition of severe penalties according to the nature of the instance. Any student found involved in the act of submitting plagiarised work may face:

• Failure in the assignment or the entire course.
• Temporary suspension or permanent expulsion.
• A damaged reputation, as a single incident is enough to harm a student’s record.
• Rejection of future admission applications.

Long-Term Impact

In addition to the aforementioned consequences, the consequences of plagiarism follow students throughout their professional life and affect their long-term career consequences:

• Tarnished reputation follows them throughout their professional career.
• Loss of promotion and job opportunities because of a single instance of dishonesty.
• Plagiarism, upon discovery, can lead to termination in some professions.
• Students caught for plagiarism may also face legal action and a complete career end.

The Hidden Costs of Plagiarism

While plagiarism results in obvious academic penalties, it also comes with some hidden costs that are often overlooked by students. 

A few of them are discussed below:

Emotional Toll

Students who commit plagiarism often find themselves afraid of getting caught, which leads to stress and anxiety. They also feel guilty of doing so. Resultantly, they end up losing self-confidence.

Institutional Damage

The impact of plagiarism extends far beyond a single individual. Widespread plagiarism may make universities or academic institutions lose their credibility. Graduates from such institutes find it difficult to get jobs or working opportunities according to their qualifications because their integrity and degrees are viewed with suspicion.

Societal Impact

Originality leads to innovation, new ideas, and theories. However, if plagiarism becomes paramount, the educational progress halts, and society risks stagnation because of fewer new ideas and less progress in academia. Simply put, plagiarism doesn’t affect a single individual; it stifles the entire academic ecosystem and society.

Tips to Avoid Plagiarism

Plagiarism is easily preventable. Students can keep their work free of any kind of plagiarism by applying a few practical strategies to make it possible. 

All they need to do is keep in mind that avoiding plagiarism is not about fear. Rather, it is about staying confident in your voice. 

Here are more details about these strategies:

Research Rigorously

The key to ensuring an original submission is understanding the prompt given by your supervisor thoroughly and understanding what they expect from you. Go through it promptly to determine what they are asking. Once you are fully confident about your understanding, research the topic rigorously. While you should prefer primary sources over anything else, don’t overlook other forms of sources such as articles, reports, and podcasts published on the web. Get insights from every possible source and try to grasp the core of the subject.

Keep Research Notes Curated

Simply accessing research sources is not the only thing you need to do. If you want to avoid getting caught for accidental plagiarism, which leads to similar implications, you must keep track of the sources you have used to understand the topic, fetch relevant insights, and gather valuable data. Failure to do so will leave you confused, and you may end up missing out on necessary citations. So, keep a record of your research journey and implement color-coding or symbols to differentiate between paraphrased information, direct quotes, and your indigenous thoughts. Even a simple spreadsheet can help you save hours later.

Ensure Proper Time-Management

Start working on assignments early, and segment the whole process into manageable phases. For instance, keep significant time for research, outline creation, writing, proofreading, and finalisation. Don’t fall victim to procrastination, leading to last-minute panic. Starting work when the deadline is just around the corner will make you look for shortcuts, and plagiarism is also one of them.

Seek Guidance

If you meet a deadlock while working on your assignment, don’t wait for an idea to hit your mind. Instead, consult professors, librarians, and writing centers and seek guidance from them. These entities are available to help you. Ask questions that are confusing you to get logical answers and ensure integrity in your work.

Paraphrase Effectively

Instead of directly quoting sourced information, shape it according to the tone and writing style of your work to ensure cohesion and logical flow. Paraphrasing is not all about swapping keywords with their counterparts. It is an entire process, requiring you to understand the original content and restate it by using your own vocabulary and writing style. Doing so will not only help you avoid accidental overlaps but also ensure the logical flow of content throughout your work.

Properly Cite Sources

Whether you are adding sourced information in the form of a direct quote, a paraphrase, or a summary, accompanying it with proper bibliographical information is a must. Hence, learn the skill of citing sources properly. Master various citation styles, including APA, MLA, and Chicago, and format the bibliographical information accordingly. Learning formatting according to these styles can help you avoid accidental plagiarism.

Run a Plagiarism Check

Before finalising your draft and starting its refinement, it is essential to ensure that your work is original and plagiarism-free. While comparing your work against research sources is a good idea, some instances may slip past your eyes. A better way to verify the originality of your work and ensure mental peace is to run the draft through an advanced plagiarism checker. 

The tool will analyse and map your work against billions of online sources to catch subtle overlaps and flag them. This possibility will help you modify your work and eradicate plagiarism beforehand.

Use AI Responsibly

Generative AI has seen a huge rise lately. Common users are leveraging it for various purposes. Students also take help from it while working on assignments. However, you should never use it as a shortcut and directly copy and paste content generated by AI. Instead, use AI to brainstorm ideas or craft an outline of your work. Cross-match the information generated by AI before taking it as inspiration. Moreover, always expand on it and add your analysis. If you need to add something provided by AI, cite it appropriately to avoid plagiarism.

Building a Culture of Academic Integrity

While students should avoid plagiarism, preventing it is not only their responsibility. They need the establishment of a culture that is built around academic integrity. Given this, educators and institutions should also play a vital role in building this culture because plagiarism loses its appeal when integrity is considered a norm. 

Here is how it is possible:

• Educators should encourage originality and teach citation skills.
• Peers should hold each other accountable and encourage collaboration without copying.
• Institutions should provide resources to help students combat plagiarism and ensure originality.

Conclusion

Plagiarism is a serious threat to student success because of subverted learning, academic penalties, and long-term impacts. Hence, it should be avoided not just because it is a breach of academic integrity but because originality is the key to growth and success. Ignoring the importance of avoiding this unethical practice will leave you with regrets later. So, choose originality, choose success!

Frequently Asked Questions