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© Joy McGregor 2003 1
Plagiarism: Sin or Symptom?Joy H. McGregor, Ph.D.Charles Sturt University
School of Information StudiesTeacher Librarianship
© Joy McGregor 2003 2
The ideal…
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What do teachers assume will be gained by asking students to
do library research? Locate information from multiple
sources Become familiar with resources Deal with ambiguity Analyse and evaluate information Organise thinking Synthesise the information
© Joy McGregor 2003 4
More gains:
Develop a specific focus Relate ideas to one another Learn new content Develop new interests
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What should they gain by writing research papers?
They should learn to: organise information in a logical
sequence express ideas cogently communicate ideas with others in a
commonly understood format
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At what point do they learn these skills?
Not clear Sometimes teachers think that early
primary children are too young to begin this process
Secondary teachers assume they’ve learned it
Seems to leave it up to the later primary years
Complex process: isn’t learned quickly or easily
© Joy McGregor 2003 7
My experience…
made me doubt concerned me--no engagement, skills
lacking
© Joy McGregor 2003 8
School Sucks
<http://www.schoolsucks.com> thousands of free papers advertisers
© Joy McGregor 2003 9
Educational claim & disclaimer:
“You know better than to turn in the papers from School Sucks. They're not so good. And your teachers and professors are checking School Sucks all the time - even if they don't tell you.
Use the papers on School Sucks to read the work of your peers. If you're learning something that doesn't make sense, maybe reading something that isn't 100% accurate, but is in street-language will help.”
http://www.schoolsucks.com/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=10
© Joy McGregor 2003 10
The Paper Store/Thousands of
Papers http://www.termpapers-on-file.com Written by employees, originally for
custom orders Within 30 minutes by email or fax Using any word processor format Email free excerpts; charge by page Will translate into other languages
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What’s going on?
Why are these sites popular? What’s happening when students turn to
these sites? What’s not happening?
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Purpose
What is the nature of higher order thinking skills carried out by gifted students gathering and using information to write research papers?
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Canadian study
School: suburban communityclose to a large urban area
Students:grade 11 (16-17 years old) International Baccalaureate
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Canadian study (cont’d)
Subjects:EnglishSocial Studies
Teachers:2 English teachers1 Social Studies teacher
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Adult Intervention
Librarian introduced materials Was available for assistance Circulated, offering help
Teachers Variable: from active assistance to
ignoring
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Task: Research paper
A topic related to Elizabethan England and/or Shakespeare
Was the Reign of Terror an inevitable product of the French Revolution?
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What did students do?
Were assigned or chose topics in the classroom
Received instruction on the requirements of the assignment
Located information and took notes in the library
Wrote papers at home
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Researcher behaviour
Trained students to think aloud Observed Interviewed Examined notes, drafts, papers Examined original sources
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Process/product…
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Categories of Information Use
Levels that don’t involve copying: A No copying and no evidence of
paraphrasing B Paraphrasing, doesn't closely
resemble original (not copying).
_________________________________
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E Copied word for word for the most part. May involve some omissions, slight rearranging, minimal changing of tenses, minimal use of synonyms.
Categories of Information Use
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D Copying, with phrases rearranged, omitted, some words added. Occasional synonyms used.
Categories of Information Use
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Categories of Information Use
C Paraphrasing, can easily recognise original pattern of sentences and paragraphs, but many words have been changed
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Types of papers
1
2
No copying. Includes categories A and/or B with no C, D, E
Primarily categories A and/or B, with limited examples of categories C, D, or E (less than 15%)
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Types of papers
3
4
5
*
Contains between 15% and 29% of categories C, D, or E.
Contains between 30% and 49% of categories C, D, or E
Contains 50% or more of categories C, D, or E.
Contains 50% or more of categories D or E.
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Tendency to plagiarise:
High degree of copying Range: from exact duplication (E)
to Some words changed, but sentence
and paragraph patterns the same (C)
28 © Joy McGregor 2003
Copying Scores, D and E Level
% of English papers
(no copying)
31.3
(less than 15% of paper copied)
21.9
(15-29% of paper copied)
15.6
(30-49% of paper copied)
12.5
(50% or more of paper copied)
18.8
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Final Mark Compared With Copying Score
ENGLISH
n Mean (%)
Range (%)
Copy score=Type 4 or 5 (30% or more copied)
16 85.2 68 - 100
Copy score= Type 1 or 2 (little or no copying)
11 76.4 68 - 88
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Processes
Some students talked about processes
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"I have to talk out my ideas in order to understand what I'm thinking" (student quote).
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“As I was eating breakfast I was thinking about the revolution and I was thinking that ... a historian ... was against the revolution because it moved too fast, and I'm going to expand on that, such as events that might not have happened, such as the king might have been more complacent if the Revolution moved slower, he might not have tried to flee the country” (student quote).
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“I thought, well, at least I get to write about something interesting. Uh, I kinda wondered, 'cause most of our essay topics before, we'd already studied what we were going to have to write about. We didn't actually have to do the studying ourselves. So this time, it was different. It's not much more difficult. Actually I almost think it's better this way, that we get to ...
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...study about it in the first place and then we get to formulate our own ideas and our own thoughts on it and then write an essay about that topic. Um, it's just very different. I think it's more work and it's a little harder to figure out what's going on when you have to figure it out for yourself, rather than have somebody tell you. I think it's more worthwhile, 'cause we'll learn it better.”
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“My general opinion was that it was a good essay topic, because we were going to develop something we really hadn't touched on in class. And I thought, why not? It would be a good chance.”
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Process Orientation
These were the students who didn’t plagiarise at all or very minimally
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Texas Study
Similar research methods Students of mixed ability Teacher warned strongly against
plagiarism Resulted in lower levels of blatant
plagiarism (Categories D and E)…
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But…
Massive amounts of quotation, cited both correctly and incorrectly
“Copying” in this case means “recording someone else’s words, whether or not credit is given”
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Analysis of Citation errors:
Word for word, cited, but no quotation marks
Very close to identical, cited, but no quotation marks
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Citation errors (cont’d)
Wrong source entirelyOther source in bibliog.Not in any source listedCombined two, cited a third
Often found between citations to same source
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Citation errors (cont’d)
Citing correct source incorrectlyWrong pageCombining two, citing one but not
the otherOnly a portion of the quote, while
using more
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Errors within the quotation
SpellingMis-spelled from source to
notecard, then repeated in paperMis-spelled from card to paper
(e.g. dissection became direction)
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Citation error continuum
Trying to do it
right but
misunderstanding
the format: can’t
assume much
about their thinking
Blindly following
rules to satisfy
requirements:
gives impression
of lack of
engagement
© Joy McGregor 2003 46
Is higher level thinking going on?
The revised Bloom’s taxonomy: highest level is Creating
“Put elements together to form a coherent functional whole; reorganise elements into a new pattern or structure” (Anderson and Krathwohl)
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We are treating only symptoms.
What is the disease?
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Why is this happening?
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What can we do?
Stop ignoring copying Treat the disease, not just the
symptoms
© Joy McGregor 2003 50
How?
Challenge students with more stimulating questions
Encourage student engagement--encourage active learning
Start early and keep at it Stop abandoning students Emphasize process, not just product
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Teaching Orientation
Product Process
Desired student strategy
Reproduce knowledge
Construct knowledge
Interaction
Group instruction
One-on-one
Instruction
Same for everyone Different for each individual
Student involvement
Passive Active
End result
Reproduction Construction
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Strategies for encouraging process orientation
I-Search process Webquests Concept mapping and mind mapping
Handout available at:
http://athene.riv.csu.edu.au/~jmcgrego/plagiarism.html