Plagiarism Detection and Prevention at AUI: Approaches and Attitudes

Drs. Lynne Dahmen and Nancy Hottel

Assistant Professors, SHSS

How many times have you actually "caught" someone plagiarizing with this service?

“It is the fact that turnitin exists which causes students not to plagiarize anymore. Before, it was a lot more frequent.”

“…not so important how many times we've caught someone, but how many times we've deterred someone.”

“I have had no more problems with plagiarism since last Spring Semester” (2006)

“It is a deterrent, and it provides a report for them to use to help avoid plagiarism; as many of them do not really understand, this is a consciousness raising device.”

How has turnitin helped you to educate your students about avoiding plagiarism? “All in all, it's a great teaching tool in this

day and age where students believe that research means scavenging the net for snippets...”

“Once students know that their work will

be submitted to the system, they start to become more careful about using quotations and about paraphrasing.”

“I confess that I am not sure that it has helped to ‘educate’ them, so much as dissuade them. It is the case that it has enabled me to clarify for them what plagiarism is, and perhaps that has been helpful. But I believe that the service works because it ‘polices’ our students.”

… “The use of Originality Reports with first and second drafts has helped a great deal to allow students to see their with their own eyes how they have done sloppy jobs of documenting and paraphrasing. Even such things as incorrect quotation punctuation is clearly visible and they are able to correct this more easily. Also, students know that TII is helping AUI professors to build a database of student work; thus, they are less likely to use work from other students from previous semesters, and it has also awakened them to the concept of ‘recycling’ of their own work, which seems to be something not really emphasized by those introducing them to plagiarism (CAD? Orientation?).”

Attitudes

Is the faculty/student relationship a factor in plagiarism?

Do faculty and students perceive trust to be central to this relationship?

Does plagiarism damage this relationship or trust?

Does it have to? Do faculty and students share

perceptions?

Statement 1

Checking for plagiarism suggests a lack of trust that damages the faculty/student relationship.

Faculty Response

Student Response

Counterstatement

Faculty check for plagiarism because they don’t trust students.

Faculty Response

Student Response

Statement 3

Plagiarism, when caught by a faculty member, damages the faculty/student relationship.

Faculty Response

Student Response

Future Considerations…

Correlations between responses and educational background

Do the findings hear correlate with those in other areas or types of schools?

…