1 September 2014

Turnitin What is Turnitin?

Turnitin is plagiarism detection software that is used by WBS, and the University, to assist in identifying matches in

submitted work against other sources. Turnitin works by comparing a student’s work with a database of millions of books,

journals, webpages and previously submitted documents. Almost all UK universities use Turnitin to assist in preventing

plagiarism in student work.

Turnitin is not used in isolation to make a judgment on plagiarism, but it does provide information on which an academic

judgment is then made.

Interpreting the Report

The Turnitin report is intuitive and simple to interpret. It consists of a reproduction of the submitted work, in which sections

are highlighted where a match or matches have been found with another source.

The overall percentage of the work which can be found in these other sources is shown as the “Similarity Index”. This is

then broken down into individual sources (with web links where appropriate), with the amount found in each source listed

next to it.

Points to note

The score received does not automatically determine that plagiarism has been committed – there is no ‘score’ to

aim for. The report is interpreted by the marker who compares the submitted paper and the suspected sources and

uses academic judgment to come to a view on whether an offence has been committed.

Turnitin will highlight quoted material, even if it has been correctly attributed. Provided they have been correctly

referenced, this will not be penalised.

Common phrases and short pieces of text may show as a match simply as they are in common usage and therefore

do not need to be referenced.

The sources identified by Turnitin may not be the only place that the material can be found – for example Turnitin

may identify Wikipedia as the source, although the material may also be published elsewhere.

WBS Practise

WBS does not allow students to submit their work to Turnitin before submission via my.wbs. It is believed that as long as

students follow the guidance given on correct referencing and avoiding plagiarism, no problems regarding plagiarism will

arise.

Student Declaration

On submission via my.wbs and on coversheets for assignments, students will be asked to make the following declaration:

“I declare that this work is entirely my own in accordance with the University’s guidelines on plagiarism and collusion. All

external references and sources are clearly acknowledged and identified within the contents. No substantial part(s) of the

work submitted here has also been submitted by me in other assessments for accredited courses of study, and I acknowledge

that if this has been done it may result in me being reported for self-plagiarism and an appropriate reduction in marks may

be made when marking this piece of work.”

By making this declaration you are indicating that you have understood the regulations and consequences of plagiarism.

2 September 2014

Example of a Good Turnitin Report

Similarity Index 5%

2% match to generic assignment cover sheet

1% match to assignment question and declaration page

No action required regarding plagiarism.

3 September 2014

Example from a Turnitin Report prompting further investigation

Similarity Index 46%

5 significant matches identified by the Turnitin report: 10%/ 7%/ 6%/ 4%/ 3%

This student was reported for possible plagiarism and the Plagiarism Panel found that:

In this assignment there were several sections that would be considered negligence if they were on their own,

however there were also 3 sections that were considered to be misconduct (one of which is shown in red in the

above example, another in blue) where the problems were not just technical issues of referencing but a case of

taking credit for someone else’s work;

The Plagiarism Panel reached a decision of Misconduct, the student was given a mark of 0 (zero) with the right to

resubmit for a capped mark.

There are a range of penalties available to the Plagiraism Panel (please see the full WBS Plagiarism Proceedure)

and each case is decided on an individual basis taking into consideration all of the information available, including

student statements and interviews (where applicable). Turnitin is only one of the elements that the panel will

consider.

4 September 2014

Example of Self Plagiarism prompting further investigation

Similarity Index 20%

Source 1 - 11% match (self-plagiarised), Source 2 - 4% match, Source 3 - 1% match

11% of this essay was self-plagiarised from an earlier essay submitted by the student;

This piece of work contained (5) substantive paragraphs containing cohesive arguments that have been lifted

and repeated from previous work;

This could have been avoided either by self-referencing, rephrasing or approaching the question differently;

there had been no attempt at any of these;

The Plagiarism Panel reached a decision of Negligence and imposed a 5 mark reduction on the mark originally

awarded for the work.

11% self-

plagiarised