J. Goosney & D. Duda – Avoiding the Plagiarism Pitfall: Preventing Plagiarism in Undergraduate Research

For faculty teaching in academia, plagiarism is a common concern. With the ever-increasing availability of electronic information, many worry that it is becoming a greater problem than ever before. To manage the problem, instructors often seek ways to detect plagiarism once it has already occurred in student work. Unfortunately, this process often involves considerable time and effort, and instructors may feel they are compromising their roles as educator and mentor by instead becoming “plagiarism police”. At the same time, efforts at detection may not meet with success – if discovering that a student has plagiarized can be called a success – because it is not always easy, or even possible, to identify plagiarized work. Instead of focusing on detection, then, this paper promotes ways to prevent plagiarism before it occurs. An essential first step toward prevention is gaining an understanding of the myriad reasons why students plagiarize. This understanding will help the instructor with the next steps: educating students and raising their awareness of plagiarism, and developing teaching strategies that reduce opportunities for cheating while helping students avoid plagiarism-prone situations. This paper, then, will begin with an examination of why students plagiarize, and will go on to explore strategies for preventing plagiarism before it happens, in four ways: by creating student awareness; encouraging students to be better time managers; designing plagiarism-resistant assignments; and enlisting the help of others at one’s institution