Why Plagiarism is Considered to be a Serious Offence in Academics?

Abstract

The paper discusses about the concept, perception, understanding and consequences of plagiarism among the future policy makers i.e., students. The paper also highlights acceptability of copying somebody’s ideas and thoughts to complete one’s own work which also indicates towards the casual approach of students. Acknowledging the fact that plagiarism is a kind of deception and is a major hurdle in the field of academic growth and development. Therefore, this must not be prevailed as it reduces the opportunity of uniqueness, in a way degrading the level of development in the thought process of people. Thereby, the paper tries to put forward the various consequences caused due to copying others’ ideas rather than putting efforts in creating some new ideas. The paper also talks about the students’ approach towards the idea of plagiarism and how educational institution tries to modify their policies in order to reduce the possibility of plagiarism.

Full text

Why Plagiarism is Considered to be a Serious Offence in Academics?
Snehlata
Amity Institute of English Studies and Research, Amity University, Noida, Uttar Pradesh
Abstract
The paper discusses about the concept, perception,
understanding and consequences of plagiarism among the
future policy makers i.e., students. The paper also highlights
acceptability of copying somebody’s ideas and thoughts to
complete one’s own work which also indicates towards the
casual approach of students. Acknowledging the fact that
plagiarism is a kind of deception and is a major hurdle in the
field of academic growth and development. Therefore, this
must not be prevailed as it reduces the opportunity of
uniqueness, in a way degrading the level of development in
the thought process of people. Thereby, the paper tries to put
forward the various consequences caused due to copying
others’ ideas rather than putting efforts in creating some new
ideas. The paper also talks about the students’ approach
towards the idea of plagiarism and how educational
institution tries to modify their policies in order to reduce
the possibility of plagiarism.
Keywords: Plagiarism; originality; cultures; intellectual
property; copyright infringement.
Introduction:
Writing a good research article requires a good grasp of
knowledge and expertise in the field of which the person is
working. It is mainly done with the idea of publishing one’s
work and unique results to the academic/research
community so as to gain popularity and get one’s work
recognised by the people working in the similar field. But
while writing a manuscript, most of the researchers,
especially the students are prone to commit mistakes and
many are even being caught for plagiarism.
One of the most popular terms which is often used in the
field of research and academics ‘Plagiarism’ is taken from a
Latin word “plagiarus” which refers to a ‘kidnapper’
(Aronson, 2007). The term ‘plagiarism’ found its place in
the Oxford English dictionary in the year 1621. The
definition of plagiarism as defined by the Encyclopaedia
Britannica is “the act of taking the writings of another
person and passing them off as ones’ own” (Dhammi & Ul
Haq, 2016). Plagiarism is considered a serious ethical
offence in the field of research and academics as it involves
the act of forgery, piracy and fraud and additionally, it also
violates the copyright law.
One of the latest definitions of plagiarism is “the use of
other’s published/ unpublished work/ idea/ words/ other
intellectual property without proper permission/ attribution/
recognition and presenting them as new and original idea
rather than acceptance of deriving them from other existing
sources” is given by the World Association of Medical
Editors (WAME), which can be accessed at the website
http://www.wameorg/resources/publication-ethics-policies-
for-medical-journals.
Paraphrasing someone else’s words with proper citation is
also termed as plagiarism from the academic point of view
as there is lack of recognition to the original person whose
ideas are being used. Improper referencing too is considered
as plagiarism irrespective of the fact that it was not
intentional (Gilmore et al., 2010).
Copyright, on the other hand, is a legal tool to protect the
‘original intellectual work’ of an author which may be
scientific, literary, dramatic, musical, artistic etc. The
protection is provided for both published and unpublished
work. The copyright provides exclusive rights to the
copyright holder and violation of any such rights is called
copyright infringement and is punishable under law.
A simple difference between copyright infringement and
plagiarism is that the copyright infringement is a construct
of the law while the plagiarism is the construct of ethics
(Sonfield, 2014). The most important point to be considered
while defining plagiarism and copyright infringement is that
the copyright infringement has just one victim, that is the
copyright holder. On the contrary, the plagiarism has two
victims, that is the original author and people who are
unaware of the origin of the actual work (Budiman &
Karnalim, 2019).
There are different types of plagiarism and all violates the
essence of ethics in the academic/research fields. It is often
seen that the young researchers, students who are new to the
field of research where they have to publish articles as a part
of their academic career are mostly found to use plagiarism.
Most of these plagiarisms are carried out as they have lack
of proper knowledge about the ethics and most of the time,
they unknowingly commit these violations during the
writing of articles/papers in their initial attempts. Gradually,
once they are being taught on the subject, they try to defer
from committing the ethical violations. Thus, by educating
the students about the plagiarism is essential in order to
identify their mistakes at the initial stages so that they can
try not to commit such mistakes.
It is very important how the university policy makers and
educationists introduce the concept of plagiarism to the
students and academics/researchers. Some of the higher
education authorities make it mandatory to introduce the
topic formally to the students as their moral duty while some
of them forcefully scare students of dire consequences if
found plagiarising. Many students reported that they don’t
plagiarise just because their professors and academic
institutions said so even when they had no understanding of
the concept of plagiarism and drawbacks related to it. The
policies related to plagiarism defined by different
institutions vary rapidly with varying countries and
continents. It is also seen that the policies revolving around
plagiarism is different for different countries while they are
all a part of same continent and are neighbouring countries.
It is also very clear from the studies published on plagiarism
that many of the graduate students and even researchers
have very faint ideas on plagiarism. Some of the students
reported that the policies on plagiarism is being defined in
their university handbooks but they have hardly ever

referred to it as they don’t take it to be a very serious
offence. Their casual approach towards the seriousness of
the topic reveals how much flawed their education system is.
this study attempts to find out the perceptions of different
students hailing from different academic backgrounds and
different countries/continents on the concepts and
understanding of the term plagiarism.
Methodology
The present review study attempts to compare different
reported statements and understanding from different studies
published worldwide to understand the students’ point-of-
view on the seriousness of the offence of plagiarism and its
associated drawbacks. Multiple articles were accessed for
the conclusion of the plagiarism ethics blunders committed
by the students/academics based on their country/continent
of origin.
Results and Discussions
A study undertaken by Hofstede in 2001 (Eckhardt, 2002;
Hofstede, 2001), conceptualised that the national cultures
impact the work behaviour and functioning of organisations
which comprises of four dimensions like power distance,
uncertainty avoidance, long-term/short-term orientation and
individualism/collectivism.
The above-mentioned factors can define the extent of
plagiarism committed by the students/researchers as these
factors varies with different places/countries/continents with
varied plagiarism policies in education sector. In this study,
an attempt is made to identify the variation among the
plagiarism policies and grasp of students on the concept of
plagiarism in different continents.
Hofstede (2001) defined power-distance as the extent to
which “the less powerful members of the institutes of a
country expect and accept that power distribution is
unequal” while the definition for uncertainty avoidance was
given as “extent to which the members of any culture feel
threatened to uncertain/unknown situations”. Individualism
is defined as “a society in which everyone is expected to
look after self and immediate family” while collectivism is
“the society where the individuals are integrated into
cohesive groups from birth are protected throughout lifetime
in exchange of unquestioning loyalty”. Long-term/short-
term orientation refers to “the choice of focus for people’s
efforts: the future or the present” (Eckhardt, 2002).
In countries/continents with lower power distance is
expected to have strong plagiarism policy which are readily
available to all the students and researchers as they will be
more open to such concepts and have better understanding
of copyright infringement and plagiarism. On the contrary,
the higher power distance means that the students have
negligible understanding and access to plagiarism policy.
Countries that have high individualism concept will be
having higher individual responsibility while in the
continents having collectivism concept will consider
plagiarism to be university community responsibility.
The policies of universities around the globe regarding the
plagiarism and copyright infringement varies with different
countries. The western nations have lesser power-distance
and rely heavily on individualism rather than collectivism.
Hence, they have better understanding on the concept of
plagiarism and have easier access to similarity detection
tools. They also have the sense of responsibility that the
content/article they publish should be plagiarism free and its
in the discretion of the individual as well as the university,
and just nit the university duty. High power distance nations
find it hard when it comes to innovation according to a study
by S. Shane (1992; 1993)
There are 7 continents in the world in which 6 continents are
inhabited with human beings. The continents like Europe,
Australia and North America are considered to be developed
while the South America and Asia are considered
Developing as the majority of the countries of these
continents come under the category of developing nations.
World Economic Situation and Prospects (WESP) classifies
countries based on different categories as developed
economies, economies in transition and developing
economies (West et al., 2007). 32 of the 44 European
nations comes under the developed nation category while
the remaining 12 are under the economies in transition
category. None of the European country is considered as
developing nation. 2 nations of the total of 23 nations are
developed in North America continent while none of the
South American countries are considered to be developed as
a nation. 2 out of 14 nations in Oceania (Australia) are
developed while other nations are classified as developing
economies. In the continent of Asia, only Japan is classified
as a developed nation while 12 nations come under the
category of economies under transition. The remaining 35 of
the 48 nations of Asia are developing economies. It is seen
that the developed economies have lower power distance as
compared to developing economies where the power
distance relatively very high. Hence the education policies
of the nations which are classified as developed economies
have better plagiarism policies as compared to the nations
classified as developing economies.
One of the most common reasons of plagiarism is that the
students do not know different types of plagiarism. They
have many misconceptions on the topic and hence it is very
important to educate them about different types of
plagiarism.
Shelly Yeo (2007) in a study revolving around the first-year
science and engineering students of Australia showed that
about 45% of those students considers plagiarism to be
merely copying the content without acknowledgement while
27% thinks plagiarism is done for the deception of the study
after copying. For another 18% of students, plagiarism is for
copying and then no acknowledgement of the original work
while 7% of the students considers plagiarism as simple
copying of content. Remaining 3% of the students have no
idea on the said matter. The same study also reported that
38% of the students think that the student who is found to
plagiarise his/her paper/article/thesis should be punished as
per the university policy while 55% of the students believes
that the deduction of academic marks is the most suitable
punishment for such miscreants. 7% of the surveyed
students considered that a warning is enough for the students
who are found to have plagiarised. A noteworthy report
published in the very same article showed that 70% of the
students doesn’t consider copying common assignment
solutions as plagiarism. 27% of the students who reported
the above-mentioned as plagiarism considered it a minor
offence while less than 5% considered it to be moderately
serious offence while no one considered it to be very serious
offence. Majority of students consider that it is plagiarism
only when it is copied and pasted in an article as compared
to copying assignment from other sources.

In another study conducted on the college students in the
Maine state of the USA conducted by Lory G. Power (2009)
reported that the students don’t plagiarise just because they
are told to do so but have no proper concept or
understanding on the same. The students also reported that
the concept of plagiarism were introduced to them as a
warning rather than any base of understanding and sense of
responsibility. According to the students interviewed, the
punishment for the plagiarism is according to the university
handbook. The interview reported that none of the students
have ever read the university handbook completely while
just 6% of the interviewee reported that they have just read
some parts of the manual.
Another similar study taken up by Mahmud et al. (2019)
reported the European student’s perceptions on the
Plagiarism policy in higher education. They reported that
83-93% of the students of the UK had access to plagiarism
policies and had better understanding on the penalties due to
the plagiarism. In comparison, 50-70% of the students from
Czechia agreed that they had access to the plagiarism
policies and penalties revolving around it. The European
countries like Romania and Poland reported even less than
50% of their students have better access and understanding
on the plagiarism policies. The stark difference between the
proportion of students from the neighbouring countries
shows how much the universities actually do care to
introduce the concept of plagiarism to their students.
A similar research published by Song-Turner (2008)
compared the perception of students on plagiarism and
related policies from the students from India (54%), Asia
(21%), Europe (13%), South America (3%), Africa (1%),
Arabia (1%) and Australia (6%) who were studying in
Australia at the time of the research published. The
Australian students responded that “using someone else’s
exact work for a particular idea or description” as
plagiarism. The European students responded that
plagiarism meant “writing other person’s ideas as yours,
without mentioning the author’s name” while the Indian
students described plagiarism as “to copy word by word
(verbatim), without referencing, without giving proper credit
to the person to whom the article or words belong”. The
other Asian nation’s students referred plagiarism as “using
other’s sources without citation and references”, the Latin
American students concluded it as “plagiarism is to present
the knowledge of someone else as your job” and Arabian
student referred plagiarism to be “copying the material
written by someone without acknowledging”. The African
students mentioned “the use of other people’s findings or
ideas in published work in one’s own work without
acknowledging the source of such ideas or findings in the
work”.
Conclusion
The students are supposed to propagate the ideology of an
honest work since they will be the future policy makers.
Plagiarism acts as an obstruction in the knowledge sphere of
students since they find it easier to copy somebody else’s
ideas rather than investing their energy in understanding the
concepts and putting it in their own words. In a way,
plagiarism acts as a source of escapism for the students.
As a result, the students are deprived of acquiring
knowledge. Plagiarism also restricts the scope of being
provided varied idea and creative skills. There needs to be
proper monitoring regarding the work of students. They
should be taught to reflect their own ideas and concepts in
order to gain knowledge, wisdom and intellectual fame.
Declarations:
Ethics approval and consent to participate
Not applicable.
Consent for publication
Not applicable.
Declaration of Competing Interests
The authors declare that they have no competing interests.
Funding support:
Authors declare that they have not received any funding for
the present work.
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