How to Avoid Plagiarism

HOW TO AVOID PLAGIARISM

Northwestern's "Principles Regarding Academic Integrity" defines plagiarism as "submitting material that in part or whole is not entirely one's own work without attributing those same portions to their correct source." Plagiarism can occur in many forms besides writing: art, music, computer code, mathematics, and scientific work can also be plagiarized. This document pays special attention to plagiarism in writing, but it is important to understand that unauthorized collaboration in a math or science assignment is also plagiarism.

In all academic work, and especially when writing papers, we are building upon the insights and words of others. A conscientious writer always distinguishes clearly between what has been learned from others and what he or she is personally contributing to the reader's understanding. To avoid plagiarism, it is important to understand how to attribute words and ideas you use to their proper source.

Guidelines for Proper Attribution

Everyone in the university needs to pay attention to the issue of proper attribution. All of us--faculty and students together--draw from a vast pool of texts, ideas, and findings that humans have accumulated over thousands of years; we could not think to any productive end without it. Even the sudden insights that appear at first glance to arrive out of nowhere come enmeshed in other people's thinking. What we call originality is actually the innovative combining, amending, or extending of material from that pool.

Hence each of us must learn how to declare intellectual debts. Proper attribution acknowledges those debts responsibly, usefully, and respectfully. An attribution is responsible when it comes at a location and in a fashion that leaves readers in no doubt about whom you are thanking for what. It is useful when it enables readers to find your source readily for themselves. You help them along the way, just as that same source helped you along yours. To make sure that our attributions are useful, we double-check them whenever we can. Quite literally, it is a habit that pays. Colleagues in every field appreciate the extra care. Nothing stalls a career faster than sloppy, unreliable work.

Finally, an attribution is respectful when it expresses our appreciation for something done well enough to warrant our borrowing it. We should take pride in the intellectual company we keep. It speaks well of us that we have chosen to use the work of intelligent, interesting people, and we can take genuine pleasure in joining our name with theirs.

A Note about Attributions or Citations

Usually the most helpful form of attribution is a citation (footnote, end note, in-text note) in which you give precise information about your source. Professors and disciplines may vary as to the preferred style for documenting ideas, opinions and facts, but all methods insist upon absolute clarity as to the source and page reference, and require