Anti-plagiarism regulations are beneficial to writers in regards to intellectual property, but can it also be harmful to science in the long-term?
In the past, academic writers could read a paper and cite it appropriately at the end of a sentence (or within). That one-sentence brief summary of an entire research concept has a specific, and limited combination of words that can be used to accurately describe the research being cited. Before the internet had a monumental involvement in the writing and review process, whether or not a researcher used similar or identical language (whether by coincidence or intention) in this sentence was largely unknown.
We now have software that scores plagiarism based on word count similarities between sentences like these, and academics that pass a certain threshold of similarities are forced to change their combination of words used to cite the research in that particular sentence. Does this not create an environment where academic writing becomes like a game of "telephone" where one original idea is modified through so many iterations that it becomes completely different than the actual meaning of the initial concept?
The English language is limited by its vocabulary, even though it evolves from time to time, and international ESL academics are even further limited by their vocabulary capacities.
How many iterations and combinations of one sentence can be use to accurately describe a specific research article before all viable combinations have been expended? Are we promoting a system that forces academics to change their writing in ways that may misrepresent research just for something as petty as a word count match threshold? Is there even a global consensus on what this threshold should be?
This is a very interesting thought. Any sensible anti-plagiarism software should obviously exclude all sentences that were cited (also as indirect citations) from its plagiarism check. The purpose of anti-plagiarism software is to identify ideas that were _not_ credited to their original authors. I think this is an interesting case of an innovation 'gone wrong' that now produces measurable, but ultimately meaningless results, since it effectively marks cited ideas as plagiarism.
I agree with in relation to depraving scholars from free ways of adopting ideas
I have used Turnitin and yes, the software can compare word similarities and co-locations. But often the things it finds are not true plagiarism, just similarities. I had to experiment with the settings in order to not get extensive "false positives."
Michael W. Marek Yikes... So we are now inducing the game of telephone in the early stages of academia? That can't be good. I hope there are more professors like yourself out there that aren't taking all of the suggested plagiarism of Turnitin at face value and asking for changes as part of their feedback.
I believe it results in unnecessary change in the simple and meaningful expression of idea. Often, a simple sentence can make it comprehensive, however, owing to the plagiarism check, the same sentence is twitched, altered and manipulated. End result: the reader says what was the need of this fancy text!. The change can come from educational institution and publishing houses who can identify this issue and make suitable change to their acceptance criteria.
There are aplication for paraphrase... For avoid similarity .. Avoid turnitin check.. Not easy catch text plagiarisme now... What do you think?
Stolen ideas isn't the issue I'm trying to bring up here, it is properly cited ideas with a combination of text that could be identical or near-identical to another article's text citing the same study. Online journals have created an explosion in academic articles, so for popular topics, there could be thousands of articles citing one single paper. How many ways can a sentence be formed before it matches another one; how many ways can a sentence be formed about an idea until all possible combinations (in the limited vocabulary of authors who are not dictionaries or linguists) are expended and the concept is no longer being accurately represented.
Russell Gray I did not use the words "game of telephone." In fact, I do not see a negative in using technology to check for plagiarism, as long as the real person using the system also exercises judgement.
The wording leading to the citation in the body of the article should NOT be word-for-word what the source said. It should always be paraphrased and worded differently.
While I agree in theory that any sentence leading up to a citation should not be word-for-word of another paper that cites the same source, after how many thousands of papers and iterations of people citing a paper is that possible anymore. For popular papers that are paraphrased thousands of times in thousands of different iterations, how long do you suppose those paraphrases are still valid until forced to use combinations of words that do not accurately reflect the research they are citing anymore.
How many word/syntax similarities between sentences do we count as the threshold? What if someone who has never read another paper citing the same study happens to write the same sentence citing the same paper (because it succinct and logical way to describe it)? Their own intellectual property (their own writing) must then change because of that? At what point do we consider regulations and thresholds like these counterproductive? Censorship? Gatekeeping?
Of course my examples are hypothetical, because this is very much a hypothetical discussion based on explosive growth of globalized scientific publishing in a single language. However, the point I want to make is that prior to the internet, people could (lets say by coincidence) write the same words as another person to describe the same thing, and no one would care. Now it is an issue because we want every single combination of words in every single published paper to be different.
I totally agree and share the inference of this observation that following the formulation and language rules imposed by science publishers degrades the transfer of knowledge and sense. Moreover, not only the originality check can distort the meaning and intention of the idea but the so-called political correctness or ethics of the language in which scietists have to write.
Prof. Russell Gray: In my opinion, most of the free-software-checkers for plagiarism don't work effectively. Since there is no guarantee that the original content of your manuscript might not be copied and sold to others before it is published by you, I discourage using any free-software-checkers for plagiarism; some of them are betrayers.
- WARNING 1: There are a massive number of betrayers!
- WARNING 2: Plagiarism is a sin! If it is, severe action may be taken and/or legal notice may be given.
Unfortunately, you have to pay for the sake of getting good results. In any way, it is not well for your reputation if there were accusations of plagiarism.
In my personal opinion, free anti-plagiarism software is not safe.
On the other side, my university, WISE, uses the TURNITIN plagiarism checker. The maximum allowed percentage of plagiarism should be commonly less than 20%. However, from the same reference, it should not exceed 5%.
To delete the previous version of your paper that is stored in the repository of the TURNITIN checker, you must contact their support and provide them with the submission ID of your research manuscript. To do that, select the relevant assignment from the submission inbox, then click the trash can icon alongside the paper submission you would like to delete. In the end, a warning box will ask you to confirm the deletion. in this case, you have to select OK to confirm that.
If you don't have this ID, you have to first ask them for restoration of the deleted manuscript. This process may need extra two to three weeks.
Finally, we must completely recognize that plagiarism is never allowed and it is almost impossible to have 0% similarity.
Dear respected colleagues,
Related to this valuable discussion thread of Prof. Russell Gray, please let me point to another critical issue related to plagiarism software-detectors.
My friend was accused of plagiarism. Why?
After about five months, his promotion process to associate professor was rejected because of plagiarism. When he checked the promotion report, he found that one of his papers was accused of plagiarism and with a 100% percentage. The reason is that his manuscript was checked by his co-author using one of these checkers. It took him several months time of following up to solve the problem and removing the manuscript from their database. After that long period, he re-applies the promotion order for the second time.
Therefore, plagiarism software may retain a copy of the manuscript in its database. To state the truth, this is depending upon the settings and type of account subscription.
So, you may face a similar situation when you submit your manuscript after plagiarism checking to a journal. It may be rejected instantly because it would show up 100% similarity index.
To solve the problem, it may take several months time of following up and removing the manuscript from their database.
If there were accusations of plagiarism, it is not well for your reputation, in any meaning.
Dear Prof. Russell Gray & all the honorable researchers,
Plagiarism is a common problem facing almost all professors. This respected portal (i.e. RG) defines plagiarism as:
The term “plagiarism” has different meanings, but it usually includes copying somebody else’s work without permission.
On the other side, self-plagiarism is when the author republishes portions of his/her own previously written research work while authoring a new work.
I may be somewhat old-fashioned, but please have a look at the following golden principles on how to avoid plagiarism in academic writing, especially Self-Plagiarism:
Now, I think that the above-mentioned rules are helping in setting boundaries to avoid plagiarism in general, and self-plagiarism in special.
Finally, believe me, or not: If you make one plagiarizing, you may solve one problem and fall into many others where some of which may be described as a knockout. Again and again, please always remember that if there were accusations of plagiarism, it is not well for any researcher's reputation, in any meaning.
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