Plagiarism Detection Tools
Plagiarism
The term plagiarism comes from the Latin word plagium meaning “kidnapping a man” (Masic, 2012). Plagiarism is the “literary theft” whose Bengali meaning is ‘Lekhachuri’ (Rahman, 2015). Plagiarism means taking the “words, thoughts, ideas, concepts, images, sentences and so forth” of others and using them as if they were your own, without crediting the author or citing the source (University of Kentucky, 2007). Copyright laws protect writers' words and idea as their legal property. Both plagiarisms of data and plagiarism of text are recognized in scientific writing (Plagiarism.org, 2017).
The followings are considered as plagiarism
- Turning in someone else's work as his/her own;
- Copying words or ideas from someone else without giving credit;
- Failing to put a quotation in quotation marks;
- Giving incorrect information about the source of a quotation;
- Changing words but copying the sentence structure of a source without giving credit;
- Copying so many words or ideas from a source that it makes up the majority of the work, whether you give credit or not (eliteracysociety.org, 2015);
- Mentioning own research result or idea (self-plagiarism) of his/her another publication; and
- Even translating from other languages (Rahman, 2015).
Criteria for detecting plagiarism
According to the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME):
- Sequentially 6 words; or
- 7-11 words of a set of 30 words.
How to avoid plagiarism
- Quotation Mark: Using Quotation Mark and proper citation.
- Paraphrasing: A paraphrase is a restatement of the meaning of a text or passage using other words. But we must not avoid citing the source.
Plagiarism Policy at IIUC
IIUC authority deals with plagiarism issues seriously. In order to avoid academic misconduct and confirm the originality of research work, the papers must go through Turnitin screening.
Acceptable Similarity
- Overall Similarity Index: 20% or less
- Single Source Similarity Index: 4% or less
- Overall Plagiarism: 0%
- Single Source Plagiarism: 0%
Options for Testing Plagiarism by Turnitin at IIUC
Search Options (Database)
- Student Paper Repository (Student Papers): On
- Current and Archived Internet (Internet Sources): On
- Periodicals, Journals, & Publications (Publications): On
- Exclude Bibliographic Materials: Yes
- Exclude Quoted Materials: Yes
- Exclude Small Sources: No
Turnitin
Turnitin is the world’s leading anti-plagiarism internet-based service. Turnitin’s comprehensive plagiarism prevention system allows quick and effective checks to all research work in a fraction of the time necessary to scan a few suspects’ papers using a search engine. Turnitin checks for potential unoriginal content by comparing submitted papers to several databases using a “proprietary algorithm”. It scans “its own database” and also has licensing agreements with “large academic proprietary database”.
Benefits of Turnitin
To avoid academic misconduct and confirm the originality of research work, Turnitin –
- Encourages proper citation
- Promotes originality
- Original writing promotes critical thinking
- Peer review without the pressure
- Grades anything
- Helps to Assess easily
- Prepares for publication
URL of Turnitin: http://www.turnitin.com