Plagiarism at its foundation is taking the work of someone else and passing it off as your own. This can apply to written work, images, films, art, etc.
Plagiarism can take many forms, including copy and pasting sections of an article, having someone else write an assignment for you, not citing information properly, collaborating on an assignment that is meant to be handed in individually, and many more. This Library Help Guide will take you through types of plagiarism and how to avoid it.
This guide can be used closely with our referencing and copyright guides.
You can read the official plagiarism policy of IADT here. It sets out levels of plagiarism and what the penalty is for each level.
The below screenshot about definitions and levels of plagiarism come from the IADT Academic Integrity Policy.
IADT uses TurnItIn, a software that checks for improper citation, unclear references, and possible plagiarism. It is also used to provide feedback on assignments.
You can submit a draft assignment to TurnItIn, and the software will highlight citation issues to you - for example, a large block of text with no citation at the end - which you can then fix, and resubmit. There is a limit to the number of times you can do this in one 24 hour period, so make sure to read the instructions on the Turn It In page. Ask your lecturer.tutor for more information on this.
The Complete Guide to Referencing and Avoiding Plagiarism by Academic integrity is the practice of being honest and forthright in your academic writing. Essentially this means always giving credit to your sources and not claiming work as your own when it has been taken from someone else. This applies to individual assignments, as well as in group tasks. It applies to not only written material but to multimedia sources also.
You can attain academic integrity by citing fully and correctly, by providing reference lists, and avoiding plagiarism as a whole.
Please feel free to contact us about any question you have - about this subject or anything else you need help with. Library staff are available to provide help and answer queries online/remotely and in-person on Level 1 of the Library.
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