How to Avoid Plagiarism| 5 Amazing Tips for Students

How to avoid plagiarism: As a student, learning how to avoid plagiarism in your day-to-day assignment or project will be at the top of your priority list.

Whether you talk about online marketing, businesses, or academics, plagiarism is a basic sin. Not only because it compromises the integrity but also because it’s a foul way of doing things.

In simple words, copying someone’s hard work isn’t exactly a good thing.

Despite that, 36% of students have admitted plagiarizing content from internet sources without citing them. This practice doesn’t only affect the learning, but it has woeful future implications as well.

A Times investigation in 2015 revealed 50,000 students who cheated in years 2012-2014. All of those students might be graduates, PHDs or masters now. However, they compromised the pillar years of their study by plagiarizing. So, how can you avoid that?

What is Plagiarism?

University of Oxford’s dictionary says that the person presenting someone else’s ideas as their own is plagiarizing. However, besides blatant copying, plagiarizing can be on different levels. Even citing a quote without giving credit to the author is plagiarizing.

Using a stat or a fact without citing the source is plagiarizing. So is claiming someone else’s research ideas and passing them off as your own. No matter how you look at it, plagiarizing has more downsides than upsides.

Sure, it helps you save some time, but at the same time, it tarnishes your reputation, among other things. For a writer, plagiarizing should be similar to the accusation of homicide. Not only is it a dark cloud to carry around, but it will also ruin your credibility whatsoever.

For a student, it has far worse implications than that. Plagiarizing not only compromises learning but also takes away your necessary educational period. A student who might paraphrase without understanding the concept ruins their chances of a bright future.

Let’s be honest; many of us cheated here and there in schools. However, being an adult makes us realize how costly those mistakes were. Things like; ”If we had only paid more attention” or “if we had only studied more” are common phrases in people who are past their school age. 

That’s why plagiarism is looked down upon in any industry, niche, or academic setting. It takes away your chances of originality and hinders whatever progress a student might have achieved.

Therefore, many people push towards paraphrasing but using their thoughts. Instead of blatant copying, try to learn the idea and use your own words next time, and you will see the difference.

5 Tips to Avoid plagiarism– How can you avoid plagiarism

Avoiding plagiarism can sound easier than it is done. Many professional writers and seasoned academic professionals always double-check their work before proceeding. The simple fact behind all this is the need for content’s integrity, which drives this extra step.

However, what can a student do to avoid that? Most students cannot hire specialist proofreaders or buy expensive programs, so what can they do to avoid plagiarism? It’s not just the idea of grasping the concept but also ensuring originality. So, here are five tips you can use to achieve that:

Once you finish writing your work, dissertations, or articles, make sure you run it through a plagiarism checker. Whether you paraphrased it, wrote it initially, the margin of plagiarism in any content piece is always in question.

Plagiarism checkers have a vast database, the kind you simply cannot access by googling sentences. So, using a checker will help you understand the percentage of copied or duplicated content in your work. It will also help you find possible fixes.

The primary purpose of these checkers is to make sure you understand where the duplicity originated. Then, the percentage helps you grasp where the safe zone is.

If your content features less than 5% of plagiarism, then it might be that a simple quotation or source citation fixes it. If not, try to paraphrase it so that it doesn’t overlap with original content.

#1.   Use Quotations Wherever Possible

Quotations are one of the significant problems in unintended plagiarism. If you’re sharing a quote, stat, fact, or even thought that was taken from another writer, make sure you quote them. Many a time, students mention the person in their works.

However, they fail to mention the origin, which becomes a problem. Quoting anything you’ve taken from another person will not take anything away from your credibility. Nor would it make the other writer more credible than you.

Use Possible Quotations in assignment writing:

What it would do is help you both stand out in a crowded world. It would help you avoid plagiarism and make your content stick, regardless of its type. So, use quotations wherever possible and needed.

#2.   Paraphrasing & Spinning

If any irregularities arise once you use a plagiarism checker to scrutinize your content, you can change that by simply paraphrasing. Many times, students deliberately copy and paste the content of other authors or writers.

This practice does not only harm their studies; it also takes away their credibility. Instead, try to learn what the writer has said and write the same thing in your own words. Paraphrasing or spinning the content will save you a lot of trouble.

Moreover, it would guarantee that any plagiarism checker avoids picking you out for plagiarized consent. Therefore, changing or tweaking a simple thing in your approach can help you avoid plagiarism.

#3.   Try Deriving Your Work Form Existing Data

Data, stats, and facts are your three best friends. How you spin, quote, or paraphrase them in your work depends on you. If you just write everything word-to-word, it will undoubtedly cause you trouble as a student.

However, if you try to learn what the said data, stats, and facts are stating, it would be better. It would educate you and help you write it in your own words. Indeed, you can use quotations and references, but using existing data to derive your work will help you stand out.

Moreover, if you’re in college, university, or school, it would help your teacher or tutor know that you’ve worked hard for it. Therefore, a simple tweak in your approach will help you steer clear of any sort of plagiarized content.

#4.   Use Citations to Avoid Overlapping Content

If you’re using data, quotes, or a common notion, then make sure you cite the sources. If a teacher checks your work and finds out that you have used content without giving credit to the author, they will mark it plagiarized.

Moreover, any plagiarism checker would catch it as duplicate content before your tutor rejects it. The only way to avoid such overlapping circumstances is by citing the source. This practice is convenient when using a stat or a literal quote.

Let’s say you’re using the quote “content is king” from Bill Gates, then quoting the original 1996 Microsoft article would be the way to go. This citation will help you avoid any plagiarism accusations and help you keep your credibility as a student.

How Does Plagiarism Affect a Student’s Career

Avoiding plagiarism by using the tips mentioned above can help you in many ways. However, avoiding these tips and still plagiarizing has adverse long-term effects on a student’s life.

It hinders careers, and it compromises credibility. So, if you’re looking for a reason to avoid plagiarism, besides that it’s unethical, let us dive in and explore how it affects a student’s activity in studies.

#1.   Brings Down Their Scores

Your GPA, Marks, or whatever you call it where you’re from, depend a lot on how you work as a student. If your idea is to get rid of projects as soon as you get them, then you will turn to plagiarism.

Thoroughly devising strategies to get your dissertations, essays, and articles done will help you. However, plagiarism will only pull your scores down to a level where they look bad on your resume.

#2.    Deprives Them of Learning

Out of all the significant fallouts of plagiarism, the lack of studies will haunt any student the most. Sure, you can avoid plagiarism by paraphrasing, but you can prevent this by learning.

Paraphrasing or spinning the content will not only hinder your studies but will also deprive you of learning. So, instead of relying on spun content, try to study to avoid plagiarism.

#3.    Risking Suspension

If you’re duplicating the content you see online, then you’re risking suspension. Many universities and colleges only have a limit to allow a student to plagiarize.

If your warnings have no effect and you keep doing it, you risk suspension. Any sort of suspension would hamper your chances for a better career.

#4.    Affects GPA & Long-Term Careers

If you fail any exams, it will affect your whole GPA or your score in any other scoring system. This crash will cause your GPA to go down with it and have long-term effects on your professional life.

#5.    Reduces Credibility in Professional Life

If your resume shows a low GPA, you will have to answer some cruel questions in interviews. Plagiarizing will cause a slump in your professional life, as well as your academic one.

Many students plagiarize and get away with it, but it affects them in the long run. Using a plagiarism checker to spin or paraphrase correctly will help you learn better and keep your credibility.

Conclusion

There you have it, some tips you can use to avoid plagiarism, and what would happen if you don’t. So, it’s better to use a plagiarism checker and rid your work of any unwanted duplicity.