Academic honesty and plagiarism

Plagiarism can be defined as the attempt to gain advantage for yourself - academic advantage, financial advantage, professional advantage, advantage of publicity - by trying to fool someone, such as a teacher, an editor, an employer, or a reader, into thinking that you wrote something, thought something, or discovered something which, in actual fact, someone else wrote, thought, or discovered. Plagiarism is sometimes defined, aphoristically, as 'literary theft'.

Plagiarism is a growing problem in all sectors of education, and the number of reported cases in UK universities has risen dramatically in recent years. It is still the case that students can fail their programme, be expelled from University, or even be prevented from pursuing a career in one of the professions such as Law, Medicine and Teaching, all of which regard plagiarism as a serious breach of professional ethics.

Increasingly, students accused of plagiarising claim to be unaware that what they are doing is wrong, and to have insufficient knowledge about the need to reference the work of others. In some cases this appears to be true.

Most universities now adopt a holistic approach to the issue, taking a more active role in educating students about 'academic honesty' or 'academic integrity' whilst continuing to instigate disciplinary procedures in serious cases. The majority of UK universities are also piloting or have implemented electronic submission of assessed work and anti-plagiarism software 'Turnitin'.

All Colleges at Exeter have at least one Academic Misconduct Officer to provide immediate support and guidance to colleagues and to attend plagiarism hearings. The Student Academic Skills Development team in Education Enhancement offers workshops for students on academic honesty, as well as one-to-one individual support to help with students' referencing skills, and the Academic Development team is working with colleagues in Schools on the implementation of Turnitin.

These pages are designed to provide an introduction for staff to the key issues on plagiarism and how to promote academic honesty through teaching, learning and assessment.