European Journal of Social Sciences ISSN 1450-2267 Vol.25 No.4 (2011), pp. 537-549 © EuroJournals Publishing, Inc. 2011 http://www.europeanjournalofsocialsciences.com
Plagiarism among Undergraduate Students in an EngineeringBased University: An Exploratory Analysis Roselind Wan Management & Humanities Department Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS Perak Darul Ridzuan, Malaysia E-mail:
[email protected] Tel: +605-3687744 Fax: +605-3656280 Shahrina BTE Md Nordin Management & Humanities Department Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS Perak Darul Ridzuan, Malaysia Muhammed B. Halib Management & Humanities Department Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS Perak Darul Ridzuan, Malaysia Zulkipli B. Ghazali Management & Humanities Department Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS Perak Darul Ridzuan, Malaysia Abstract Plagiarism is a complex phenomenon and addressing the problem requires a thorough examination of various constructions underpinning it occurrences. This paper explores plagiarism practices and its contributing factors among the engineering undergraduates in a higher learning institution. 500 questionnaires, consisting of 50 items, were distributed to the Engineering students as respondents in this study. The investigation hinges on four dimensions which include awareness about plagiarism, knowledge on academic referencing, intent and extent in committing plagiarism and contributing factors towards plagiarism. The findings provide some sociological insights for better understanding of the problem among students in universities.
1. Introduction Plagiarism has always been discussed in abhorrent undertones, describing it as an act despicable and intolerable essentially in a community such as the academic community, where integrity and accountability of works are held in high esteem. The criminal connotations of plagiarism (Bretag & Mahmud, 2009) and the moralistic tones (Park, 2003) that inherently follow any plagiarism occurrence are viewed as befitting the nature of the act. The substantial amount of studies carried out in recent years on the issue of plagiarism among university students says a lot about the severity of the problem in the academia today (Angelil-Carter, 2000; Bretag, 2005; Carrol, 2003; Devlin, 2003, cited in Bretag 537
European Journal of Social Sciences – Volume 25, Number 4 (2011) and Mahmud, 2009). Universities particularly do not condone plagiarism as it affects the integrity of the institutions. The repercussions of students’ plagiarism are usually stated in the university’s academic policy where students are warned of sanctions and expulsion from the university if they were found to have committed the offense (Thomley, 1989). Williams (2005) describes the continuous debate regarding plagiarism as an emotionally charged issue (http://www.economicsnetwork.ac.uk/handbook/plagiarism/21), yet it is highly understandable since the integrity of literary works and scholarship has been compromised. Plagiarism however is not a new phenomenon in the academics (Davis et al., 1992; Desruisseaux, 1999, Williams, 2005). A study conducted by Hale way back in 1987 on plagiarism among college students had reported that fifty-five percent in each of his two samples admitted to plagiarism. However, the universal access (Scanlon and Neumann, 2002) to electronic sources through the proliferation of new-age technology such as the internet has exacerbates and brought the problem of plagiarism to a level unimagined in recent years (Zack, 1998; Cosgrave et al., 1996; Park, 2003). The magnitude of the problem was discussed in McCabe’s study (2005) where 73 percent of a total 50,000 undergraduates from around 60 campuses in the United States admitted they have committed plagiarism in one form or another. Such percentage is indeed alarming considering the seriousness of such unethical misconduct. The incidences of plagiarism continue to grow to almost as an epidemic (Desruisseaux, 1999) amongst the students in higher leaning institutions. Although target studies on the understanding of plagiarism among engineering undergraduates students have been few, some scholars believe it may be more pervasive in science, engineering and technology students (Newstead et al., 1996; McCullough & Holmberg, 2005 cited in Yeo, 2007). However internet searches on the occurrences of plagiarism among engineering undergraduate students in Malaysia specifically, have not provided a clear picture on the problem in Malaysian universities. This study attempts to provide an exploratory analysis of plagiarism among engineering undergraduates by investigating their awareness, knowledge on academic referencing, the extent of plagiarism among the students and the contributing factor to plagiarism. The findings will provide a significant contribution to a deeper understanding of plagiarism occurrences in the context of a higher learning institution in Malaysia.
2. Literature Review 2.1. Defining Plagiarism Plagiarism is derived from the Latin word ‘plagiarius’ which means to steal or to plunder. It has been popularly defined as the practice of using other people ideas and works without appropriating the sources and passing it as one’s own works. Palmquist (2003) sees it as “a form of intellectual dishonesty, involves unintentionally using someone else’s work without properly acknowledging where the ideas come from (the most common form of plagiarism) or intentionally copying someone else’s work and passing it off as your own (the most serious form of plagiarism)” (p.134). Others prefer to view plagiarism as a theft of intellectual property and copyright infringement (Hannabuss, 2001; Seadle, 2008), prompting Mawdsley (1994) to argue that a distinction should be made between copyright and plagiarism. He sees copyright as a legal issue that protects intellectual property and has economic implications, while plagiarism as more of “conduct” of the plagiarist. In this context, he contends plagiarism as more of a moral issue that has no economic gains on the students who commit the offence. The continuing discourse regarding the definition and the terminology used to describe plagiarism has established that it is a highly contentious term. Most scholars also argue that it is a highly subjective concept (Lyndsay, 2003; Ashworth & Bannister, 1997) with no one clear definition to justify the meanings and nuances associated with it. The problem of defining it stamps from the rhetoric surrounding the term and the complex factors concerning its occurrence (Bretag & Mahmud, 2009). Many researchers argue that dictionary definitions may no longer be enough to describe what 538
European Journal of Social Sciences – Volume 25, Number 4 (2011) constitute plagiarism as it has become an intricate problem which could essentially relate to factors such as linguistic competence, academic literacy, culture, racism, academic integrity, media scandal and institutional governance (Bretag, 2005). Although most common views on plagiarism are based on the concept of copyright, ownership and moral implications of the act, factors such as differences in educational cultures and acceptable academic traditions (Handa & Power, 2005) should also be considered as different cultural background will further contributes to the complex nature of plagiarism. 2.2. Types of Plagiarism Plagiarism comes in various forms. Literature on plagiarism and academic dishonesty have argued on the different types and extend of plagiarism, suggesting the line between what really constitute plagiarism and original works as existing in a continuum of a “spectrum of situations” (Park, 2003). This spectrum of situations is similar to Angelil-Carter’s (2000, cited in Bretag and Mahmud, 2007) contention that plagiarism occurs at different levels. As James, McInnes and Devlin (2002) argue plagiarism may take place with different intent and extent ranging from deliberate fraud, to negligent or accidental failure to acknowledge sources when paraphrasing from original sources and misunderstanding about conventions of academic referencing. It does appear looking at the various instances of plagiarism as reported by Bretag and Mahmud (2007) in Table 1 that there is a clear thread to suggest plagiarism as committed with clear intent and there are those that are committed with no clear intent to commit plagiarism. It would be easy to categorize the former as a form of plagiarism existing within the context of the spectrum of situations as postulated by Park but in the context of the later, Madray’s (2007) contention of accidental plagiarism seems highly suggestive. She claims this as being the result of common misunderstanding about plagiarism within the academic, arguing that students unintentionally plagiarized when they do not know how to paraphrase, summarize or quote correctly. Howard (1995 cited in Sutherland-Smith, 2003) on the other hand, maintains that the key difference in plagiarism is in the intention. She cautions however that discriminating between unintentional and intentional plagiarism may not be as clear cut, prompting her to suggest investigating if the plagiarism was committed with a clear knowledge of the academic requirements or whether it was a consequent of the students’ ignorance of academic conventions. The problem of intention has largely contributed to the uncertainty about the concept of plagiarism. No matter, the prevalence of plagiarism among students continues to be an enigma for researchers. The “Types of Plagiarism” table 1 provided by Bretag & Mahmud, (2007) highlighted the spectrum of situations that students either knowingly or unknowingly find themselves situated in: Table 1:
Types of plagiarism
Author
Martin (1994)
Howard (1995)
Evans (2000)
Type of plagiarism Word-for-word Paraphrasing Secondary sources Form of a source (structure of an argument) Ideas Authorship Cheating (borrowing, purchasing or otherwise obtaining another’s work) Non-attribution of sources “Patch-work” Quotation Paraphrasing Auto-plagiarism (failure to cite oneself) Self plagiarism (submitting the same document several times) Cryptomnesia (where hidden memory plays a key role in lack of citation)
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Types of plagiarism - continued
Harris (2001)
Cabe (2003)
McCabe (2005)
Roig (2006)
Bretag & Carapiet (2007); Scanlon (2007) Errami, et al. (2007) Wright & Amstrong (2007)
Downloading fee papers from the Internet Buying a paper from a commercial paper mill Copying an article from the Internet or online database Translating foreign article in English/another language Copying a paper from another student Cutting and pasting from several sources Quoting less than all the words copied Changing some words but copying whole phrases Paraphrasing without attribution Summarizing without attribution Faking citations Direct Truncation Excision Insertions Inversions Substitutions Change of grammatical structure Undocumented factual information Inappropriate use of quotation marks Inappropriate use of paraphrasing Unauthorized collaboration Paraphrasing Cut and paste (copying chunks of text) Falsifying bibliography Ideas Copying text Paraphrasing Collaboration Self-plagiarism Self-plagiarism (failure to cite one’s previously published work) Dual or duplicate publications Faulty citation practices
Nonetheless, recent literature on plagiarism among students has grouped forms of plagiarism into four main categories (Wilhoit, 1994; Brandt, 2002; Howard, 2002 cited in Parks, 2003, p.475): 1. Stealing material from another source and passing it off as their own, e.g. a) buying a paper from a research service, essay bank or term paper mill (either pre-written or specially written), b) copying a whole paper from a source text without proper acknowledgement, c) submitting another student’s work, with or without that student’s knowledge (e.g. by copying a computer disk), 2. Submitting a paper written by someone else (e.g. a peer or relative) and passing it off as their own. 3. Copying sections of material from one or more source texts, supplying proper documentation (including the full reference) but leaving out quotation marks, thus giving the impression that the material has been paraphrased rather than directly quoted. 4. Paraphrasing material from one or more source texts without supplying appropriate documentation. Students who engaged in any one of these are said to have committed plagiarism although the question about intent as postulates by Howard (1995) as well as the extent (James, McInnes and Devlin (2002) of the plagiarism occurrences as they would appear on the spectrum of situations suggested by Park (2003) continues to be a point of contention among scholars alike. 540
European Journal of Social Sciences – Volume 25, Number 4 (2011) 2.3. Why do Students Plagiarize? Studies on plagiarism have stated various factors for students to commit plagiarism. Among the many reasons for students to commit plagiarism as stated in Yeo (2007, citing Harris, 2002; Park, 2003) are: “Lack of time to complete the task or poor time management skills; insufficient reward for (perceived) effort or desire for efficiency; over-full curricula; fear of a poor mark or of disappointing others; the perception that they can “get away with it’; or the desire to defy authority (p. 201).” Arguably, students’ lack of awareness and understanding about what constitutes plagiarism is said to be one main contributing factor for students to commit plagiarism (White, 1993; Rosnow and Rosnow, 1995 cited in Smith et al.; Love and Simmons, 1998). Students are not aware that copying and lifting information from the internet and other sources are considered cheating as “students are ignorant of the plagiarism concept, or negligent in their writing, and that they plagiarize without intent to deceive” (Carrroll, 2002; Park, 2003; McCabe, 2005). This concurs with a study by Smith et al. (2007) on accounting students in a Malaysian university where students committed plagiarism because they do not understand what plagiarism is and they do not realize that it is wrong. However, Yeo’s (2007) data from a case study on 190 first-year science and engineering students at Curtin University of Technology, Australia suggests that students do have an understanding of the concept of plagiarism. She organizes students’ written responses into five (5) categories : A) copying or using others’ work, B) copying or using others’ work, without acknowledgement, C) copying or using others’ work as your own (deception), D) copying or using others’ work as your own (deception), without acknowledgement, and D) Note representing plagiarism. For Category C and D in which the various elements of plagiarism are grouped, 46% claimed that they clearly understand what constitute plagiarism. Lack of knowledge to do proper academic citation and referencing is also suggested as a contributing factor for students’ plagiarism. Students do not possess enough experience and skills to write research papers and are not prepared for the academic demands of universities (Overbey & Guiling, 1999). Other studies by Dant (1986) and Roig (1997) also suggest undergraduate students need to be taught the complexities of writing as they face problem in integrating information correctly into their own writing. Contrary to Dant and Roig studies, some scholars have found that not having the skills is not necessarily the reason for plagiarism. Batane (2010) for example reported that in his studies of 272 students, only 6.7% of the students attributed lack of skills as a reason for them to plagiarize. Surprisingly a vast majority (75%) of the students stated the reason for them to commit plagiarism is due to laziness and that they have been “taught ... to write papers the right way, we just choose not to …” as doing so requires a lot of time and effort on the students. The students see this as a smart way for time management as they have to juggle their time around their various class commitments, assignments and co-curriculum demands (Lim and See, 2001; Lambert et al., 2003). Most literature concerning motivation for plagiarism among students have provided a list of some common factors why students resort to plagiarism. According to Williams (2005, p.7), these are: 1. poor time management skills and an inability to cope with the workload, 2. a lack of motivation to excel because of a perception that the academic responsible for the class has little enthusiasm for the subject, 3. increased external pressure to succeed from parents or peers, or for financial reasons, 4. an innate desire to take on and test the system 5. cultural differences in learning and presentation styles where, in some setting, it is considered normal custom and practice to quote the experts without citation. There are thus many contributing factors that could lead to the complex ethical issue of plagiarism. This study is not only another attempt to gain deeper understanding of plagiarism but it also seeks to get better insight into multi-faceted issues of plagiarism through an exploratory analysis.
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3. The Study Due to the lack of literature on plagiarism among engineering undergraduates in Malaysia, this exploratory analysis is a significant contribution towards understanding the problem of plagiarism among students. The respondents are engineering undergraduates studying at a local private engineering-based university in Malaysia. The university is recognized by the Malaysian Public Services Department and is accredited by the National Accreditation Board. The university views plagiarism as an academic misconduct that would seriously affect the integrity of the institution. It defines academic misconduct under article 5.1 in its “A Guide to University Academic Policies and Procedures” as: Academic misconduct includes cheating and plagiarism. Cheating implies dishonesty in fulfilling academic requirements. Some examples of cheating include copying, allowing other students to copy outside or during an examination. Plagiarism may involve presenting another person’s work, opinion or term as one’s own without proper acknowledgement, be it printed or electronic materials such as books, magazines, thesis or projects. If found guilty, the student will be given an ‘F’ grade for the said course and may be suspended for a period of time or dismissed or any other penalty deemed necessary by the University (p. 22)”. The students’ population is made up of local Malaysian students and international students pursuing various engineering programs. 3.1. Data and Methodology 3.1.1. Respondents A total of 500 questionnaires were given out to Management and Humanities lecturers to be distributed to their students during their lectures. The rationale for selecting the Management and Humanities lecturers is because their students constitute students from the various disciplines (Chemical, Mechanical, Civil, Electrical & Electronic and Petroleum Geoscience), which provides a fair distribution on students population in the university. The lecturers were instructed to distribute the questionnaires to the students during their regular class time (a time frame of two weeks), which means that only students who were present during the lectures on the day the questionnaires were distributed will make the sample for the study. The respondents were assured of their anonymity and participation was voluntary. All the students that attended lectures on the day the questionnaires were distributed participated in the survey. Consequently, out of 500 questionnaire forms given out only 378 questionnaires were returned (see table 2 for distribution of respondents). Table 2:
Distribution of Respondents According to Programmes
Valid Chemical Engineering Mechanical Engineering Civil Engineering Electrical and Electronic Engineering Petroleum / Geoscience
Frequency 74 84 55 60 105 378
Total
3.2. Instrument A questionnaire form consisting of 50 questions was used in the study. The questions address four dimensions of the study and the respondents completed the survey by indicating on a five-point Likerttype scale, ranging from ‘strongly agree’ (1) and ‘strongly disagree’ (5). The four dimensions addressed in the survey Awareness which addresses students’ awareness on plagiarism and what constitute plagiarism. The items include questions on whether the students were made known about the university’s regulation on plagiarism as soon as they entered the 542
European Journal of Social Sciences – Volume 25, Number 4 (2011) university. They were also asked if the university has a clear-cut policy about plagiarism. The dimension also addresses whether the students were made known about the university’s regulation on plagiarism and the associated punishment. There is also a question to solicit information on the level of seriousness that the students’ lecturers show on plagiarism issues. Another dimension gauges the students’ level of knowledge on academic referencing. It is important to see whether the students actually know the proper way to do academic citation and referencing. The findings will reflect on the level of intent whether plagiarism is committed out of deliberate fraud, negligence or carelessness. The items test the students’ level of knowledge by including several scenarios in plagiarism. Students were also given instances of plagiarism to measure their level of understanding. One situation given is “if a student borrows a few sentences from external sources without quotation marks or acknowledgement but the essay remains mostly his own work; this is not plagiarism.” The students were also asked if in a situation where they buy a book for themselves, they have the right to use the information and content in whatever way they like because they paid for it. Another situation given is translating from a source into English Language to be written in the students’ assignments is not considered as plagiarism. The students were also asked if joining sentences from different sources to form another sentence does not constitute plagiarism. The following reflect the types of items included in the next dimension that seeks to capture the students’ intent in committing plagiarism. They were asked if they have deliberately committed plagiarism in the past, whether they know any students who committed plagiarism, or most of their friends commit plagiarism one way or the other. They were also asked if the lecturers actually take any action if the students were to commit plagiarism. The dimension seeks answers to see whether the students would deliberately plagiarize if they would want to gain a better grade in a course. A more pertinent question in this dimension is to know if they are bound to commit plagiarism intentionally or unintentionally in the future no matter how hard they try to avoid such academic crime. Like in many other studies on plagiarism, this current study is also interested to investigate the factors contributing towards plagiarism amongst the engineering students in this university. It is crucial to identity the reasons that lead the students to commit plagiarism. The findings could provide an insight into appropriate intervention or treatment to prevent immoral acts of plagiarism from prevailing. Some of the reasons included in the questionnaire are whether they have difficulty finding the right words to paraphrase someone else’s ideas; and if they do not understand what they have to do for their report; or if they do not understand the requirements of the assignment. One of the items included in this dimension asks if lack of ideas is one of the main problems in completing a written assignment or report that usually lead to plagiarism. Level of command in English Language is also one of the plausible reasons included as the medium of instruction in this university is English Language. It also solicits if the students commit plagiarism as a last minute resort to finish a report before the deadline due to time constraint. Based on the nature of engineering courses it would also be interesting to know if the students find plagiarism more rampant in non-technical courses that is represented by one of the items in this fourth dimension. 3.3. The Results and Discussion The items in the questionnaire were factor analyzed (with varimax factor rotation) using the SPSS package in order to cluster them under relevant dimensions. Through confirmatory factor analysis, several items were removed due to low standardized loading (
