Whether you’re doing A levels, have just started university or have been there for a while already, you’ve may well have heard about plagiarism. But what is plagiarism? It involves copying someone else’s work or ideas and using them in your own work. Penalties for plagiarism can be severe, such as being expelled from your program, put on probation or automatically failing a module. This may sound quite intimidating, and may make you worry that you’re going to get caught for something you haven’t even done.

Detecting plagiarism is the reason that much of your coursework has to be turned in using Turnitin. This is a computer programme which compares your submission with millions of articles, essays and websites and highlights bits of your text that appear elsewhere. When you submit to Turnitin, you’ll get a percentage score back about how much of your work has appeared elsewhere. Don’t worry if it’s more than 0% (it definitely will be) – common phrases, theory names and even journal article titles from your reference list will probably get picked up. This doesn’t mean that you’ve committed plagiarism. But what can you do to make sure that you’re not plagiarising in your work?

First off, don’t just copy text from a journal article, newspaper, book, the Internet, etc. However, it is okay to use short quotes in your work, although it’s good not to rely on this too much. When you do this, be sure to follow whichever referencing style your department uses to let the marker know where you took that quote from. It’s likely that your library will have an online guide to help you use the referencing style correctly, and you can also talk to your librarian to make sure you’re doing this properly.

So what about when you’re not actually quoting from another source in your work. If you’re taking statistics, theories or other ideas from another author and including these in your work, you need to acknowledge where these came from, again using the correct referencing style. It’s a good idea to not rely too heavily on quotations, and to explain these ideas in your own words. Changing a couple of words, or even changing each word for a synonym is not enough, and may be considered plagiarism.

To make sure that you are indeed using your own words and not inadvertently copying what someone else has written, it’s a good idea to close the original book and take a few minutes to think over the main points. Then write this down as you’d explain it to someone else. You’ll probably need to rewrite it again when you’re actually writing the essay. While this may seem like it will take a long time, this process will help you to not only avoid plagiarising the ideas, but also to better understand what authors are saying so that you can then relate that to what other authors are saying.

There are serious repercussions if you do decide to plagiarise in your work, but it’s unlikely to happen accidentally. So keep in mind that it’s fine to use what others have written before you (that’s why it’s there), but you need to acknowledge that you’re using someone else’s ideas! After all, you wouldn’t want anyone using your ideas without giving you credit.