Plagiarism means using someone else’s ideas without acknowledging where they came from. Every year, many students worry about being accused of plagiarism – especially after putting in so much time and effort on their assessments. So, how can you avoid falling into this trap? Luckily, there are several things you can do to steer clear of such academic misconduct:

Use your own words when reading sources and making notes

It’s convenient and tempting to highlight key ideas or copy exact phrases from the sources. But these methods aren’t as effective as making your own notes, since they don’t always require you to actively process the information. If you’re serious about understanding and mastering the material, try to put things into your own words – it helps you engage more deeply with the content.

Keep a record of your sources

At postgraduate level, you’re usually expected to read a wide range of sources when preparing for assessments, so it’s easy to lose track of what you’ve read. A common issue that can arise is mixing up ideas from your sources with your own opinions. To avoid this, keep a running list of everything you read. To take it a step further, you can also organise your ideas using research matrices.

Find out more about research matrices here.

Paraphrase or summarise the ideas from sources effectively

Paraphrasing means rewriting someone else’s ideas in your own words while keeping the original meaning, whereas summarising refers to condensing the main points of a source into a brief overview, also using your own words. As you can see, “using your own words” is key to both techniques, as they help demonstrate your understanding of the sources.

Find out more about the steps to effectively paraphrase or summarise ideas here.

Use quotation marks to enclose a direct quotation

If you’d like to use the original words from a source, make sure to enclose them in quotation marks and include a properly formatted in-text citation. However, relying too heavily on direct quotations can suggest a lack of understanding of the source material, so use them sparingly.

Find out more about the use of quotations here.

Cite everything that is not your own

You might think that you don’t need to include in-text citations for concepts or ideas you already knew before reading any sources, but this isn’t necessarily true. If an idea isn’t considered common knowledge, it’s important to cite the source where you found it. As for which referencing style to use, check your module information to find out the requirements.

Find out more about referencing here.

Develop your own ideas instead of always relying on sources

While it’s true that you should use sources to support your arguments, you shouldn’t solely rely on them when developing a body paragraph, as your voice may not be presented. Remember that, as postgraduate students, you need to show your own opinions and critical engagement with sources.

Find out more about presenting your critical voice here.

Lastly, some students may think that using generative AI tools to paraphrase or summarise ideas can help them avoid being accused of plagiarism. However, copying sentences generated by these tools is also considered plagiarism. For regulations on the use of Gen-AI tools, please refer to this page on the University website. If you’d like to learn more about upholding academic integrity, please visit this page on Learn for relevant resources.

Written by Bess Chan, EAP Tutor