According to Merriam-Webster Dictionary, "plagiarism" means:
"An act of copying the ideas or words of another person without giving credit to that person."
One of the main reasons to cite is to avoid plagiarism. Citing your sources is a standard academic practice that allows the reader to find the sources you used to write your paper. It gives credit to other researchers and acknowledges their ideas. It provides supporting evidence for your work and increases your credibility.
The key to avoiding plagiarism is to make sure you give credit where it is due. This may be credit for something somebody said, wrote, emailed, drew, or implied. Students sometimes forget exactly what needs to be credited. Here is a brief list of what needs to be credited or documented:
There are several types of plagiarism ranging from direct plagiarism to copyright infringement. Here is a short list of tips to help you stay honest in your work.
Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association by
The Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association is the style manual of choice for writers, editors, students, and educators in the social and behavioural sciences. It provides invaluable guidance on all aspects of the writing process, from the ethics of authorship to the word choice that best reduces bias in language.
MLA Handbook by
The Modern Language Association, the authority on research and writing, takes a fresh look at documenting sources in the eighth edition of the MLA Handbook, the official guide to MLA format. Works are published today in a dizzying variety of ways: a novel, for example, may be read in print, online, or as an e-book--or perhaps listened to as an audiobook. Writers of research papers routinely need to know how to cite works on Web sites, videos on platforms like YouTube, interviews and other works created by multiple authors, journal articles contained in databases, online images, posts on social media sites, song lyrics, and more. Instead of providing separate instructions for each format, the MLA's unique, innovative approach recommends one set of guidelines that writers can apply to any type of source. This groundbreaking edition of the MLA's best-selling handbook is short and designed for easy use. It guides writers through the principles behind evaluating sources for their research and thus focuses on the key skills of information and digital literacy. It then shows writers how to cite sources in their writing, offering detailed guidance on in-text citations, quoting and paraphrasing, avoiding plagiarism, and more. Intended for students, teachers, librarians, and advanced scholars, the handbook is an indispensable resource in composition, communication, literature, language arts, film, media studies, digital humanities, and related fields.
The Online Writing Lab at Purdue University houses writing resources and instructional material, and we provide these as a free service of the Writing Lab at Purdue. Students, members of the community, and users worldwide will find information to assist with many writing projects.
Use the following links to go to the APA resources at the Purdue Online Writing Lab.
Use the following links to go to the MLA resources at the Purdue Online Writing Lab.