Seven Ways to Plagiarise: The Magazine Surprise

From The Embassy of Good Science
Cases

Seven Ways to Plagiarise: The Magazine Surprise

What is this about?

This presents seven anonymized case of allegations of plagiary and from these draws specific conclusions and advice to authors and administrators. Specifically, case #6 presents the surprise of a doctoral student to see paragraphs of his Master’s thesis appearing verbatim in a magazine without any citations or references to him.

Why is this important?

This factual anonymised case shows that plagiarism can come in more than one formats. The case adds to the real-world examples of plagiarism scenarios that research integrity officers may encounter.

Examples are useful for recognizing, highlight, and avoiding plagiary.

For whom is this important?

What are the best practices?

Specific advice for authors: "Do not put your name on a manuscript written by someone else. • Do not insert someone else’s text as a place-holder in a draft manuscript. The original might not be replaced later. • Do not copy verbatim the background section of someone else’s paper. Copying an amount beyond fair use might violate copyright law. The background section could be incomplete or erroneous. A subsequent inquiry or investigation would consume a lot of time from faculty and administrators, and it could embarrass the institution. • Include references to all sources, with appropriate citations, in all manuscripts and grant proposals. • Take allegations of plagiarism to a research integrity officer. If there is no research integrity officer, then consult a knowledgeable administrator"[1]

  1. Loui, Michael C. "Seven ways to plagiarize: Handling real allegations of research misconduct." Science and Engineering Ethics 8.4 (2002): 529-539.

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