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A
testcase:
A
testcase
A forged and
ripped article containing material from very diverse sources.
This is intended as collection of
material to give an impression how various plagiarism
detection software treats the following
quotes:
Plagiarism in Dutch
Higher Education
By Keith
Russell
The problem of
plagiarism in Higher education has been growing since the
advent of the internet. Copying
and pasting texts is extremely simple and is a fast way to
create an article. In the United
States the problem of plagiarism is well known. In an article from 2003 Dr. William T. Ryan
writes on the subject of online cheating:
``With the increasing number of on-line
term-paper mills, such as Schoolsucks.com and Cheater.com,
students have an even greater tempta tion to plagiarize.
Instead of copying text out of books or journals
by hand, students can now find an array of termpapers online
and can copy and paste blocks of text right into their word
processors (Heberling, 2002).''
Now with some alterations:
``Many rather Deceitful degree students may also
copy articles from websites of conference proceedings or
well-intentioned academics. Starting March 2003, the Kimbel Library at
Coastal Carolina University had recognised 250 active Internet
paper and essay websites (Fain, 2003). A survey conducted by Mr McCabe, a management
professor at Rutgers University, found that overhalf of the
students admitted to plagiarizing from the Internet. 74% of students admitted that at least once
during the last school year they had engaged in ``serious''
plagiarism. and just under half of students believe their
teachers choose at times to ignore students who are cheating
(Stricherz, 2001).''
(Website
http://www.syllabus.com/summer2003/pdf/W10a.pdf , captured
February 13th 2006)
A quote
like this should turn up in most plagiarism software, even if
it is correctly cited. It is
available in a pdf document which is available on the public
internet. On the other hand
restricted files are harder to detect. The obvious example is texts which have been
copied from publishers' websites which have restricted access.
Fortunately, also publishers are
beginning to realise the necessity of combating plagiarism.
In an article in the chronicle of
Higher Education Scott Carlson writes:
``Publishers of academic journals and scholarly
articles are starting to use specialized software to root out
instances of plagiarism and self-plagiarism. Such software, already used to check the work of
students, can scan academic papers, compare them against
others in a database, and find instances of common language
and sentence structure.
The trend
was first reported in Nature. The publication's article notes that major
journal publishers, like Elsevier, are reviewing commercial
software packages that can sniff out plagiarism and are
considering incorporating them in the production
process.
Plagiarism software is also under development by
academics who review articles for publication and run online
journal archives. Christian Collberg, an assistant professor of
computer science at the University of Arizona, is developing a
program to find self-plagiarists--academics who republish
portions of their work in an effort to pad their
vitae.''
(Chronicle of Higher Education, Volume: 51,
Issue: 40 (June 10, 2005))
Dutch higher education is experiencing the same
problems. In 2004 SURF, the Dutch
organisation responsible for stimulating the use of ICT in
higher education, commissioned a report on the situation of
plagiarism in higher education in the Netherlands.
Please note that this is a
translation of a Dutch text and will probably not show up in
any software which is available at
present.
``Based on a
websurvey we draw the careful conclusion that plagiarism does
not appear to be an issue (yet) at four universities, three
universities are starting to address the problem. Three universities have plagiarism detection
software in use but this doet appear to be supported by
policy. Three other universities
have addressed the problem from a more policy based approach.
Only one university has actually
has addressed the problem at the level of the entire
institution.''
(Plagiaat en
Anti-Plagiaat in het Nederlands Hoger Onderwijs. SURF, juni 2004)
So in conclusion, I can state that plagiarism
does appear to be a problem both in the United States as well
as in the Netherlands. The use of
plagiarism detection software is only one tool in addressing
the problem. If you wish to
address the problem from an integrated point of view I would
refer you to the Handbook for Deterring Plagiarism in Higher
Education, written by Jude Carroll. This is available through Oxford Brookes
University website.
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