A basic question to consider is why do students plagiarize? Reasons can include the following:

Students Don't Know How to Document Properly: Students may be unfamiliar with the appropriate documentation requirements for their field. Brief in-class sessions about citation style can get students on the right track.

The UWC has several handouts that deal with paraphrasing, quoting, and crediting outside sources for MLA, APA, and other styles; our in-house reference shelf also has documentation manuals for all major styles.

Lack of Awareness of Writing Expectations: Students may plagiarize because they are confused by what constitutes ownership when dealing with ideas...which may be understandable, because what may be considered plagiarism in one situation may not be a problem in another.

For instance, plagiarism is usually defined as presenting another's ideas as one's own, but teamwork often combines individual contributions without specific acknowledgement of each group member.

Different genres and disciplines have different expectations for documentation. For example, researchers may rely on the work of grad assistants who are not acknowledged in the final published work. Problems occur when students over-generalize between field-specific expectations. For example...

Marco, a student in an educational psychology class, must write a short review of literature about guided discovery learning in K-12 math instruction. He recalls a "review" essay assignment from a past composition class, for which he wrote a response to a text but was not required to document sources. In writing the literature review, he follows the same model: he discusses the major research concerning his topic but does not provide specific references.

In this case Marco has confused the expectations of two different fields and assignments.

Another example (from Klooster and Bloem's The Writer's Community, pg. 152):

A legal studies student is assigned to write a research paper about the legality of local rave clubs. He's about to go to the library to look for background information when his roommate says, "I wrote an essay on that same topic last year, and I have all my research notes. You can just use those instead of wasting time getting all those articles yourself." The student reads the notes and writes his paper based upon this information.

If the student were an intern working for a newspaper, this kind of "borrowing" might be acceptable. In a classroom, however, this would be considered plagiarism. Although the writer above has written the essay himself, part of the expectation in a standard research paper assignment is that the writer will engage in legitimate research about the topic, and so construct meaning in an authentic way. The audience expects that the writer has maintained integrity in locating, reading, and considering the research material himself, all in an effort to present insight in an honest and knowledgeable way.

Making expectations explicit helps avoid such situations. Make writers fully aware of what qualifies as research, how they should use sources, and any requirements for acknowledging credit.

Poor Planning: As much as we'd like to hope that students will make researching, drafting, and revising a priority, the reality is that some will not. Confronted with a looming deadline, students may plagiarize out of sheer despair. By assigning due dates for particular sections, instructors can head off the tendency to plagiarize through desperation (see Structuring the Assignment).

The Student Has Nothing To Say: Intimidated by expert sources and unsure of how to enter into an academic discussion, some students have a tendency to develop a "what-can-I-possibly-contribute" attitude. Students may drift towards using the terminology, phrasings, and opinions of others as a measure of safety, feeling they have no authority or voice of their own.

To prevent this, instructors can help develop a critical confidence and voice in students by modeling effective ways of interacting with texts. For example, short response essays to reading assignments can help students grapple with ideas, as can class discussions about how an article, image, film, or similar text succeeds (or doesn't succeed) in making its point.

You can also help students participate in the conversations of their field through activities such as mini-debates, short class presentations, and issue forums. These exercises ask students to discuss topics and defend stances as experts. As students get more practice with the expectations of communication in their discipline, they gain the confidence to make specific contributions of their own.

Student Choice: Ideally, we want to prevent plagiarism before it happens by removing the conditions that create it. Even so, a few students may plagiarize simply because they don't care, or because they believe they can get away with it. Essay-checking sites such as turnitin.com can discourage this behavior.