Plagiarism is every writer and academic scholar's nightmare but is there a way to avoid plagiarism in research writing? Read to know more.

A common problem with academic scholars, writers, and students working on research papers or studies today is the fact that their research is spot on but their work is highly plagiarised.

After spending months and endless hours drafting their thesis, dissertation, or blog articles, the written material is still always at least 60-70% plagiarised. But you must be thinking why does this matter?

Don't we get away with plagiarised homework and notes in examinations without it being considered a huge deal? Well, this is because the world of literature digitally is a lot more different than our textbook knowledge. 

When we write the same content we studied in our textbooks in our examinations we are often doing so to give answers to questions that are ever-present.

We are never dealing with questions that have never been asked. The goal is to answer the question with what has been the answer for years together.

Common practical knowledge is what is written in our textbooks.  ( https://www.editorworld.com/article/268/Paraphrasing-versus-Plagiarism )

However, when we work on research papers and articles about dealing with new questions requiring new answers and different answers each time, blog posts, or anything to be published online, there comes the need for Authentic, Original Content Writing.

But now you would say isn't the material available online common knowledge as well? Well no it isn't. 

There is a way content writing online works. When you write the same content word for word from an already existing source, your piece of writing has no element of originality in it.

What you do is simply reproducing the content that is already existing online on the internet. And this is unacceptable and unethical because the original writer or author came up with the original unique content that you simply copied word for word.

The author of the original piece has the right to take legal action against you because of the copyright they possess. 

A Copyright on Content gives the original author or writer of an article, book, blog, or anything that is exclusively written by them the right to sue, punish or take legal action against anyone who copies their authentic piece of information or what they published word to word.

This is because the author has put in hard work in coming up with this unique piece of writing and if you copy-paste their content you benefit from their content without acknowledging them as the original creator of it. ( https://becomeawritertoday.com/plagiarism-vs-paraphrasing/ )

Now you must be wondering if textbooks are also written by some author, does that author not have a copyright to take legal action against us when we copy their content word for word in our assignments and examinations?

Well, this is because the author has produced common knowledge for the masses to benefit from and so the author does not impose copyright infringement. 

The world of Online Content is dark waters that one must only tread with the belief that they are original and authentic in their writing. But is every author producing a completely new piece of information each time?

And what about the articles that seem so similar in knowledge? This is where paraphrasing comes into the picture.

We are about to explore the most important skill in the world of writing content- how to avoid plagiarism and rephrase content or paraphrase it. Let's dive in.

Warning! Plagiarism detected: what is Plagiarism and what are its types? 

Plagiarism is when you copy-paste someone else's written content word for word without giving any credit to the original author of the piece of information.

Plagiarism is considered an unethical practice in writing because it leads to duplication of work, creates multiple copies of the same information, and in the process loses its integrity.

The original author of the content gets lost in all the copies made by other authors and no new development ever emerges on the same topic. ( https://www.scribbr.com/frequently-asked-questions/plagiarism-vs-paraphrasing/ )

When you copy-paste someone’s written material word for word it jeopardizes your reputation as a writer and also raises questions on the originality and authenticity of content posted by the company or blog site you work with.

Not only are you but also your blog page, website, online company, and e-commerce platform in danger of facing legal action that can be taken by the owner of original content that you copy-pasted or plagiarised. 

This is seen as a heinous crime and sometimes can also be reported as a cyber crime and can lead to gruesome punishments and fines for such copyright infringement offenses. 

Many writers believe that it is okay to draw from the ideas of the original writer and simply change the language of the content in the name of paraphrasing.

However, Plagiarism is not just about copying or duplicating content word to word, but also about copying the ideas, beliefs, and views expressed by the original author. 

Even when you copy-paste the ideas, views, or beliefs of the original writer of a piece of content, you are at the risk of copyright infringement. 

The Concept of Common Knowledge:

Any piece of Knowledge which is universal, commonly accepted across the globe, and factual piece of information known by everyone, comes under the concept of Common Knowledge.

For eg: if you write there are 7 continents in the world and name all 7 of them, this piece of information is universally accepted knowledge. The world knows for a fact that there are 7 continents in the world and this information Is common knowledge.

When you mention or write things that fall under the category of common knowledge, this piece of information is not considered to be copied or plagiarised in writing.

For eg: if you are writing that The US bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki on 9th August 1945, there will be many many articles that will have this sentence or statement written in them.

But since this sentence or statement is a commonly known fact by the world, it is not considered a plagiarised piece of content.

Types of plagiarism: keep a close eye on these: 

1. Direct Plagiarism: Direct Plagiarism is the traditional definition of plagiarism as explained above. Word-for-word copying of written material without mentioning or giving credit to the source is called direct plagiarism. Direct plagiarism is the most unethical out of all the other types of plagiarism. The Duplicator does not care often about plagiarised content and aims to benefit from the content written by someone else by simply copy-pasting. However, Direct plagiarism sets you on the radar of not just the original author, but also the internet bots that ensure no content is completely plagiarised. It is important to avoid direct plagiarism at all costs. 

2. Mosaic Plagiarism: Mosaic Plagiarism is something we commonly face every other day. This is called unintentional plagiarism because the writer does not intend to plagiarise. What happens is, sometimes you may have referred to a source and may have also given source credit but might have quoted wrongly or not quoted the author or cited the source at all. Even if this is a mistake on your part the plagiarism bots on the internet do detect this common mistake as plagiarised content nonetheless. 

3. Self-plagiarism: have you ever felt lazy to do an assignment and simply thought of why not just submit an assignment you have done previously all over again for another subject and no one would notice? This is called self-plagiarism. When you simply produce the same content you have already made use of in some other context for an educational assignment or project, you are copying or creating an identical copy of your work. This is considered unethical at academic levels because you are not producing any original content and are rather just giving a copy of a previously done assignment to get by without actually working on the new assignment. This duplication when caught can result in a bad grade or even a failing grade. 

4. Accidental Plagiarism: when you are studying various materials, you can quote a different source for a completely different piece of information. Sometimes you may even wrongly cite a source based on the multiple sources you found for that piece of information. This is called Accidental Plagiarism. Not being careful and not being alert while quoting and citing sources can result in this kind of plagiarism. You may have your information correct but faulty quotations and citations can get you in trouble. 

Now that we know about Plagiarism, How can we avoid it? The answer is by using a writing technique called Paraphrasing. 

What is Paraphrasing? 

Paraphrasing is the art of conveying the same message through your content by understanding what you wish to document in your article and using your own words to do so.

Paraphrasing or Rephrasing is when you study various sources and get a deep understanding of the subject matter you are writing about and produce authentic original written content in your own words as per your understanding.

Paraphrasing will save you the struggles of plagiarism because instead of copy-pasting, you convert that piece of information into your own words and write an original piece and add authenticity to your article or research paper. ( https://law-richmond.libguides.com/c.php?g=998384&p=7227189 )

You will find many articles online that talk about the same topics or issues but each of these articles is written differently using a unique style of writing or a different tone to put across the same concepts or ideas.

Many times you will find various new interesting takes on the same topics giving you a variety of content even when it's all related to the same topic being discussed by all the authors worldwide. 

Many Books are written based on the same issues and topics but what makes them unique is the author's effort into making each book different from the others.

Adding some key points or takeaways or removing or criticisingcriticizing something some other author wrote, etc are things you would notice even in the books that are written on the same topics but have different content within. This is the power of paraphrasing. 

You could draw inspiration from an idea, view, expression, or belief of an author and can come up with completely new material on what your views, ideas, and expressions are regarding the author's material.

There is room for endless possibilities in paraphrasing content and writing by retaining the originality of a piece of content and your style of writing.

Paraphrasing gives you the freedom to use the platform set by other authors but to express differently how you feel about their views and opinions. 

You must remember to focus on what it is that you wish to say out of your writing instead of focusing on the language used.

You must focus on understanding concepts yourself first and then coming up with a fresh perspective on issues and topics you wish to write on.

And also you must remember to quote the source that supported your ideas or gave you one in the first place.

Make sure you cite and quote in abundance when you draw any takeaways from any other author. After all, they inspired you to write a whole new piece of content.

Remember it is not only about cloning or copying the language of the author but also the cloning of their ideas or expressions that can get you in trouble as plagiarised content. 

How can you avoid Plagiarism? Are there any tools that can help?

The most traditional way to avoid plagiarism is to paraphrase, cite and quote sources and give credit to the source site or author.

What you could do apart from this is make use of the many free plagiarism checker sites on the internet to analyze your content and highlight any bit of plagiarism in your writing and edit it.

Today, plagiarism checkers check for plagiarism and grammar and punctuation errors and make your written material error-free. ( https://www.enago.com/plagiarism-checker/resources/difference-between-plagiarism-and-paraphrasing )

Some websites also offer to generate a complete plagiarism report for your article or blog posts for free and give you a complete analysis of your entire article.

These plagiarism reports can tell you accurately how much of your content is unique and authentic and how much of it is plagiarised and exists in other blog articles already in percentage ratios.

You can also get an idea of the keyword density and whether you are stuffing many unnecessary keywords in your content.

Not only this but the plagiarism report also gets you the website links where the plagiarised content can be seen as previously or already existing.

This enables you to learn about the source of plagiarised content and to edit it as per your content’s requirement to avoid copyright infringements. 

Some of the tools freely available on the internet are:

• Killbot

• Plagiarism checker free

• Grammarly plagiarism checker

• Google Scholar

• Plagiarism detector free

• Duplichecker

• Enago

And many more such tools are freely available to use without any hidden costs. 

To conclude, I hope this article helped you all understand the basic avoidable mistakes that result in hours of frustrating rework.

Keep your content original, authentic, crisp, and precise and remember, originality is at the heart of content writing.