The Most Effective Ways to Avoid Plagiarism in Research Papers

In your research paper, third-party sources provide you with authority over your work. However, there is a difference between using external sources to back up what you are saying and misrepresenting the words or the idea from a source as your own. Whether it’s an essay or research paper writing, it is vital to avoid plagiarism in your academic writing. Lauren Bradshaw, an academic expert from a custom research paper writing service outlines below the most effective ways of doing this when it comes to a research paper.

What is plagiarism?

Plagiarism is to basically take the words or ideas of somebody else and pass them off as your own, and not give credit to the original source. Even if this has been done accidentally, it is still classed as plagiarism if you try and claim that somebody else’s words or ideas are yours. It is very easy to copy and paste text and although it may seem like there is no harm in doing this, there are serious implications, especially in professional and academic situations.

Why plagiarism needs to be avoided

Plagiarism is an ethical issue and anybody who plagiarizes somebody else’s work is actually stealing and hoping to benefit by doing this. This relates to somebody who is writing in order to make money, as it does to somebody who’s creating a research paper and hoping to get the best grade possible. It is crucial to avoid plagiarism as it affects your integrity. Not only will it leave a negative impression on your tutors, but it can also affect your future career. Additionally, plagiarism takes away the credit that the original person deserves and could end up in a legal battle if legal action is taken.

Five ways to avoid plagiarism in research papers

Thankfully, it’s quite easy to avoid plagiarizing somebody else’s work once you have a good understanding of what plagiarism actually is. In order to avoid plagiarism in your research paper consider the below:

Always cite the sources that you use: If you mention an idea that is not yours then remember to add a citation in your research paper that identifies the full details of the source including the full name, the date that the sauce was published, and any other aspects that you are required to fulfill when it comes to the style guide that you are following.
Always include quotations: If you include a quotation in your research paper, and it is word-for-word, then make sure you use speech marks around the quote to highlight that the words are not yours to ensure that you avoid plagiarism. All direct quotes also need to cite the source from where they have been taken so that your reader knows whose quote it is.
Remember to paraphrase: Paraphrasing refers to the act of rewriting information or ideas using your own words, but remember not to change the meaning of what you are writing. However, it’s important to be careful as it’s quite easy to plagiarize when paraphrasing if you don’t paraphrase correctly. To successfully paraphrase you need to reword your writing so that it is original and to use words or phrases that are different from the original. The important element here is to make sure that by doing this you don’t completely alter the meaning of the actual idea. You must also remember to cite the source that you have used because you are still using somebody else’s idea even though you are paraphrasing.
Put forward your own ideas: Don’t just repeat another person’s words or ideas, consider what you have to say about the subject. Think about what unique element you can add to the idea that you have put in your research paper and make sure that this is completely your own idea. Once again, remember that if you are linking to somebody else’s words or ideas to make your points, you’ll still need to follow the guidelines above to ensure that you and what you have written is not subject to plagiarism. Another aspect to consider is if you need to write about the same topic for multiple essays or papers, it’s easy to reuse words that you already used and this falls under self-plagiarism. The risk of doing this is still as high as if you plagiarize somebody else’s work.
Use a reliable plagiarism checker. When you are researching a topic it’s quite easy to find that certain words or phrases get stuck in your head and without realizing it, you end up putting them into your writing and forget to cite your source. To avoid this, it is worth using an online plagiarism checking option which will help you to spot issues such as this before you submit your research paper. There are many options that you can use online such as Grammarly or Small SEO tools which are free and allow you to check your writing for plagiarism. They don’t just tell you if your writing is plagiarized, they can even highlight certain sentences, phrases, or words which may be of concern, and they can tell you where the original text can be found.

The above five options are vital to consider in order to ensure that you avoid plagiarism in your research paper. Feel free to read very interesting facts about plagiarism in college. It’s not just about avoiding plagiarism in your paper, it’s also important to understand what is classed as plagiarism in order to ensure that you avoid it effectively in all essays, assignments, and research papers that you write in the future too.

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Nirupama Verma

Nirupama Verma is a self passionate blogger, managing a bunch of informational blogs. She has written a lot of informational content for several popular blogs.