Consequences of Academic Plagiarism
No matter what degree you pursue, the course you opt always require to have good writing skills. As per the university guidelines, students these days are required to write hundreds of assignments, research papers, dissertations, thesis, essays, and much more. The ability to write and generate original content is one of the most important and useful traits that a student must-have. The only common thing in all these assignments is that they pose different challenges to students.
Being a student, it is important for you to be on the right track while writing an assignment. One of the biggest challenges that students face is that they have to avoid academic plagiarism in their assignments.
Plagiarism is one of the most common mistakes that students make while writing a research paper or an essay. There are times where you might not intend to plagiarize someone else’s work but still end up doing so. More than a mistake, plagiarism is often seen as an offense. While writing a document, one needs to gather a great amount of information and is also required to provide evidence to make the arguments strong. Naturally, when you write something, you will obviously look at some already published theories, books, and writings. But at the same time, it is also important for you to be extra careful to avoid falling in the trap of plagiarism.
What is Plagiarism?
If you want to avoid plagiarism from your text, the first and foremost thing to understand is what plagiarism is. Plagiarism simply means using the words or ideas of some thinker or author without any consent or acknowledgement. At times, if you use some of your own ideas or thoughts that have already been published without citing the source or work, it can still be considered as plagiarism. It is considered to be a serious offense and can lead to some really serious consequences for students.
Some of the consequences of academic plagiarism are-
Loss of reputation for student
According to people, plagiarism is just an offense, but there is much more to it. Plagiarism is often seen as something that is unethical and immoral. If you commit plagiarism, the world might think of you as a person who has resorted to it because of your inability to complete the task. Thus, one of the biggest consequences that you have to face for committing plagiarism is the loss of reputation. And once you lose your reputation over plagiarism, it incurs an absolute irreparable loss to you. There’s nothing you’d be able to do to regain your reputation.
Loss of professional reputation
Not just students, the rule of plagiarism applies to professionals as well. In the professional realm, plagiarism is said to be an intolerable offense. When a public figure, a businessman, or even a politician is found guilty of plagiarism, the damage caused to his reputation follows him for his entire career. There are chances where the person might be asked to step down from his post because of committing plagiarism. Moreover, if you step down because of an offense like plagiarism, then it becomes impossible for you to find a respectable job. For a popular person or a well-known personality, the accusation of plagiarism means your name getting ruined, and the hopes of a meaningful career end.
Disciplinary actions
A usual disciplinary action is the last thing that you could expect as a result of plagiarism. In some cases, plagiarism can even lead to suspension from educational institutes and universities. If not, then you might face huge disciplinary action for the same. In fact, you can even suffer fines or legal consequences and in some cases, serve a jail sentence as well. At an academic level, if the student is not suspended or expelled from the university, then he might definitely fail his assignment paper or class. There are institutes that take plagiarism so seriously that they even put a note on the transcript or answer sheet of the student, which says, ‘Convicted of plagiarism.’
It defrauds the system
It is not easy for you or anyone out there to produce a decent piece of research or document. It requires a lot of hard work and days to make a decent research paper. If you include someone else’s information in your CV, then the companies seeking the right candidature for their business might end up giving the job to a plagiarist, who does not even deserve it. Thus, you can say that plagiarism works as a tool for someone to defraud the system.
It limits the creativity level
Plagiarism is nothing but an imitation of someone else’s work. It is considered to be the exact opposite of creativity. When students do not get caught for plagiarism, they keep resorting to it. The fact is, no one actually wants to put extreme hard work in creating an original and authentic piece of work. Therefore, the teachers should take strict action against students if they perform so. It is a practice that needs to be condemned. If the teachers or instructors fail to do so, creative endeavors and thoughts get limited on the part of students. Students tend to lack the skills of creative thinking, which in turn affects their whole semester grade.
Loss of confidence
Plagiarism might work for students to achieve good grades, but in the long run, it results in the loss of confidence. The student might pass the semester while acknowledging someone else’s work as their own, but every time he does this, it would definitely affect his confidence. These students often tend to underperform in all spheres of life.
Copyright infringement
If you try to copy someone else’s work for your project, then the original author has the right to sue you in a court of law on the basis of copyright infringement. Most of you think that the act of plagiarism is a subtle one, and no one will find about it. But you need to keep this thing in mind that once the plagiarized work is out, the entire world knows about it, including the original author of the work.
Unsuccessful and sloppy research
Plagiarism is considered to be one of the most widespread kinds of research misconduct. Authenticity is one of its important elements. If you do not provide original information or facts in your work, it is no research at all. The entire purpose of the research is lost if you commit to plagiarize your work. You make a huge mistake, when you copy some other researcher’s work because that researcher might have written some points under stipulated conditions. So you cannot be sure about the points that you’re copying will fit right into your research material.
