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How do universities check for plagiarism?

How Plagiarism Detectors Help to Reduce Plagiarism in Universities?

Plagiarism detection and appreciation of original content among many research papers is not an easy task for the universities of this information era.

A plagiarism detector application helps in reducing this burden and accurately spots any duplicate content in much less effort and time.

Plagiarism Detectors Make the Task of the Students Easier

To check for plagiarism in research papers, professors and teachers undergo a rigorous job every year. Students often search for information from the internet or from the former students’ papers, which may lead to unintentional plagiarism. Duplicate content in academic papers may cause harm to the reputation of the concerned institute.

A helping hand for the faculties, the necessity of a plagiarism detector is understandable to combat unnecessary copying of the content on research papers or other academic papers.

The Booming Knowledge Can Give Rise to Plagiarism in Universities

With the evolution of the ways a student prepares and executes their term papers or research papers, it has become a norm for the universities to revise their techniques to evaluate those.

The boom of information around the web often leads students to unintentional plagiarism. Sometimes some students may even proceed to ‘borrow’ some content of previously published works, which calls for a severe plagiarism test.

Professors undergo a tough time to track the plagiarized content and hence to cancel the concerned paper.

Professors of the modern-day era are introduced with specialized anti-plagiarism software that detects plagiarism with minimum effort and eases up this tenacious job.

The other traditional techniques employed are comparing the writing styles, reviewing formats, and such methods. Search services can also be hired by the institutions to determine plagiarism.

Let us consider the different ways the universities undertake to detect plagiarism and safeguard the institute’s ethical values.

  • Scrutinizing Writing Styles of the Students

Tracking the previously submitted papers of a particular student produces a clear concept of that scholar’s writing style. An introduction of a whole new style, or an amalgamation of different styles of presenting a new topic—both calls for a check on plagiarism.

In some cases, the usage of some unfamiliar phrase or the unexpected choices of words that are not compatible with his style gives a clear indication of plagiarism.

The anti-plagiarism guidelines provided by the Writing and Humanities Program of MIT states that ‘an uneven mix of both amateur and sophisticated sentences can be a red flag.’

  • Electronic Screening Software

With the evolvement of technology, plagiarism detector software has gained immense popularity. As time passed by, these software applications got upgraded into better versions and became more and more used by universities for their efficiency and accuracy.

These applications allow the analysis of the concerned work with billions of potential sources. Many books, websites, and journals can be accessed by this screening software to detect any possible plagiarism on the research paper.

Side by side, these software applications also enable the professor to be informed if the paper is of ‘low-quality’ category, which has resulted in copying content from the web. Nowadays, universities can avail of any free online plagiarism checker to avoid plagiarism.

  • Search Services that look for Plagiarism

Several service providers provide Plagiarism Search Services and are a popular choice of universities to determine the moral and ethical integrity of the paper submitted.

It is a natural process to implement. All the instructor is supposed to do, is to ask the concerned students to submit their works on the web page of the search service provider, which in turn generates an email alert to the instructor on the detection of duplicate content.

This detection service comprises scanning the student works and comparing them with the database of previously submitted papers, previous web searches, and publishes books.

The email sent to the instructors consists of the report against this comparison with the database, which usually displays matching links and phrases.

  • Reviews of References and Formats

Every student follows a particular style of formatting that an instructor usually gets used to in due course of his career. A variation in the layout of the paper may be an indication of plagiarism.

Heading or sub-heading styles, mixed up tables or margins, varied paragraph styles indicate clear signs that plagiarism has occurred. Mixed paragraph styles may show that chunks of data have been copied directly.

References of older versions that are particularly outdated or are unavailable to the institution demonstrate a possible plagiarism encounter.

  • Other Applications

Essays that are presented with the applications by the freshmen need to be checked for plagiarism too. There are hundreds of such applications that do not fall under the category of a term paper or research paper but need equal attention from the institution.

There are specialized software systems that are used to review such admission papers. These software applications scrutinize the essays with bulk data and inform the university whether the admission paper of the applicant is at all acceptable or not.

The applicants are usually the graduates applying for post-graduation; however, sometimes undergraduates are aimed too.

Why Freelance Writers Need Them?

Why Freelance Writers Need plagiarism checkers

Freelance writers often seek the help of online free plagiarism checkers to evaluate their work. They are the ones who usually work all alone and thus are left with no option other than to search the web for any help. 

  • Which is better—paid or a free plagiarism tool?

The paid and free plagiarism detectors available online provide them with guidance on the performance of their work. However, often the ones with sophisticated technologies provide better results than the other.

The plagiarism checkers with sophisticated technologies are most of the time the paid tools. However, since in the modern-era packages are there, hence, it often doesn’t hurt the pockets of the writer, be it a student or a freelance writer.

Conclusion

Duplicate content, when detected, is demeaning and can be fatal for the writers who might end up in losing their reputation. It leads them to rejection by the clients and loss in their career build-up.

Students who work hard to produce original content can find several free tools available online such as the paraphrasing tool, grammar checking tool, and online plagiarism checker very helpful.

These anti-plagiarism tools help to check for plagiarism and avoid duplicate content. Well, it subsequently increases the quality of the write-up. Thus, giving a good reach to a particular write-up, and if the students are using it for academic purpose then it can be said that it helps in improving their grades.

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