Читать книгу How to Write Brilliant Psychology Essays - Paul Dickerson - Страница 53

Look at the following cases in Tables 2.1–2.3. The cases and names (which are from a random name generator) are fictitious, but the incidents are informed by real events. For each case, consider what the student did, what happened and what, in hindsight, they could – or should – have done.

Table 2.1

Table 2.2

Table 2.3

If this chapter is successful, it will stop you from choosing to outsource your essay, to cut and paste another’s work or to simply make cosmetic changes to someone else’s work. All of these turn a beautiful, human task of creation into an ugly, mechanical chore of simulation. Writing is difficult, joyful and satisfying; copying is easy, shameful and empty. At rock bottom, even if you could ‘get away with it’, plagiarism is pointless. It is pointless in the sense that it sucks point and meaning, learning and growth, out of your work, and your experience of being a student is diminished. The opportunity to really learn and grow – and you will learn and grow by writing – is just too precious to squander in an anxious bid to complete your assignment.

The tragedy is that most people do not set out to cheat. Even the essay-writing services attempt to appease the consciences of their potential customers, suggesting that their service is ‘like having another teacher’ and that students can ‘learn from the essays’ that are written for them. The cut-and-paste passages are often done with the intention to change it, soon. Finally, students often make cosmetic changes to a passage not just to evade detection by plagiarism software, but in a genuine attempt to ‘make it their own’.

Ace your assignment Citation and referencing

Chapter 9 addresses the issues of citing and referencing sources using the formatting guidelines of the American Psychological Association (APA) in substantial detail. Here it is worth very briefly touching on some of the implications that these have in regard to plagiarism.

The sources that you draw on in informing your ideas should be cited using the format: Surname (date of publication), for example, Dereckson (2020), within the body of your essay. At the end of your essay, the reference section (arranged alphabetically by surname) should contain the full reference details, enabling your reader to locate that resource (Chapter 9 discusses these issues in more detail).

Where the phrases or sentences are used from a source, these should be given in quotation marks and you should cite the surname, year of publication and page, or pages, from which the quotation was taken (again, Chapter 9 discusses this in more detail).

It is important to realise that citing sources is vitally important throughout your essay, but that doing so doesn’t then license you to give up thinking, letting your essay be carried by extensive (cited) quotations. While there is little of the deception usually associated with plagiarism in essays that do this, they are still over-reliant on the thinking of others. Do take into account immediate guidance from those involved in setting your assignment but, in general, quotes should be used to support your intelligent engagement with the essay, not replace it.