Analysing the Factors Leading to Plagiarism Amongst Researchers: An Exploratory Approach
Keywords:
Plagiarism, forms of plagiarism, Unethical academic behaviour, Intentional and unintentional plagiarism, Academic IntegrityAbstract
Understanding the challenge that Plagiarism and its defeating consequences are on the overall quality of research, institutional reputation, Country’s competitiveness, demotivation to the researcher and lack of confidence it poses on the researcher understanding the underlying assumptions, causes, awareness and possible strategies to overcome this menace is pivotal.
With the understanding of numerous incident at Global level and consistently rising Pressure on institutions on quality research and innovativeness in research it is pertinent to note that Plagiarism in its different forms needs an immediate attention to be understood by all concerned.
It demands an attitudinal and policy imperative so that building research strength, academic honesty, ethical research and an overall environment towards effectual research work can be build.
With this as a background the purpose of the present study is to identify amongst researchers in different disciplines the understanding towards plagiarism, reasons of it and also differences in plagiarism as per discipline.
From the analysis of study, it was found that majority respondents were aware about what plagiarism is and its different forms are and also about rules and regulations framed by their institution.it was also found that majority of them avoided plagiarism in different ways. The gaps redressed emphasize that an academic environment which is transparent and frequent discussion on this issue is deeply needed. Also pressure on writing research papers, lack of competitiveness, poor collaborative research work and lack of trainings, orientation and exposure to such knowledge are a major determinant of plagiarism.
It was also seen that irrespective of the disciplines majority researchers had common understanding about plagiarism.
Thus the study provides clues for institution to identify the reasons behind plagiarism, problems and challenges of their researchers and efforts aimed at maximizing quality research and access to valuable resources to be innovative in research.
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