Sixteenth International Conference on Technology, Knowledge & Society

Abstract

Plagiarism constitutes a problem threatening the integrity of education throughout the world. In the age of internet, students can easily copy and paste materials to complete assignments. In the past, plagiarism required students to visit libraries, and get information manually without the ability to simply cut and paste text into a document (Batane, 2010). Similar to many others terms, different scholars use a diverse set of criteria when applying the term “plagiarism,” but unanimously, scholars describe the impact as “literary theft” (Barnhart, 1988). Plagiarism practices differ among students in universities all over the world. Each university provides some policy regarding plagiarism and the consequences. Kuwait University (KUNIV) is one of the universities experiencing a number of plagiarism cases; however, there the policy to control plagiarism and the actions described to instructors remains difficult to implement and comprehend. This research investigates the awareness of the notion of plagiarism amongst Kuwaiti university students in the College of Social Sciences. Accordingly, the current research suggests improvements to increase the awareness of KUNIV students to avoid the specific issue of “copy and paste” plagiarism. The research examines factors shaping the definition of plagiarism among the students. In addition to the previous, the research examines the main motives leading students to plagiarize. Finally, the study evaluates the KUNIV plagiarism policy to assess areas for improvement.