Avoiding plagiarism

How much do you know?

Test your knowledge on plagiarism, fraud and academic integrity with this quiz produced by Université de Montréal (in French).

Citations

The Quoting and Paraphrasing section of University of Wisconsin writer’s handbook has useful tips for your papers ;
For bibliographic entries, consult Citing with style to see samples based on source type (article, website, etc.).

The importance of citation

In drafting a text, it is vital to acknowledge the documentary sources upon which you drew. If you don't, then you could be guilty of plagiarism - appropriating the work or ideas of others and presenting them as your own. Citing your sources also gives your readers leads to follow, should they want to find out more.

For instance, imagine that a technical report or maintenance manual simply said, "We used a Canadian standard on vibrations." How could staff or an engineer from another division trace the source without knowing the issue number or year of publication?

Video : Du plagiat? pas moi!

When to cite

Written works: you must cite ALL your sources, even if you're simply paraphrasing an idea, method, theory, statistic or other data from:

Print documents
Electronic documents, including images and websites.

Let's take the following two statements as an example: "Heat pumps account for x% of the Canadian air conditioning market" or "Higher crude oil prices are attributable to (X, Y or Z)." Statements like this must be linked to a source if their ideas, data or findings do not come directly from you.

There is one exception: if the information is common knowledge (i.e. "Paris is the capital of France"), a citation is not required.