Email this article Exploring Undergraduate Students' Understanding and Perceptions of Plagiarism in Academic Writing
This study explores undergraduate students’ understanding and perceptions of plagiarism in academic writing, focusing on its meaning, source-use practices, perceived seriousness, contributing factors, and perceived impacts. This study used a qualitative phenomenological approach. Seventeen undergraduate students from the Faculty of Teacher Training and Education at an Islamic private university in Jakarta participated. They were in their sixth, eighth, or later semesters and had experience in academic writing, such as papers, essays, research proposals, theses, or scientific articles. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews after participants completed a demographic survey and provided informed consent. The interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim, and analyzed using Miles et al.'s interactive model, consisting of data condensation, data display, and conclusion drawing. Credibility was strengthened through data triangulation across different participant groups and investigator triangulation. Students generally understood plagiarism as copying or using others’ work without proper acknowledgment. However, their understanding remained basic and partial, mainly limited to visible forms such as direct copying. Students also had limited understanding of subtle forms of plagiarism and source-use practices. Paraphrasing was often understood mechanically as synonym substitution or sentence restructuring, while summarizing and citation conventions were not fully understood. Although students perceived plagiarism as a serious moral, academic, legal, and religious violation, some tolerated it pragmatically because of time pressure, weak enforcement, and inconsistent lecturer guidance. Plagiarism was perceived as being influenced by individual, peer-related, pedagogical, and institutional factors. Students also associated plagiarism with consequences for academic development, lecturers’ responsibilities and professional reputation, institutional credibility, and original authors’ intellectual ownership. Student plagiarism is a multidimensional issue requiring academic integrity education, scaffolded writing instruction, consistent lecturer support, and clear institutional policies. A faculty-level citation and plagiarism prevention guideline integrated into research methodology or academic writing courses is recommended.
Keywords: academic integrity, academic writing, higher education, plagiarism, undergraduate students.
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