BBC NEWS | 'Quarter of students cheating'

According to a survey conducted by the British Plagiarism Advisory Service, approximately 25% of students have cheated by copying material from the Internet and integrating it into their essays.

Researchers disagree on what the findings suggest:

Ranald Macdonald of Sheffield Hallam University, speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, said that there had been a "hysteria built up" over the problem of plagiarism.

And he said that students sometimes did not have the research skills to recognise what was meant by plagiarism - and that universities had to show how original research should be carried out.

Frank Furedi, professor of sociology at the University of Kent, rejected this interpretation, saying that students knew when they were cheating - and that universities preferred to "turn a blind eye" rather than confront the problem.

"There is a major conspiracy of silence over this," said Mr Furedi.

"A culture has been created which sends the message that second-hand, unoriginal work and cheating are part and parcel of university life," he said.

In my teaching, I've encounted *many* more students who have plagiarized because they do not have good research skills and do not recognize what is meant by plagiarism.

Increasingly, colleges and universities are turning to software programs to help professors detect plagiarists more easily. If students are warned about this software, some reason, then plagiarism will go down.