Abstract:

Mainly in the field of Higher Education, in recent years it has experienced a large growth the studies related to the phenomenon of academic plagiarism among students. However, it is essential that the phenomenon is analysed from a somewhat broader approach, which takes into account various educational levels, so as to report similarities or differences that would allow a much more accurate and efficient knowledge on the subject. That is why, from the research group Education & Citizenship based at the Balearic Islands University, we present this paper whose main objective is to describe and analyse the levels of commission of some actions related to the phenomenon of academic plagiarism, self-reported by the students of different educational stages (university, high school and secondary school). In particular, in this paper we only focus on the presentation of data collected through a survey designed ad hoc for each educational level in where we measure the intensities and frequencies of commission of certain actions related to academic plagiarism. Thus, the main results suggest some overlap between the commission levels for different types of action and describes some variation observed between groups (is evidenced, for example, that some actions are performed continuously by the students of a particular educational stage, but not for the other two groups of students of different levels). This has enabled a much broader reflection (that we consider enriches the literature on the topic) on the phenomenon of academic plagiarism among students; secondly, the study has helped designing diverse strategies and proposals for the prevention and reduction of this phenomenon.

This paper is part of a study carried out under the Research project "The academic plagiarism among students of Secondary Education" funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation with reference EDU2009-14019-C02-01/02-02 and developed by the University of the Balearic Islands and the University of Cadiz.

The research group based at the University of the Balearic Islands, “Education & Citizenship”, has consideration of Competitive Group and is sponsored by the Autonomous Community of the Balearic Islands, through the Directorate General for Research, Innovation and Technology Development of the Department of Innovation, Interior and justice and has FEDER co-financing funds.

Keywords:

Academic Plagiarism, Educational Stages, Academic Dishonesty