PLAGIARISM AS AN UNETHICAL BEHAVIOR

Nowadays academic communities around the world are imbued by a great problem,
plagiarism. This problem greatly affects the quality of academic production, and has
fairly broad moral connotations. In this writing, it is intended to show plagiarism as
an unethical conduct, since it violates several of the values that must be present in
the human being. For this, it will start explaining what the plagiarism is, subsequently
explain what is ethical and what values are affected by the plagiarism; finally to
conclude with some of the consequences of the already mentioned problem.

To start, it is very important to know what the first thought when the word plagiarism
is mentioned. According to the Collins dictionary of English language ‘Plagiarism is
the practice of using or copying someone else´s idea or work and pretending that
you thought of it or created it’. 1 Pirating would be then, in the academic community,
to take the ideas of others, whole or partially, capture them and translate them as
their own, emerging here a problem with a quite serious moral nature.

What moral implications would it have to commit plagiarism? Although this topic is
quite controversial, there is no doubt that it is considered as an inappropriate conduct
by the greater part of the population. Said Yankelevich in its article Mapas
prestados para entender el plagio académico: (Maps provided to understand
academic plagiarism)

Theft of words, is a formula that at first glance helps us to describe certain

forms of plagiarism, those in which the plagiarist reproduces a text in its
entirety, the idea would be that the words are proper of the person who wrote
them before, and the plagiarist hurts him by appropriating them. (Yankelevich,
2016, p.22)2.

1
Taken from www.collinsdictionary.com/es/diccionario/ingles/plagiarism
2
Own translation.
And this is evidently what happens when plagiarism is made, the author is
disrespected and harmed, not a physical damage, but an intellectual damage.
Plagiarism has the same implications as a robbery or fraud, since it is appropriating
the alien. In addition, the plagiarist is reduced to an immoral person, unethical,
disrespectful and dishonest.

Certainly the previous position is not an absolute truth, because there was no
mention that a giant group of people who consider what was already mentioned, as
the only face of plagiarism. There is one of the modalities of plagiarism, called
involuntary or accidental plagiarism. According to Soto Rodríguez quoting Núñez:

Accidental Plagiarism can be committed when forgetting to make reference

about where certain information was obtained, when there is a confusion of
the original source of information, it is paraphrased without really getting away
from the original text so that it is very similar, and is not properly referenced,
among others. (Soto, 2012, p.7).3

However, although there is no clear intention to commit plagiarism, this is not a sign
that plagiarism has not been committed, due to the fact that it valid, is that the ideas
of others are taken as their own, without giving any credit to the original author. This
situation would be similar to going to a bookstore, take a book and save it in the bag
to cancel later and then leave the place without having cancelled, arguing that I had
forgotten. Would it be this an involuntary theft for the place managers or only a theft?

It is necessary to conclude, to bring out the implications that the problem of

plagiarism is currently having, because it is an unethical behavior its consequences,
whether voluntary or not, are becoming more rigorous. Many countries have begun
to punish with penalties of several years in prison for not taking into account the
rights of author, in other places still is not punishable with imprisonment, but are
studying the possibilities.

3
Own translation.
On the other hand, in institutions of higher education, is punishable by penalties for
several years, to submit their research and in more complex situations with the
expulsion. Undoubtedly, plagiarism is an unethical attitude in which it is harmed in
an ambivalent way, in the first instance the original author and second to the one
who commits plagiarism, because it is seen socially as a person without values and
unreliable, with a marked reputation by a long time.

References

Soto, A. (2012). Plagiarism and its impact an academic and professional scopes.
E-Ciencias de la información, 2 (1), 1-13.

Yarkelevich. J. (2016). Maps provided to understand academic plagiarism.

Perfiles educativos, 37 (164), 20-27.