A Qualitative Investigation into the Understanding of Plagiarism in a Malaysian Research University

Abstract

This research paper explores forms of plagiarism and awareness of plagiarism in a Malaysian Research University abbreviated as AMRU for ethical considerations. In this case study, we adapted the interview prompts for the two constructs of plagiarism from Marshall and Gary (2005). The analysis of the semi-structured interview which lasted more than two hours at AMRU in May 2015 reveals that the interviewee's understanding of plagiarism is insufficient even though he has been doing his MA program by research mode in English for three years by then and he has attended around twenty workshops on research-related topics and academic writing. The interviewee is rather familiar with forms of plagiarism and he is aware of plagiarism as he has learned about plagiarism from his academic parents. However, terms such as quoting and paraphrasing and the two verbs, adapt and adopt were not clear to him before the interview; now he knows what they mean academically after the interviewer's explanation.