How to Avoid Plagiarism in Review Writing

Careful note-taking during research helps writers avoid plagiarism.

It might seem hard to avoid plagiarism when you're writing about another's ideas. Literature reviews are compilations of source materials on a subject with notes and analysis by the writer of the review. Since the writer is literally listing other people's thoughts, the line between the writer's ideas and the ideas in the sources can become blurred. Following a few basic practices when compiling and writing a literature review will help writers avoid unintentional plagiarism.

Instructions

1. Mark your research notes with clear indicators of what ideas are yours and what ideas came from others. You're effectively writing formal research notes when you write a literature review, so your informal notes must be more meticulous than usual. You might falsely remember an idea from your notes as yours later, so it is important to include references even at the earliest stage of research.

2. Keep a list of every source consulted in your research, whether or not you use that source in your final review. It is better to cut sources out in editing than to completely forget to acknowledge them.

3. Use quotation marks or indentation to mark any direct quotes used in your review annotations. Because annotations build upon an existing work, you need to make a clear definition of what words are yours and what words belongs to others or you risk confusing your reader.

4. Indicate the source of paraphrased material with in-text reference to the original source or a visible footnote. Since paraphrases don't have visual indicators such as quotation marks, you need to use language and footnotes to make it clear that the idea is not yours.

5. Give credit to the sources of any statistics or technical information you use to enhance your analysis of included texts. Even if a fact seems obvious and thus common knowledge, if it comes from a formal study you should cite that study.

Tips & Warnings

• Literature reviews are unique documents, so studying other literature reviews can give you a better idea of how to cite sources within your introduction and annotations.

• Begin your review with an original thesis. By giving yourself a clear thesis to work from, you'll have an easier time pinpointing where your ideas are original to that thesis and where they are borrowed from others.

References

• Purdue Online Writing Lab: Safe Writing Practices
• The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: Literature Reviews
• The University of Arizona: Avoiding Plagiarism