The Original Material

The association between humans and dogs began as a hunting relationship before organized agriculture had been developed. This Paleolithic cave painting dates back to about ten thousand years ago and shows a Stone Age hunter who has successfully killed an eland with the assistance of his dogs.

Page 150 The Intelligence of Dogs: Canine Consciousness and Capabilities by Stanley Coren. MacMillan, 1994

Here's a paragraph in which the student plagiarizes by direct copying from Coren's text.

Plagiarism by Direct Copying Dogs have been "man's best friend" since long before recorded history. The association between humans and dogs began as a hunting relationship before organized agriculture had been developed. One Paleolithic cave painting dates back to about ten thousand years ago and shows a Stone Age hunter who has successfully killed an eland with the assistance of his dogs.

The student has typed in Coren's words exactly in the first copied sentence and altered only one word in the second.

Here's a paragraph in which the student identifies Coren in a signal phrase, acknowledges Coren's work, and goes on with her own presentation of Coren's material.

Revision 1: No Plagiarism--Correctly Paraphrased! Some experts think that dogs have been companions for humans at least since our earliest records. University of British Columbia Professor of Psychology Stanley Coren suggests that humans and dogs first got together as hunters. In his book The Intelligence of Dogs: Canine Consciousness and Capabilities ,Coren includes a cave painting from about ten thousand years ago that pictures a hunter with two dogs and an eland they have killed (Page 150).

In the in-text parenthetical citation, the student provides the page number. Her reference page will include bibliographic information for Coren's book.

The main difference between this correctly paraphrased passage and the paraphrased theft-of-ideas above is that here the student has introduced the author and provided the location for the specific information. She is giving Coren credit for his work, not presenting his ideas as her own. Notice that the student has also removed the phrase "man's best friend" and the quotation marks that suggest she is quoting them from Coren. She provides a citation even though she does not use directly quoted material--the main idea as well as the contents and interpretation of the painting are part of Coren's work and research, not the student's, so she must acknowledge them.

Here's a paragraph in which the student identifies Coren in a signal phrase, acknowledges Coren's work, goes on with her own presentation of Coren's material, and includes a quote.

Revision2: No Plagiarism--Correctly Quoted! Some experts think that dogs have been companions for humans at least since our earliest records. According to University of British Columbia Professor of Psychology Stanley Coren, dogs and humans first teamed up as hunters. In his book The Intelligence of Dogs: Canine Consciousness and Capabilities, Coren includes one cave painting that dates back about ten thousand years and shows "a Stone Age hunter who has successfully killed an eland with the assistance of his dogs" (Plate 2).

The quoted material provides Coren's own phrasing and her own words.