Errors students make

Examples from Psychology

The following is a passage from Coon (1986):

Personnel selection begins with a job analysis to find out what workers do and what skills or knowledge they need for success in a job (Tenopyr & Oeltjen, 1982). A job analysis may be done by interviewing workers or supervisors, by giving them questionnaires, by observing work, or by identifying critical incidents (p. 638).

The following is a passage from Siegel and Lane (1987):

Job analysis is a systematic procedure for identifying the duties entailed in performing a job and the surroundings (both physical and social) in which these duties are performed. The information from job analysis is indispensable to most other activities in personnel psychology (p. 83).

The following is a passage from Ghorpade and Atchison (1980):

With the above goals in mind, our definition of job analysis is as follows:
Job analysis should be purposeful, ongoing organizational activity, performed by professionals in order to uncover, synthesise and disseminate information about jobs that can be used in decisions relating to organizational planning and design, human resources management and other managerial functions (p. 136).

What is wrong with the following use of the information contained in the sources above?

Coon (1986) suggests that personnel selection begins with a job analysis. This is a systematic procedure for identifying the duties entailed in performing a job.

The phrase "personnel selection begins with a job analysis" is taken straight from Coon. While this is not a lengthy phrase taken from the source article, many markers would think it should have been acknowledged by the use of inverted commas around the phrase and provision of the number of the page upon which it appeared. Whatever a marker thinks about the need for quotation marks around short phrases, he or she is very likely to view such borrowing of phrases as indicative of poor work.

More seriously, the phrase "is a systematic procedure for identifying the duties entailed in performing a job" is a much more lengthy phrase taken directly from Siegel and Lane who are not even referred to, let alone cited as the source of a quotation. The unacknowledged use of this borrowed phrase constitutes plagiarism.

Would the following be better?

Coon (1986) suggests that "personnel selection begins with a job analysis" (p. 638) which "is a systematic procedure for identifying the duties entailed in performing a job" (Siegel & Lane, 1987, p. 83).

As far as citing information sources is concerned, this sentence is better. However, the passage is now unacceptable for another reason. Neither of the phrases is really "worthy" of being quoted. Both state simple ideas which we could easily have expressed in our own words.

How about this?

Siegel and Lane (1987) suggest job analysis, which should precede the establishment of a personnel selection procedure (Coon 1986), entails systematic and careful identification of the duties which make up the job.

Both information contributors are acknowledged and their contributions integrated to link the purpose and process of job analysis together.

What is wrong with the following?

Job analysis is undertaken to provide information about workers' jobs, and the skills or knowledge required to do those jobs (Tenopyr & Oeltjen, 1982). Ghorpade and Atchison (1980) define job analysis as purposeful organizational activity, performed in order to uncover information that can be used in decisions relating to human resources management.

Firstly, Tenopyr and Oeltjen (1982) are cited here as the sources of information in the first sentence. If Coon was really the source of that information (that is, if you read only Coon and did not read the article by Tenopyr and Oeltjen which was cited by Coon) then this citation is incorrect. When one article is cited by another author before being cited by you, this is called a secondary reference. In other words, your use of the information is second hand. It is the article which you read that should be cited; articles referred to within another reading cannot legitimately be cited as direct sources of information. (Some markers will accept secondary citations, but you should check this with individual markers. See the Psychology Programme Guide to Writing Reports in Psychology and/or O'Shea (2000) for the correct secondary citation protocol.)

Secondly, the sentence attributed to Ghorpade and Atchison is an incomplete quotation rather than paraphrasing; several words have been omitted from the original passage. Correctly, it should have been cited as a quotation with omissions indicated as follows: "purposeful ... organizational activity, performed ... in order to uncover information ... that can be used in decisions relating to ... human resources management".

Omitting words (and making minor changes to the wording) is a common but poor practice. Here the distinction between what is and what is not plagiarism is blurred, and opinion divided. However, you will recall that the University's definition prohibits the use of "exact phrases" without acknowledgment. Whatever the verdict in individual cases, if a marker is ever moved to ask of your written assessments "is it, or is it not, plagiarism?", this will undoubtedly be taken as an indication of poor work.

References

Coon, D. (1986). Introduction to psychology: Exploration and application. St. Paul: West Publishing.

Ghorpade, J. & Atchison, T.J. (1980). The concept of job analysis: a review and some suggestions. Public Personnel Management Journal, Fall, 134-44.

O'Shea, R.P. (1996). Writing for Psychology (2nd edition). Sydney: Harcourt Brace.

Siegel, L. & Lane, I.M. (1987). Personnel and organizational psychology. Homewood (Ils): Irwin.