Date of Conferral

4-16-2024

Date of Award

April 2024

Degree

Ph.D.

School

Psychology

Advisor

Sandra Street

Abstract

While instances of cut and paste plagiarism among undergraduate college students has decreased over the past several years, a new form of plagiarism has emerged that often goes undetected by these software systems. Paraphrasing websites allow users to enter information from a source, which the website will then reword, giving the appearance of an original work. When used by undergraduate college students, these students are not only committing plagiarism, but they are also not learning the material or working to develop writing skills. While much research has been conducted on the quality of writing created by paraphrasing websites, little research has been devoted to understanding the factors that predict paraphrasing website use among undergraduate college students. The present study was conducted to determine if predictors of other forms of plagiarism among undergraduate college students, such as academic locus of control, academic-self-efficacy, honors status, academic year, and being a community college transfer student also predict paraphrasing website use in undergraduate college students. Undergraduate college students at a for-profit university in Connecticut completed a survey measuring these variables, and the collected data were analyzed using logistic regression. Although the results of the logistic regression indicated that academic locus of control, academic-self-efficacy, honors status, academic year, and being a community college transfer student did not predict paraphrasing website use in undergraduate college students, the results of this study still have important implications for college instructors as well as researchers who study predictors of plagiarism in undergraduate college students.

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