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Research & Referencing SED1007: Week 6
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Do you trust your sources? You can find plenty of web pages saying… “Windows 7 is better than OS X” “OS X is still better than Windows 7” “Margaret Thatcher ruined this country” “Margaret Thatcher saved this country” Opinion often presented as fact With over 8 billion pages indexed in Google you can easily find a web page that says whatever you want it to
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The problem with Wikipedia The encyclopaedia that anyone can edit Can include mistakes Can be manipulated to suit an agenda Washington’s politicians edit Wikipedia Washington’s politicians edit Wikipedia Can be incomplete Wikipedia probably not best source of drug information Wikipedia probably not best source of drug information
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Not completely useless Don’t abandon Wikipedia altogether Should be a starting point – follow up the references and sources quoted at the end of an entry Often better to cite the references when you read them than the wikipedia entry Have a sceptical attitude to information online
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Good practice Look for multiple sources confirming the same information Check whether there are sources saying the opposite Try to assess the trustworthiness of the source…
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Good sources Peer-reviewed journals Fact checked by experts before publication Text books Strong editorial controls and reviewing Not immune from political influence (i.e. Evolution) Newspapers Tend to be good at fact checking (at the quality end) Not immune from bias or censorship
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Weaker sources Corporate Websites Advertising generally has to be truthful Can omit information Don’t trust quotations Blogs & Discussions Mostly stating opinion Other Websites Not regulated Need to justify your trust
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Unfair Means
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University assessment regulations Plagiarism is a serious offence under the assessment regulations Penalties include Having to repeat an assessment Having to repeat a module Being permanently excluded from the University Taken very seriously – all offences recorded
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Plagiarism means The practice of taking someone else’s work or ideas and passing them off as your own For example Copying the work of another student Copying and pasting text from books or websites into your assignment Using template sites for your web pages rather than write your own Can even self-plagiarise
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Relatively easy to catch Almost always obvious when we mark a piece of work that is not a student’s own Suspicious work is followed up Online tools make it easy for us to check sources Turn It In for example is highly automated
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Always cite your sources As mentioned in Cite My I’m Yours http://www.bolton.ac.uk/Students/StudyResources/Library/Hel pGuides/StudySkills/Harvard07.pdf http://www.bolton.ac.uk/Students/StudyResources/Library/Hel pGuides/StudySkills/Harvard07.pdf Either Paraphrase the source Talk about the source in your own words Quote an excerpt from the source Too much quotation and not enough of your own words can leave nothing to mark!
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Harvard referencing Put the name of the author plus the date of publication in brackets (Isherwood, 2009) Include full details in your Bibliography If your source is a website the contents may change State the date you accessed the source Keep a copy of the version you are referencing Full details online
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Include enough commentary Citing the source deals with plagiarism Can still get zero marks! Idea is to use sources to support your argument Balance should be heavily in favour of your own words justified by references to your sources Read some of the online sources Steve mentioned last week to see how it’s done
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