Whether you’re writing a single document or a book, your words have value and impact. Taking someone else’s ideas or work without proper acknowledgment — even a single sentence, is considered plagiarism.
Plagiarism undermines a writer’s credibility and can have serious, sometimes severe consequences ranging from harming your reputation to legal repercussions. Knowing what plagiarism is and how to avoid it is a must, no matter what you’re writing.
Learn about plagiarism in a sentence, what plagiarism involves, and ways to avoid it.
Whether you’re a high school student writing an academic paper, a professional journalist, or a programmer, copying a sentence constitutes plagiarism just as much as copying an entire paragraph, a whole page of code, or any other work made by someone else.
When you copy a sentence to use in your own work, you’re essentially taking someone else’s ideas, words, or expressions and presenting them as your own.
If you include someone else’s words or ideas in your work — you have to give them credit.
Review the information below to learn how to cite your sources.
So, how do you give the original author credit for their idea, expression, or phrasing? There are different ways to do this depending on the style preferred by your company or school.
Here are three of the most common citation methods:
In-text citation (Author-Date):
Direct quote:
In-text citation (Author-Page):
Direct quote:
Footnotes/Endnotes:
Direct quote (Author-Date):
Note: Style guides may update and change their citation guidelines. For further reading on proper citations across different types of sources (such as books, websites, and journal articles), review the latest citation style guides for APA Style, MLA Style, and Chicago Style.
Properly citing authors and their work helps to avoid plagiarism in a sentence. To expand on this excellent foundation, take a step back and think about how to conceptualize the idea. Consider how to put it into your own words using your experience and what you’ve learned.
This helps ensure that what you’re presenting is your own work. Over time, this builds your credibility and reputation as a writer.
Contributing your original ideas and perspectives helps drive innovation and progress. Putting your original ‘spin’ on different concepts, be they content or code, also encourages you to think critically and develop your professional skills.
Of course, it’s one thing to say you should think authentically and infuse originality into your ideas — it’s another thing entirely to actually do it. So, how do you go about creating unique sentences from existing ideas?
Then, always cite the original author if you’re unsure to prevent plagiarism.
There are many ways that technology can uncover plagiarism in a sentence. The most common is through text-matching algorithms. Text-matching algorithms scan submitted text and compare it to databases, websites, academic essays, and more to find exact matches in the submitted text.
However, many examples of plagiarism in a sentence go far deeper. They are often much more varied and subtle. For this reason, sophisticated tools and algorithms, such as fingerprinting and semantic analysis, are also common detection methods that use features like:
Many advanced models, including Originality.ai, also use machine learning features such as ongoing training and pattern recognition to find and flag instances of potential plagiarism.
The bottom line is this — plagiarism in a sentence is just as much plagiarism as if it were an entire page or essay.
Understanding how to properly cite work and give credit where it’s due helps prevent instances of plagiarism. At the same time, it fosters integrity and credibility. Formulating ideas and expressing them in your own words also cultivates your writing abilities and boosts credibility as an authority in that field.
The Originality.ai plagiarism checker helps you avoid plagiarism in a sentence (and elsewhere in a document) by leveraging the latest advanced technology. With comprehensive plagiarism detection abilities, detailed fact-checking, and its ability to detect AI writing, Originality.ai is a quick and efficient way to detect plagiarism in a sentence.
Have you ever needed to quickly compare two different sets of text to check for plagiarism? Originality.AI’s Text Compare has you covered. With Text Compare, you can copy and paste text, upload files, or check URLs for plagiarism in seconds. But the tool goes well beyond just comparing two different texts for plagiarism. In fact,