Researching, referencing and plagiarism

Academic research involves ...

• Formulating questions about the topic of research

• Carefully collecting information using established methodologies and techniques

• Properly citing and reference your sources to avoid plagiarism

• All answers are correct.

When researching, you should evaluate each source to find the most relevant and suitable ones.

• True

• False

What makes a source suitable for academic research? (Choose all correct answers)

• The use of formal or semi-formal vocabulary, and an objective, impersonal style of writing

• The author has written so many books

• It often uses compound or compound complex sentence structure

• It has citations and references to studies or other research

• The text has no clear language or factual errors

Identify which of the following statements is a fact. (More than one answer is correct)

• The weather tends to get colder after sunset.

• There are 21 regions in Saudi Arabia.

• Sleeping for over 12 hours a day helps reduce anxiety and stress levels.

• Porsches are one of the fastest and most popular cars in the world.

• Millions of people are divorced each month.

Compare the following two texts on immersive gaming and choose which one is more reliable as a research source.

• Envision partaking in exhilarating competitions with peers in a genuine Mario Kart race, deftly navigating through perilous obstacles while engaging in friendly competition. According to a study conducted by students at CALTECH (2021), advancements in virtual reality technology have opened up new avenues for immersive gaming experiences, allowing individuals to interact with digital environments in unprecedented ways. (Exploring the Boundless Realms of Immersive Gaming, 2021, p. 53)

• Picture yourself ricing against your friends in a real-life Mario Kart game, zooming around crazy tracks and throwing bananas at each other. Everyday now, game development is getting bigger and bigger, and I believe that when you are you playing, it would feel like you are inside the actual game in the near future.

Academic work depends on the research and ideas of others, so it is vital to show which sources you have used in your work.

• True

• False

In academic work, why should you cite and reference your sources? (Choose all correct answers)

• To give your work more value.

• To help readers find the original sources.

• To meet the word count requirement of the task.

• To avoid plagiarism.

• All answers are correct.

Decide in which cases should you reference. (Choose all correct answers)

• A quote from a biography of a famous person.

• An idea you formulated after watching serval videos on a single topic.

• An item of common knowledge (i.e., The Earth is roughly a sphere.)

• Results of a scientific study from medical journal.

You only need to cite your sources if you quote directly from them.

• True

• False

Match the following definition to the correct concept:
A brief mention within the text of an academic work that acknowledge the source of a particular piece of information or a quotation.

• Quotation

• Citation

• Reference