Academic infractions of assessed work in Japanese langauge
Article Sidebar
Main Article Content
Abstract
Google Translate (GT) is a free on-line translation tool and accessible to anyone including students who study languages.
Before the advent of GT, dictionaries have been used by language learners, which have only receptive translation function.
Unlike dictionaries, GT has two translation functions: receptive and productive. This productive function of GT has been
increasingly creating problems in university language assessment and language teachers with students’ cheating, plagiarism
or academic infractions. The purpose of this article is to find evidence that GT has a causal effect of students’ cheating,
plagiarism or academic infractions. In addition, how coherence also seems to be associated with academic infraction is
discussed before the methodology. The study investigated the formative Japanese coursework essay writings of three
students who have studied Japanese for 1 year but with no basic understanding or knowledge of the Japanese language at a
university of South of England. It is concluded that all the three students were suspected of committing plagiarism in spite of
teacher’s warning of plagiarism. The implications of this study are directed at institutions, teachers and students. Institutions
should review the information gap between the websites which are written for students and the university’s official
published website statement on plagiarism. Institutions may also need to mention GT specifically in the plagiarism
documentation. Institutions may also consider adopting an additional coversheet system to use as students’ declaration of
plagiarism. Language teacher should be familiar with the differences between plagiarism vs. cheatings, plagiarism vs.
academic infractions/offences and the components of academic infractions of the university they work. Students should
submit their own work, not using GT or copying and pasting translated sentences from websites.
Keywords: Google Translate (GT), plagiarisms, higher education, Japanese langauge teaching.
Downloads
Article Details
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (SeeThe Effect of Open Access).