Análise de plágio em teses e dissertações dos programas de pós-graduação na área de ensino no período de 2010 a 2012

Abstract

This study aimed at verifying whether Higher Education Institutions (IES, Brazilian Portuguese abbreviation) develop policies and actions to prevent plagiarism in academic works enabling the creation of relevant publications. To achieve such aim, the following basic hypothesis was defined: Policies adopted to prevent plagiarism and actions developed by IES do not eliminate it, therefore, generate publications of little relevance and reduced reference indicators. The variables dependent on the basic hypothesis were relevant publications and number of appearance in references. The basic hypothesis independent variables involved policies and institutional actions. Regarding the objectives, the study was developed as exploratory research, carrying out a predominantly qualitative analysis of the problem. In relation to technical procedures, a survey was carried out, in which the corpus comprised 330 documents (dissertations and thesis) presented from 2010 to 2012, from the Graduate Courses (Masters, Professional Masters and PhD programs) in the teaching area offered by 45 higher education institutions. Data was collected using the Google search tool, and 50 excerpts were analyzed (containing sentences of up to six words) from the sections: introduction, five excerpts; theoretical background, 30 excerpts; methodology, 5 excerpts; and results and discussion, 10 excerpts. The data was analyzed by employing descriptive statistics. The basic hypothesis was confirmed, since the institutional actions implemented did not eliminate the problems resulting from plagiarism as confirmed by the proportion of plagiarism found (1,924 excerpts with plagiarism – over 11.0% of the excerpts analyzed). In addition, the report of some research results was published in journals which are not indexed in the Qualis system by Capes (33.1%). Despite recommendations made by Capes in 2011, very few measures were implemented by the IES to prevent academic plagiarism. The results led to the conclusion that the IES should implement internal norms and instruct the community periodically. They should also carry out a stricter analysis of the documents sent, punishing severely those responsible for plagiarism and intensifying actions and measures to systematically fight scientific dishonesty. Such measures might mitigate the plagiarism volume.