This page is intended as a source of advice for students, and is a collaboration between the Centre for Learning & Teaching (CLT), Skills Centre, Academic Registry and The Library.
Academic integrity means being honest about where you have sourced the materials for your assessments, indicating which ideas are your own and which are from other authors, and if you have used an Artificial Intelligence (AI) tool to generate content or to refine your work.
The University expects all its students to commit to, and maintain, high standards of academic honesty and integrity, respecting the work and originality of others.
All students are required to undertake academic integrity training and satisfactorily complete the University of Bath Academic Integrity Initiative Test. You should ideally complete this early on in your studies.
Page sources: CLT | Skills Centre | Academic Registry
Using published or unpublished material or ideas, without acknowledging the original source, is known as plagiarism. Plagiarism is an academic offence which is taken very seriously by the University. All assessments must be accompanied by a declaration from you that the work is your own and that any re-use of your own work, or use of the work of others, is referenced appropriately.
A 2022 video from the Library about the types of plagiarism and how plagiarism is detected by the University [3:42]
Plagiarism is often unintentional: for example, a student may copy and paste from a journal article, and then at the writing-up stage mistake the copied words for their own. The solution? Always try to re-write the author’s text in your own words and reference the source at the same time: this is known as paraphrasing and is good academic practice.
For new students at all levels of study: The 'Referencing and understanding plagiarism' module of the publisher Bloomsbury's Skills For Study interactive resource is essential training and should be undertaken before you progress to the compulsory University of Bath Academic Integrity Initiative Test. For returning students, the module provides a helpful refresher course in the fundamentals of referencing and understanding plagiarism. The 'Referencing' section gives examples of references and looks into the type of information that is required and how to present it. The 'Understanding plagiarism' section includes exercises and feedback to help you become familiar with different ways of using academic sources without plagiarising them.
A 2022 video from the Library about strategies to avoid plagiarism [13:17]. The video comprises the following sections:
1. [0:00-6:25] Top five tips to avoid plagiarism.
2. [6:26-11:03] Paraphrasing advice and plagiarism examples.
3. [11:04-13:17] Quick quiz.
University of Bath tutors upload student work to Ouriginal similarity-checking software; students are not able to upload their work to Ouriginal before they submit it to their department.
Ouriginal (provided by Turnitin) checks electronic, text-based submissions against a large database of material from other sources and, for each submission, produces a report based on text-matching and writing style analysis. Ouriginal makes no judgement on the intention behind the inclusion of unoriginal work; it simply highlights its presence and links to the original source.
If the University submits your work to Ouriginal, the similarity-checking software will retain indefinitely certain personal data relating to you, including your name, email address, programme details and the work submitted. You may ask for your personal data to be removed by contacting the University’s Data Protection Officer.
Illustration: AI-generated image using Copilot designer tool
AI tools such as Microsoft Copilot can be useful to support learning: for example, they can help to inspire ideas or find information quickly. While GenAI promises many benefits, as with any technology, it also poses distinct risks and potential harms. Understanding these challenges will help you make educated choices when interacting with GenAI systems as a user.
Whether you can use GenAI depends on the ‘category of assessment’ that has been applied to it: Type A, Type B or Type C. Your tutor or supervisor will explain which category has been applied to your assessment; you can also find out more about each one by selecting the picture of the categories here.
If you choose to use GenAI, the University's supported tool is Copilot. Ensure you are logged in using your Bath email address because this safeguards your user data.
Note: When using GenAI, you must not enter or upload any sensitive data. For example, personal information or any work that is not your own.
If you have used an AI tool to assist in the general development of your work, such as summarising notes or proofreading, acknowledge this in a statement at the beginning of your work. For example:
‘I acknowledge that this work is my own, and I used ChatGPT 3.5 (Open AI, https://chatgpt.com/) to summarise my initial notes and to proofread my final draft only.’
The minimum requirement for an acknowledgement is:
Select the relevant section below for guidance on referencing AI-generated content or images.
Where you have used an AI tool to generate text content or ideas which you refer to in your work, you must acknowledge it as a secondary source. How you do this depends on whether the source is retrievable (can be returned to via a link) or non-retrievable (cannot be returned to via a link).
If the content is retrievable then reference this as a website or webpage.
For example, in the Harvard Bath style it would be:
ChatGPT, 2023. Why is citing and referencing your sources important? [Online]. San Francisco, Calif.: OpenAI. Available from: https://chatgpt.com/share/782cb099-a0dc-45b1-8da4-0e99713f2d45 [Accessed 4 September 2023].
If the content is non-retrievable (cannot be returned to via a link), acknowledge the source of the content in your text, but don't include a full corresponding reference in your reference list or bibliography. You can acknowledge non-retrievable AI content using one of the following two methods:
(Google Gemini AI (pers. comm.) 22 August 2023).
If you have used an AI tool to generate an image you must acknowledge that tool as a source.
If the image is retrievable, reference it similarly to an image taken from the web, citing the tool and year of publication in the caption and listing the image reference to your reference list using the webpage format.
If the generated image is not retrievable, i.e. cannot be returned to via a link, then you would give an in-text, ‘personal communications’ citation in the caption only.
For example, in Harvard Bath style:
Figure 3. Shark in a library image generated using an AI tool (Craiyon, AI Image Generator (pers. comm.) 14 July 2022).
Further information:
Note: If you are not using Harvard Bath, please refer to your specified style's guidance for referencing GenAI. If your chosen style does not provide a method for this then apply the rule of ‘best fit’ and reference it using the guidance outlined above: either a website, image from a website, or personal communication.
The following modules are compulsory training that you should complete before taking the Academic Integrity Initiative Test:
Note: Once you open the page of the test in Moodle, you need to click on the training modules to proceed to the test itself, regardless of whether or not you have already completed the training.
The other modules on Bloomsbury's Skills for Study platform are useful academic skills to develop during your time at the University. They are:
This online guide to referencing provides detailed examples for all print and electronic sources, business, government, technical and legal publications, works of art and images. In addition to the Skills for Study module, you may wish to complete Cite Them Right's referencing tutorial.
If using Harvard: be aware that you will need to adapt the examples from the platform to the Harvard Bath style, as the Harvard style used by Cite Them Right is different.
This 3rd edition continues to demystify the referencing process and provide essential guidance on making sure you are not committing plagiarism. It provides clear guidelines on why and when to reference as well as how to correctly cite from a huge range of sources.
The Skills Centre has produced a video guide setting out nine key points and questions to consider to help you use AI tools confidently and responsibly in your work.
A blog post from the official APA Style Blog answering the frequently asked question by students of how to reference text created by ChatGPT in APA style.