Academic Integrity Guide Ask Us

What is Academic Integrity?

According to the International Center for Academic Integrity, Academic Integrity represents the moral value and ethical standard upheld within academia. It is the commitment to honesty, trustworthiness, fairness, respect, responsibility, and courage in all scholarly activities.

Why is Academic Integrity Important?

Academic Integrity is a critical value to uphold for your own learning, the sake of your classmates, and others who have contributed to your discipline.

• Fairness and Trust: Ensures that success is based on individual effort and ability.
• Credibility: Maintains trust among students, educators, and institutions, preserving the integrity of academic institutions.
• Personal Development: Encourages ethical decision-making and reinforces honesty in all life aspects.

Additionally, instructors expect students to act with Academic Integrity, and may include further information in their course syllabi regarding this topic. Depending on the course content and expectations, certain actions may be perceived as misconduct, so you should always verify with your instructions that your actions are acceptable in their classroom.

 In addition to guidance your instructors give you for specific classes, the University of New Brunswick has guidelines on Academic Offenses that it is important every student familiarizes themselves with. While this guide focuses on best practices around writing and citation best practices, this guidance document also includes other forms of academic misconduct, including submitting false information to get work extensions or exemptions, and cheating on tests.

Resources on Academic Misconduct and Plagiarism:

• Avoiding Plagiarism - Purdue OWL® - Purdue University
• How do I protect my Academic Integrity? - Trent University
• UNB Writing Centre - Resources

How to act with Academic Integrity

• Always ensure you properly acknowledge instances where you are incorporating other people's ideas or words through in-text citations and a bibliography
• When you are directly quoting someone, indicate this with quotation marks
• When paraphrasing, ensure you substantially change the words used and sentence structure, while still acknowledging where the information came from
• Only put your name on work, or submit papers, if you are positive that the work is original and fairly attributes any sources used
• Avoid sharing work with classmates when it is meant to be completed individually
• Speak to your instructor if you have any questions or concerns about actions that could be considered misconduct

Impact of Generative AI On Academic Integrity:

Advancement in AI: Language models like GPT-3 and GPT-4 are changing academic integrity norms. These tools may enhance learning, provide writing assistance and creative exploration, but there are also important factors to consider before incorporating these tools into your work.

Guidelines for Using AI Tools in Academic Assignments:

Using generative AI in your assignment does not automatically equal to plagiarism. Here are a few things you need to consider before using an AI tool, like ChatGPT.

1. Read assignment instructions carefully: Always check if AI use is allowed as per the specific instruction provided for each assignment.
2. Clarify instructor's expectations: If you are not sure about whether you are allowed to use AI tools, confirm with your instructor before starting the assignment to avoid misunderstandings.
3. Complete due diligence: Choose your tools carefully, and ensure you consider their information source, potential for bias, recency, and any other criteria that are important to you.
4. Keep track of how you use AI: Note which applications you use, and in what capacity so that you can properly acknowledge them. Consider keeping track of prompts or outputs, so you can illustrate how you changed outputs, or synthesized them.
5. Acknowledge your use: Using the information in the Citations tab of this guide, properly attribute your usage. If your instructor has additional expectations (such as a form, or statement of acknowledgement), include this in your submission.
6. Reflect on your experience: Were the outputs you got adequate? Did you learn or retain new information? How would you approach similar tasks in the future?

Concluding Advice:

Learning vs. Assistance: Remember that the primary goal of academic work is to challenge and develop your skills. AI tools like ChatGPT should be used to supplement your learning, not to replace the effort required to overcome academic challenges.

Now that you've learned how to navigate the use of Generative AI for your academic work, it's time to apply your knowledge! Head over to the interactive game from University of Waterloo library to see if you can apply these guidelines effectively. It will reinforce best practices when leveraging AI as a learning tool.

ChatGPT and Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI): The Assignment Dilemma

Available Help

If you need help to improve all aspects of your academic writing, please visit Writing & Study Skills in Fredericton or the Writing Centre in Saint John. There, you will receive personalized assistance from writing experts. Your tutors help you at any stage of the writing process, from brainstorming to revision. They offer feedback on organization, clarity, grammar and style. Additionally, writing centers often address specific needs such as academic writing, research papers, and citation styles.

At the library, we offer specialized help from subject librarians. We help you in locating resources, navigating databases, and conducting research within the assigned disciplines.

Citing Generative AI, Use ChatGPT As An Example

APA style

In-text citation

Parenthetical citation: (OpenAI, 2023)

Narrative citation: OpenAI (2023)

Reference

Format:

Name of Company. (Year). Name of the generative AI program (model of program) [Large language model]. URL.

OpenAI. (2023). ChatGPT (May 05 version) [Large language model]. https://chat.openai.com/chat

Read more detail on how to cite generative AI tools with APA style

MLA style

In-text citation

The title will usually be a description of what was generated by the AI model.

Example

("Describe the symbolism")

reference

Format:

Author/Creator. "Name of chatbot." Title of platform where accessed, Full URL, Date Accessed (optional).

OpenAI. "ChatGPT." ChatGPT, https://chat.openai.com/chat, February 2, 2023.

Read more detail on how to cite generative AI tools with MLA style. In this handbook, you can find information on how to quote text generated by AI tools, cite visual works created by generative AI.

Chicago (17^th edition) author-date system

In-text citation

(ChatGPT 3.5 May 05, 2024)

Avoid including ChatGPT citations in your reference list unless you provide a publicly accessible link. OpenAI assigning unique URLs to your prompts, these URLs require login for access, these ChatGPT conversations should be treated as personal communications like emails, phone calls, or text messages. Read more detail on citing generative AI tools with Chicago style.

If you use ChatGPT or any similar generative AI tool to brainstorm or plan your assignments, it's important to acknowledge it, even you don't directly use AI-generated content into your assignment. The acknowledgement should include details about the AI tool you used, describe how you used it, and mention the date of access. You can do this by capturing a screenshot or saving the conversation by clicking the export sign at the top right corner of the webpage if you use ChatGPT

Please note: IEEE and Vancouver haven't approved citing AI outputs for publications, so there is not guideline on the citation. JAMA doesn't recognize ChatGPT and similar AI tools as authors, so there's no standard way to cite them. The article below explained JMAL’s opinion and action on using generative AI as authorship.

Flanagin, A., Bibbins-Domingo, K., & Berkwits, M. (2023, Jan. 31). Nonhuman “authors” and implications for the integrity of scientific publication and medical knowledge. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2801170

Remember, as technology evolves, citation rules might change too. Keep an eye out for updates.