Are Paraphrasing Tools Really Worth It?
A paraphrasing tool refers to software that is used to rewrite an expression in a way that is devoid of plagiarism; it helps a writer to write an author’s idea differently; by mostly replacing the original writing with synonyms while still conveying the original author’s idea. Another term to refer to this process is essay spinning. Many students use such tools to help create work that won’t pass as another work’s duplicate. There are several free online paraphrasing tools that can paraphrase sentences, paragraphs, entire journals or chapters of a book. They include QuillBot, Chimp Rewriter, Small SEO Tool, Spinbot, Article Rewriter Tool, Quick Article Spinner, Plagiarisma, Paraphrasing Tool, etc.
Why Some Writers Use Paraphrasing Tool
Often, writers especially are obliged to report the outcome of their research works in writing. They use resources for their articles from existing materials; hence, the need for them to ensure they explain the same idea or concepts in their own words. Hence, writers tend to use paraphrasing tools:
1. To rewrite secondary research materials, they have used in their work quickly
2. Because of lack of proficiency with the use of the English language; hence they resort to these tools to aid them in writing
3. Or just pure laziness
Should I Use a Paraphrasing Tool?
To determine if it’s advisable to use such tools, we will examine a few of these tools using sample contents from management, law, biological science, engineering as well as the computing domain as seen in the table below. Note that the accuracy is computed using the formula below:
Let “a” represent the number of words in the Paraphrased Write Up
Let “b” represent the number of new words introduced to Paraphrased Write Up to form the Actual Content to Use so that the Original Write Up idea is fully intact. NB “b” can vary from writer to writer.
Accuracy in % = 100-((b/a)*100)
Using a paraphrasing tool could be helpful in research based writings. However, from the examples above, it is evident that paraphrasing tools sometimes fail in this regards; although they may help reduce plagiarism, they sometimes distort the actual meaning of the original write up by using bizarre and unidiomatic language in place of the expected standard term that is relevant to the topic being written. Moreover, some of these tools do not change the actual contents drastically; hence are susceptible to high plagiarism.
Finally
In conclusion, although these tools might be helpful to students, especially non-native English speakers, they are however not 100% accurate and can still introduce a substantial amount of plagiarism. Also, from personal experience, I have discovered that sometimes it takes a shorter time to paraphrase by one’s self in contrast to using these tools and then modifying the output to retain the original thoughts of the writer.
Originally published at https://academicianhelp.com
