At 04:39 PM 11/28/99 -0600, Paul wrote:
> Ah, once again we run into the disagreement about the definition of
>"paraphrase". I'm starting to think that I'm in the minority as a person who
>refers to proper summarization of a source as "paraphrasing".
Until just a few years ago, I treated both processes interchangeably as the APA
Manual apparently does. Because students' paraphrasings can often result in
plagiarism, I used to focus primarily on proper paraphrasing and not enough, or
not at all, on summarizing. Increasingly, however, I have found it very useful
to distinguish between both activities when I go over writing papers with my
students. I now think it is very important to focus on both processes, as I
believe that the type of writing that we want from our students in advanced
courses demands a thorough understanding and use of proper paraphrasing and
summarizing strategies.
In this regard, I would say to my students that, when writing, say a review of
a literature, we typically _condense_ a lengthy description of a study
(hypotheses, rationale, method and results) into a couple of sentences. Hacker
(1995) and other authors of writing manuals refer to this process as
summarizing. Of course, sometimes in the process of summarizing, we might find
it useful to 'follow much closely the author's original presentation', as Aaron
(1998) describes the process of paraphrasing. For example, when we are
describing a very specific and complex procedure found in a method section, we
probably want to resort to more paraphrasing than to summarizing. Thus, when
writing papers we probably rely on both processes.
In another post, Paul wrote:
>I also suspect that from the student's point of view, the problem is almost
>entirely in the nature of the assignment. He is thinking, "well, I don't
>understand these articles, so how can I put them into my own words?". I'm
>starting to question the value of the "summarize a published article"
>assignment that so many of us give to our students. But that's another
>issue...
On the contrary, Paul. I think such exercises can have the potential of
building up very useful writing skills.
Sure, most students will have great difficulties understanding the language in
many the articles that we assign to them. For example, many get discouraged
when they read an empirical paper once and find that they cannot understand it.
At that point they'll probably conclude with the above comment ("well, I don't
understand these articles, so how can I put them into my own words?"). I have
found that some students become even more discouraged when I tell them that _I_
sometimes I have to read those articles several times, particularly if they are
outside my area of expertise (as if I had one =) ) in order to thoroughly
understand them. They often reply "Well, if _you_ can't even understand that
stuff, how can you expect _us_ to understand it?"
My response would be that if students are serious about becoming professionals
in our discipline, they have to be made to understand that _they_ need to build
a certain degree of knowledge structure and familiarity with the language and
issues in the field. Such knowledge base will, in turn, allow them to better
understand those types of articles. As far as I can tell, the acquisition of
that knowledge structure only comes in three ways: Practice, practice,
practice. I mean practice reading and writing (summarizing and paraphrasing)
in that area.
>This is a much more complicated task for students than we tend to believe
>it is.
I agree and because of that realization, I sometimes wonder whether it is
always wise to apply very stringent standards of paraphrasing/plagiarism with
beginning students.
Obviously, we can help ease that painful process (and it must be intellectually
painful for the student. I still remember it being painful) by carefully
selecting articles that have an appropriate degree of reading level and
familiarity for the students to read and summarize. This is often difficult,
particularly when we have classes with a wide range of intellectual ability.
But, for those still experiencing problems, the use of a good dictionary of
psychology terms can be extremely useful here.
Oh well, that's enough of a rant for now. Can you tell from this post that I
also have a big pile of papers to read? =)
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Miguel Roig, Ph.D. Voice: (718) 390-4513
Assoc. Prof. of Psychology Fax: (718) 442-3612
Dept. of Psychology [EMAIL PROTECTED]
St. John's University [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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