Academic and research writing are essential components of postgraduate study. Masters and PhD students must write and present lengthy essays known as dissertations or theses. This is a major requirement for programme completion.
Academic writing is required of postdoctoral fellows and faculty members alike. This could be a journal article, a research proposal, or a poster presentation. Simply put, in order to be a great scholar, you must be a good writer.
Software and artificial intelligence (AI) have become useful tools for improving writing quality. Some software applications and methods of use are listed below.
5 Softwares for Excellent Academic and Research Writing
1. Turnitin
Turnitin is an internet-based software solution that detects plagiarised documents. The software was launched in 1997 in the US. It is very versatile and widely accepted amongst academic institutions. Based on this, over 30 million students and 15,000 institutions use Turnitin to maintain standards in research work.
So therefore, researchers at both college and graduate school use Turnitin. From simple tasks like essay submissions to term papers or long dissertations or thesis, Turnitin has found a place.
Many universities require research Masters and Ph.D. students to submit their dissertations or theses for thorough review by Turnitin before being approved for graduation by faculty.
Turnitin for Academic and Research Writing
Academic writing requires thought originality. Originality must be ensured during the presentation process. As a result, academic writers use Turnitin to avoid plagiarism. It also aids in the correct citation of academic articles in writing.
Turnitin is also used by academic institutions such as universities and research organisations to maintain academic integrity. When academic writing is discovered to contain a large amount of copied material without citations, it is graded or rejected outright. Grades are also assigned in part based on the quality of work as determined by the software’s originality report.
Free or paid Turnitin?
Turnitin is a paid service. This is due to the fact that they charge either the institution or the individuals who use their services for the use of their systems.
Turnitin accredited partners are found at universities all over the world. These institutions pay the premium fee for faculty and student use of the software. The cost is frequently passed on to students. This is included in the cost of study. As a result, while a student or researcher may use the software for free, the graduate school, department, or university pays the termly subscription.
How to use Turnitin free
For individuals, there are limitations to accessing and using this important research writing software.
Websites like scribbr offer a free but limited version of this plagiarism detection software. Register on the website and explore it to use Turnitin.
Cost of Turnitin
It is quoted as costing $3 per student annually. Again, individual license purchases are not granted to users. Many institutions offer plagiarism detection services from Turnitin. Therefore, ask your school or university to know if the service may be available to you under using Turnitin partner license.
2. Copyscape: is a service that searches the internet for similar text on other websites to determine whether it has been plagiarised. Academic fraud is relatively simple to commit on the internet. It is unethical to copy published research content and republish it on another website or in predatory journals. An ethical researcher must avoid such situations at all costs. Copyscape can be used to detect infringement of content wherever it is.
Copyscape has been fighting content fraud and theft since 2004. It allows bloggers and authors to quickly find and identify duplicate copies of their web pages on the internet. Indigo Stream Technologies developed the software.
How to use Copyscape
Copyscape has a free comparison tool. Researchers can paste at least a paragraph of their article or a journal. The articles are pasted into different boxes for comparison.
A better method is to compare different websites or an article with a website. The URL for the website is pasted while the research article is pasted in the opposite space. The percentage similarity is detected by Copyscape software.
Copyscape premium scans a scholarly research work and compares it with the world wide web. Unlike the freemium version that scans only a webpage. The Copyscape premium version crawls the internet and presents a percentage similarity. The result here is more reliable. It is better detection of plagiarism.
Take note that the wrong spelling of websites will generate an error report. This wiki how gives pictorial steps to using Copyscape.
Free vs. Premium Copyscape
Copyscape Premium is a token-based service with flexible payment options.
It costs $4.95 per month for up to ten pages and $0.25 per month for each additional page for a total of 500 pages. Every day, the Copysentry Professional service checks for duplicates of your pages. It costs $19.95 per month for up to ten pages on your website and $1.00 per month for each additional page for a total of 500 pages.
Copyscape’s Reliability
As expected, the free Copyscape package produced subpar results. This exposes the research writing efforts to being flagged if a contravening article is discovered.
Furthermore, the premium version, while more reliable, should not be relied on completely.
3. Grammarly Grammarly is a software application for the correction, editing, and proofreading of typed research work. Grammarly works by correcting grammar, punctuation, spelling, and word distortion.
Moreover, this is an artificial intelligence software that runs in the cloud. Its ability to detect and correct errors in documents while typing is intuitive. The software was created in 2009 in California, United States. It has however, evolved into a valuable resource not only for research writers, but also for journalists, authors, bloggers, and publishers.
How to Use Grammarly during Research Writing
This adaptable software can be used in a number of ways.
A. Mobile Devices: Grammarly is available as an Android or iOS app. To use Grammarly, download the apk file for your mobile device from the Appstore.
After installation, switch to Grammarly as your phone’s keyboard. This enables the app to auto-correct or suggest changes as you type.
B. Internet-based: It can also be accessed via the Grammarly website as a web-based application. The document can then be pasted into the website in this case. Corrections are made or suggestions are made at the prompt.
C. Windows and Mac: Grammarly can also be integrated into other applications. Grammarly can be integrated with Microsoft Word .
Grammarly fits smoothly into Microsoft Word on macOS. When installed, the writing process for anyone is seamless with suggestions appearing in the right margin of your desktop.
Also, there is an extension for Google Chrome. According to Chrome
Grammarly offers real-time suggestions to help you write your best online, no matter what you’re working on in your browser. This means when typing on any website, the Grammarly for chrome extension brings real-time auto-suggestions. For researchers, typing over Google docs or sheets, the software will aid academic research.
Grammarly (free or premium)
Grammarly is completely free to use. This comes at the cost of limited access to all of its features. The free Grammarly app is a personal writing assistant designed solely to ‘assist.’
The free package corrects spelling errors, punctuation errors, and several grammar errors. It can also detect the tone of the article.
Moreover, Grammarly’s premium plan goes beyond the basic checks and suggestions. Premium suggests ways to restructure the long sentence. It also changes the tone and eliminates repetitive patterns. Grammarly’s premium version is adequate for a full-fledged editorial review of a research paper, such as a dissertation or journal article.
Is it necessary to proofread a journal/research paper after using Grammarly?
Grammarly is an artificial intelligence-based language software application. While it is capable of detecting a wide range of errors, it has some limitations.
The terminologies and vocabularies used in research and academic writing are distinct. Depending on the subject, some words in context would be beyond the capabilities of any AI software.
Furthermore, proofreading and editing extend beyond grammar checks. Professional editors understand the flow of the text, the placement of charts and images, and the division into chapters or subheadings. Proofreading and editing research writing also entails double-checking citations. This does not eliminate errors made by human proofreaders, but it does produce a better result.
4. Quilbot (https://quillbot.com/)
is a great research writing software used for paraphrasing an original write-up. Quilbot rewrites sentences, paragraphs or complete articles with the help of artificial intelligence.
Quilbot is American software cooperation founded in 2017. It is based in Chicago. Quilbot is used by students, research writers, essayists, authors, content writers, and public speakers.
In this case, the writing tool manipulates the structure or style of an original write-up rewritten to give a new one. The new write-up would largely have a similar meaning to the original but it had been completely rewritten. To achieve this, the application uses a powerful AI and a mix of synonyms in paraphrasing an article.
Importance of Quilbot to Academic Writer
The challenge of plagiarism is huge. So, academic writing must be done to present ideas in new ways. There is also the challenge of self-plagiarism, where the researcher’s previous work might be unwittingly inserted without quoting.
Quilbot assists academic writers to present the same idea in different ways. As such, it can pass any plagiarism detection software. It uses state-of-the-art AI to detect the style, fluency, and tone of the article.
Therefore, the time spent by researchers and students brainstorming is reduced. It also increases the speed of writing. Giving time for proofreading and editing. It is also used for summarising a long article.
Ultimately, the major reason why academic writing should be supported by the Quilbot application is to prevent the booby trap of plagiarism. This is notwithstanding if the research writing is a thesis, dissertation or journal article presentation.
How to use Quilbot
Quilbot, like Grammarly, can be used on a variety of devices in a variety of ways.
A. Mobile devices: the app is downloaded from the appropriate appstore. It is available for both iOS and Android devices. So, setup is simple and straightforward.
B. Web-based application: Simply copy and paste a paragraph or sentence into the Quilbot website, https://quillbot.com. To read a rewritten article, click on the link below.
C. Browser extension: The Quilbot extension is available for installation in Google Chrome.
Premium or free?
To a large extent, Quilbot can be used for free. It can paraphrase up to 125 words at a time.
The software began as a paraphrasing tool but has since evolved into a plagiarism detection, citation, and grammar checking tool. These additional add-ons are only available with a premium subscription. The premium version of Quilbot costs $4.17 per month or $49.95 per year.
5. ProWriting Aid is a grammar and style checker programme. In terms of checking grammar, punctuation, and spelling errors, ProWriting Aid is a reliable alternative to Grammarly.
Also, this is a premium application used by novelists, columnists, academic and business writers. It can be used for self-editing. It does more than just correct a manuscript; it also makes suggestions for improving writing skills.
Why ProWriting Aid instead Grammarly for Research and Academic Writing?
Both ProWriting Aid and Grammarly offer quality service in the work of making your academic articles clean. More like, they are different sides of the same coin.
ProWriting Aid edges Grammarly by offering more in-depth reports and analyses of your write-ups. It is cheap and well-suited for fiction writers. It fails by not having a mobile app like Grammarly and Quilbot. This article compares both writing software.
Free and Paid ProWriting Aid
ProWritingAid is a free version. However, the free version is less effective than the premium version. The freemium version has a 500-word review limit.
Finally, premium version of ProWritingAid comes at $59 per annum. In addition, its lifetime plans cost $224.
Conclusion
There are many more software applications, useful for research writing. The five (at least four) mentioned above, on the other hand, are a “must have” for excellent academic and research writing.
What other software programmes should be included in the list? I’m looking forward to hearing from you in the comments section.
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