One in two Cambridge students admit to having committed some form of plagiarism in their university career.

Of the 1000 students who responded to the online survey carried out by Cambridge‘s student newspaper, Varsity, 49 per cent admitted to plagiarism including handing in someone else's work, copying and pasting from the internet, buying essays online or paying someone to proof read their work.

One anonymous student told Varsity, “Sometimes when I’m really fed up, I google the essay title, copy and throw everything on to a blank word document and jiggle the order a bit.”

The University of Cambridge’s website maintains that plagiarism “is both poor scholarship and a breach of academic integrity.”

The faculty of Law said that they were “surprised” to have the highest percentage of plagiarists in the survey, with 62 per cent of their student body admitting to having committed plagiarism of some type.

The University of Cambridge states: “Plagiarism is defined as submitting as one's own work that which derives in part or in its entirety from the work of others without due acknowledgement.”

Many blame the University’s definition of plagiarism for the high number of students who have had to admit to committing plagiarism. Speaking to The Journal, Patrick Kingsley, the editor of Varsity, also voiced concerns regarding the University’s broad statement on plagiarism.

He said: "We were surprised that there should be so much plagiarism at the university, especially given that Cambridge is an academic institution which bases its reputation on scholastic rigour and integrity. However, we feel that this probably says more about the ambiguity of the university's plagiarism policy than any serious wrongdoing on the part of the students."

An anonymous third year student told the paper: “They’ve got to draw a distinction between failing to cite references properly and actual cheating.”

The survey further highlighted problems concerning over-reliance on online sources, such as Wikipedia: 82 per cent of plagiarists admitting to copying material from the website.

Of the University’s colleges, Edmund College had the greatest number of students who admitted to plagiarism while Selwyn College had the fewest. These two colleges find themselves at the bottom and top of the Tompkins table, respectively.

A member of the University council stated: “It stands to reason that those students who are performing less well will resort to underhand means to get by.”

In response to the findings, some students suggested that a heavy academic work load left many struggling students with no choice but to cheat. A second year Cambridge student said: “The quantity of work supervisors expect us to do is unrealistic”

Others asserted that “low level” plagiarism has been rife within the establishment for decades and seemed unsurprised by the findings.

A third year student stated: “All Part One lab reports are copied off the elder years, including mine. Presumably at some point someone did these lab reports by themselves, but that was probably about 100 years ago, and we have been copying it ever since.”

The survey also confirmed that 80 per cent of students believe that the university is doing enough to combat plagiarism. However, a member of the general board asserted, “You can see why students, a great number of whom are breaking the rules to their own benefits, would be keen to uphold the impression that the system is working.”

The university takes a seemingly hard-line on plagiarism: in a recent statement a spokesperson for Cambridge said: “The university regards deliberate acts of plagiarism as a serious and potentially disciplinary offence which can lead to failure to obtain, or withdrawal of a degree.”

However, of the 49 per cent of students who admitted to plagiarism, only five per cent said they had ever been caught. A third year student commented, “I know the university says that not acknowledging ideas counts as plagiarism but in reality I don’t think my supervisors or anyone really cares that much.”

In addition, a report from the Higher Education Academy and Joint Information Systems Committee found that out of 9,200 cases where students had been pulled up for plagiarism, only 143 students were expelled. The report found that the most common punishment was to re-submit the work.

Cambridge actively uses Turnitin plagiarism detection software in many of its faculties to try and combat plagiarism within its institution.

Universities are also being advised to review their plagiarism policies in light of new evidence which suggests some students might be using Facebook to cheat. Plagiarism experts have warned universities and colleges to be aware of students copying from each other when discussing coursework on social networking sites.

Gill Rowell, from the consultancy Plagiarism Advice, said universities needed to reassess their policies on plagiarism with “internet working in mind”. However, she insisted that institutions were treating incidents of plagiarism seriously enough.

University plagiarism experts will discuss cheating with Universities UK, the umbrella group for vice-chancellors, on 19 November.