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Student plagiarism is a growing problem within Australian universities and abroad. Potentially exacerbating this situation, research indicates that students' attitudes toward plagiarism are typically more permissive and lenient than the policies of their tertiary institutions. There has been suggestion that this is especially so in Asian countries relative to Western countries; however, very little research has sought to empirically validate this suggestion. Moreover, existing research in this area has typically compared international and domestic students studying in Western countries. As yet, no studies have directly compared Chinese and Australian university students' attitudes toward plagiarism, as they exist within their native countries. Rasch analysis/ differential item functioning were conducted to contrast 131 Australian and 173 Chinese undergraduate university students' attitudes towards plagiarism. Results indicated distinct cross-cultural differences in aspects of students' plagiarism attitudes. Regardless of ethnic background, the results highlight undergraduate students' typical lack of understanding of plagiarism and plagiarist behaviours. students. The author attributed this result to academic pressure (i.e., workloads) and the perception that many international students were doing likewise. Generalisation of these findings, however, is complicated by the unique demands of studying abroad. For instance, in addition to typical coursework demands, international students also must overcome unique and significant language barriers, which have been associated with plagiarist behaviours (Devlin and Gray 2007). It is therefore difficult to determine whether these findings provide an accurate reflection of cultural differences in attitudes towards plagiarism or the additional pressures international students face in a foreign learning environment.Furthermore, plagiarism is a highly complex phenomenon and, as such, it is likely that there is no single explanation for why individuals engage in plagiarist behaviours. In fact, At the heart of this issue is whether or not there are genuine cross-cultural differences in attitudes toward plagiarism. To address this issue, the current study surveyed Chinese and Australian university students studying domestically in order to compare these students' attitudes toward plagiarism and the perceived factors contributing to plagiarist behaviours.Importantly, the cross-cultural comparison of university students studying domestically minimises the conflation of the unique demands of studying abroad. As such, any differences in plagiarism attitudes can more readily be attributed to cross-cultural differences in attitudes Method ParticipantsParticipants were domestic undergraduate students enrolled at either an Australian (n = 131) or Chinese university (n = 173). In the Australian sample there were significantly more females than males (80.9% female), the pattern of which was reversed in the Chinese sample (19.3% female). All Australian students were enrolled in...

The relationship of language style and online review has drawn increasing academic attention recently as it can provide customers with a guide to make the purchase. Extant research attaches importance to the language style that is presented in the use of function words, instead of product-related content words. This study aimed to examine the language style generated by customers’ comments relating to the product based on content words, that is, product-centered language style (PCLS). We built a corpus of Chinese women clothes online reviews to explore the general picture and distinct features of PCLS and the distinct feature of PCLS. A content-word-centered Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) in terms of product performance is established. PCLS is calculated based on the language style matching (LSM) algorithm. Our results show that the PCLS in women clothes online review is featured by diverse and polarized language styles among three groups of women clothes buyers, and the prioritized arrangement of words of importance contributes to the PCLS. The findings benefit the women clothes industry in which it can help companies quickly find the distinctive and the transition of PCLS and offer an approach for companies to indiscriminately look into the significance of the product category from the linguistic perspective, which can help with product sale strategy and product design.

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