JMIR Medical Education (Jul 2024)

The Ability of ChatGPT in Paraphrasing Texts and Reducing Plagiarism: A Descriptive Analysis

  • Soheil Hassanipour,
  • Sandeep Nayak,
  • Ali Bozorgi,
  • Mohammad-Hossein Keivanlou,
  • Tirth Dave,
  • Abdulhadi Alotaibi,
  • Farahnaz Joukar,
  • Parinaz Mellatdoust,
  • Arash Bakhshi,
  • Dona Kuriyakose,
  • Lakshmi D Polisetty,
  • Mallika Chimpiri,
  • Ehsan Amini-Salehi

DOI
https://doi.org/10.2196/53308
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 10
pp. e53308 – e53308

Abstract

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Abstract BackgroundThe introduction of ChatGPT by OpenAI has garnered significant attention. Among its capabilities, paraphrasing stands out. ObjectiveThis study aims to investigate the satisfactory levels of plagiarism in the paraphrased text produced by this chatbot. MethodsThree texts of varying lengths were presented to ChatGPT. ChatGPT was then instructed to paraphrase the provided texts using five different prompts. In the subsequent stage of the study, the texts were divided into separate paragraphs, and ChatGPT was requested to paraphrase each paragraph individually. Lastly, in the third stage, ChatGPT was asked to paraphrase the texts it had previously generated. ResultsThe average plagiarism rate in the texts generated by ChatGPT was 45% (SD 10%). ChatGPT exhibited a substantial reduction in plagiarism for the provided texts (mean difference −0.51, 95% CI −0.54 to −0.48; PPP ConclusionAlthough ChatGPT demonstrates a notable reduction of plagiarism within texts, the existing levels of plagiarism remain relatively high. This underscores a crucial caution for researchers when incorporating this chatbot into their work.