Plagiarism has become a major problem among university students around the world. Academic misconduct is a concern for those who teach at universities. Therefore, to prevent this from happening, educational organizations have put in place measures to avoid plagiarism. Currently, newly recruited students are informed of the consequences of plagiarism and that severe measures are in place (Ashworth, Bannister and Thorne, 1997, p.1). However, plagiarism can be divided into two parts: deliberate and unintentional. Here we present the reasons why student plagiarism is considered quite high in Western universities, even though many university students do not seek to cheat. There are three reasons: (1) lack of clear understanding of the concept; (2) lack of knowledge about citation and referencing skills; and (3) poor time management. The first focus is on the definitions of plagiarism and the differences between two types of plagiarism, the reasons for inadvertent plagiarism and, finally, the reasons why international students have become the most plagiarized students in Western universities. Plagiarism is a type of academic misconduct that is treated seriously in Western universities. universities. Plagiarism is defined as “literary theft, stealing (copying) someone else's words or ideas and passing them off as one's own without crediting the source” (Handa & Power, nd, p.66 ). For example, using any material from any source, such as books, electronic journals, the Internet, or the work of others, constitutes plagiarism. There are two types of plagiarism: (1) deliberate (intent to cheat); (2) inadvertently (no intention to cheat). If students do it on purpose or intend to cheat, it means they have cheated...... middle of paper ......), 471-488.http://www.elearning. tcu.edu /resources/faculty/turnitin/Why%20Students%20Plagiarize.pdfPeter Ashwortha, Philip Bannistera, Pauline Thornea, "Guilty in whose eyes? University students' perceptions of cheating and plagiarism in work and academic assessment" Studies in Higher Education, Volume 22, Number 2, 1997Roig, Miguel (1997) “Can undergraduates determine whether a text has been plagiarized”, The Psychological Record: Vol. 47: Iss. 1, article 7. Available at: http://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/tpr/vol47/iss1/7Walker, John. “Student plagiarism at universities: what do we do about it?” » Research and Development in Higher Education, Volume 17, Issue 1, 1998http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0729436980170105?journalCode=cher20Wang, Y. (2008). Online plagiarism by a university student. International Journal of Online Learning,7(4), 743-757.