What is paraphrasing, and why is it essential in academic integrity?

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Paraphrasing is restating someone else's ideas in your own words and sentence structure, while preserving the original meaning. In academic work, it shows you understand the source and helps you weave evidence into your argument. Because the idea belongs to someone else, you still need a citation to avoid plagiarism, even when you paraphrase. Paraphrasing isn’t about swapping a few words; it involves reexpressing the concept in a way that fits your own voice and analysis while accurately conveying the original point. The other options miss the essence: paraphrasing is not just a one-sentence summary, it’s not copying text exactly without quotation marks, and citing alone does not excuse not presenting ideas in your own words.