Personal Research and Private Study
Non-Commercial Research and Private Study
You are allowed to copy limited extracts of works without permission from the owner when the use is non-commercial research or private study, but you must be genuinely researching or studying.
In assessing whether your use of the work is permitted or not, you must assess if there is any financial impact on the copyright owner because of your use. Where the impact is not significant, the use may be acceptable under the principle of fair dealing.
When a work is reproduced as part of your studies, this must be supported by sufficient acknowledgement and attribution as well.
How much can you copy?
Under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, the amount that can be copied is not precisely specified but must take into account the concept of fair dealing. This means you must assess if there is any financial impact on the copyright owner because of your use. Where the impact is not significant, the use is likely to be acceptable under the principle of fair dealing.
The less of a work that you use, the more likely it is that your use may be considered fair. It has been suggested that 5% and under is likely to be seen as reasonable under fair dealing but in some cases even 5% may be too much, so just use as much as you need.
Provided you have only made a single copy of a limited (fair) amount of a copyright work which is directly relevant to your studies, and provided you acknowledge that work in your finished work you are unlikely to be infringing anyone's copyright.
You are not required to delete copies you have made on completion of your work; however any copies should not be distributed or sold.
