When I drag an icon on my desktop, it creates a duplicate copy of the dragged icon

I drag an icon on my desktop to another location. The dragged icon doesn't change location. Instead a duplicate copy of the dragged icon is created and dragged from the original location of the dragged icon. This duplicate copy is dragged to wherever I dragged it.

Item 1 (let's say "My Pictures" folder)--------> a copy of "Item 1" is created when Item 1 is dragged

Legend:

"--->" means "an icon dragged to another location on the desktop"

What's causing this strange problem? Is there any way to prevent this from happening? I don't want to unintentionally create a new copy of whatever item is being dragged on my desktop. That's because I don't want my desktop to have unnecessary duplicate copies of whatever item is being dragged. Plus, this problem makes it impossible for me to drag and change the location of any icons on my desktop since the duplicate icon is dragged rather than the original icon.

Extra information: I use Windows 7.

I hope my description of the problem makes sense.

 

Hey CR. Not sure if I'm understanding you completely so bear with me. Is the "My Pictures" folder on the same drive as the Desktop? If you drag an item from one drive to another, Windows makes a copy of it; but if they're the same drive it should move it. If they're the same drive and it's still making a copy by default then I don't know. How long's it been doing it? If you have some restore points you might try a System Restore. Or instead of using the left mouse button to drag and drop, try using the right one. When you drop the item, choose Copy Here or Move Here. I got in the habit of doing it this way, it's easier for me than trying to remember what drives I'm using. Hope that helps.