How does citation work

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If you continue with this browser, you may see unexpected results. Identifying an author who has made the same point as you can be an opportunity to add legitimacy to, as well as reinforce the significance of, the research problem you are investigating.

The key is to build on that idea in new and innovative ways. If you are not sure how to do this, consult with a librarian! Should I cite a source even if it was published long ago? Any resource used in writing your paper should be cited, regardless of when the study was written.

However, in building a case for understanding prior research about your topic, it is generally true that you should focus on citing more recently published studies because they presumably have built upon the research of older publications. This is particularly true of new or revised editions of books, unless an older edition has unique information not carried over into newer editions.

When referencing prior studies, use the research problem as your guide when considering what to cite. If a study from forty years ago investigated the same research problem, it probably should be examined and considered in your list of references because the research may have been foundational or groundbreaking even if its findings are no longer relevant to current conditions or reflect current thinking [one way to determine if a study is foundational or groundbreaking is to examine how often it has been cited in recent studies using the "Cited by" feature of Google Scholar ].

However, if an older study only relates to the research problem tangentially or it has not been cited in recent studies, then it may be more appropriate to list it under further readings. Department of Biology. Bates College; Lunsford, Andrea A. Martin's Handbook. New York: St. Martin's Press, ; Mills, Elizabeth Shown.

Purdue University; Using Evidence. Indiana University. The following USC Libraries research guide can help you properly cite sources in your research paper:. The following USC Libraries research guide offers basic information on using images and media in research:. Listed below are particularly well-done and comprehensive websites that provide specific examples of how to cite sources under different style guidelines. This is a useful guide concerning how to properly cite images in your research paper.

This guide provides good information on the act of citation analysis, whereby you count the number of times a published work is cited by other works in order to measure the impact of a publication or author. The links below lead to systems where you can type in your information and have a citation compiled for you.

Note that these systems are not foolproof so it is important that you verify that the citation is correct and check your spelling, capitalization, etc. However, they can be useful in creating basic types of citations, particularly for online sources. This point is a simple corollary of the previous one. Indeed, showing off scholarship is simply the icing on the cake of what a well-cited article has to offer. The better documented your research and arguments, the more credible you are to your scientific colleagues.

Citation enables better verification of your work. Any piece of academic writing gets vetted several times over before it finally makes it into print or onto a website. Whether one is a peer reviewer, editor, or editorial assistant whose job is simply to track down sources in the bibliography and make sure that the citations are accurate, life is simply easier when there is less busy work. So, your paper is much more likely to be passed through these multiple rounds of editing with minimal criticism and positive feedback if you have already taken the trouble to attribute your information correctly and cite all your sources.

In a future article, we will discuss strategies for integrating good citation practices when writing and revising your articles.

Until then, incite yourself to cite when you write! The following is a list of suggested readings on the subject of citation. The citation style used in this bibliography is that adopted by the American Psychological Association APA , 6th edition, which I chose because it is one commonly used in many scientific journals. Bryson, D. Using research papers: citations, referencing and plagiarism. Journal of Visual Communication in Medicine , 35 2 , 82— Not at all. On the contrary, citing sources actually helps your reader distinguish your ideas from those of your sources.

This will actually emphasize the originality of your own work.