Search Techniques

SECTION 5:  EVALUATING AND CITING YOUR SOURCES

B.  Proper methods of citation 

Citing your information sources is an important part of scholarship, whether you are using facts, quotations, or ideas that support your own work. In some cases you will use direct quotes or you will paraphrase something from these sources. Whether you quote from the sources or consult them for ideas, you need to cite them for several reasons:

• in order to give credit to the authors or creators of those sources
• to allow your readers to find and benefit from the sources you used
• (in a college paper or project) to let your professor know how you arrived at your conclusions

According to the U.S. Copyright Office, Circular 1 on "Copyright Basics" (http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.pdf):

"Copyright is a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States (title 17, U. S. Code) to the authors of “original works of authorship,” including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works. This protection is available to both published and unpublished works."

Using someone else's work without citation is plagiarism, which usually results in serious consequences.

STYLE MANUALS explain how to cite all types of sources, how to construct the bibliography or literature cited section, and how to format a paper. 

Style manuals can be discipline-specific.  For example, the Modern Language Association (MLA) Style Manual is used by humanities disciplines; Turabian is used in many social science disciplines; and, American Psychological Association (APA) style is used in many science disciplines. 

Nursing publications usually follow APA style.  Copies of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association are generally available at college and university libraries.  Depending on which edition you use, the printed manual may be, or may become, outdated with respect to citing electronic documents. You can find Web resources on citation styles by starting at the library Home Page, and from the Resources listing, choose General Reference Sources. On the General Reference Sources page, choose Style Manuals & Writing Guides.

There is CITATION HELP available from many sources:

• Internet: Many of you have probably used one of the free citation generators on the Internet (e.g., Citation Machine, EasyBib, OttoBib).  While these can be very helpful, they have also been known to have errors.  If you choose to use them, be sure to check the citations for errors and adherence to the style you are citing in.

• Databases: Many library databases will generate citations in various formats for any given record.  For example, EBSCOhost databases provide a "Cite this article" button that will produce results for you to cut and paste into your bibliography:

  

Again, since there can be errors, it is important that you be sure to check the citations for errors and adherence to the style you are citing in.

• EndNote: In addition, many databases allow you to export your selected citations into a bibliography creation system, such as EndNote, RefWorks, ProCite, etc.  ODU has a license for the EndNote and EndNote Web products. You may want to find out more about using them by exploring the information provided at http://www.lib.odu.edu/libassist/howto/endnote/index.htm. 

QUIZ on Section 5