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References in Research – Types, Examples and Writing Guide

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References in Research

Definition:

References in research are a list of sources that a researcher has consulted or cited while conducting their study. They are an essential component of any academic work, including research papers, theses, dissertations, and other scholarly publications.

Types of References

There are several types of references used in research, and the type of reference depends on the source of information being cited. The most common types of references include:

References to books typically include the author’s name, title of the book, publisher, publication date, and place of publication.

Example: Smith, J. (2018). The Art of Writing. Penguin Books.

Journal Articles

References to journal articles usually include the author’s name, title of the article, name of the journal, volume and issue number, page numbers, and publication date.

Example: Johnson, T. (2021). The Impact of Social Media on Mental Health. Journal of Psychology, 32(4), 87-94.

Web sources

References to web sources should include the author or organization responsible for the content, the title of the page, the URL, and the date accessed.

Example: World Health Organization. (2020). Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) advice for the public. Retrieved from https://www.who.int/emergencies/disease/novel-coronavirus-2019/advice-for-public

Conference Proceedings

References to conference proceedings should include the author’s name, title of the paper, name of the conference, location of the conference, date of the conference, and page numbers.

Example: Chen, S., & Li, J. (2019). The Future of AI in Education. Proceedings of the International Conference on Educational Technology, Beijing, China, July 15-17, pp. 67-78.

References to reports typically include the author or organization responsible for the report, title of the report, publication date, and publisher.

Example: United Nations. (2020). The Sustainable Development Goals Report. United Nations.

Formats of References

Some common Formates of References with their examples are as follows:

APA (American Psychological Association) Style

The APA (American Psychological Association) Style has specific guidelines for formatting references used in academic papers, articles, and books. Here are the different reference formats in APA style with examples:

Author, A. A. (Year of publication). Title of book. Publisher.

Example : Smith, J. K. (2005). The psychology of social interaction. Wiley-Blackwell.

Journal Article

Author, A. A., Author, B. B., & Author, C. C. (Year of publication). Title of article. Title of Journal, volume number(issue number), page numbers.

Example : Brown, L. M., Keating, J. G., & Jones, S. M. (2012). The role of social support in coping with stress among African American adolescents. Journal of Research on Adolescence, 22(1), 218-233.

Author, A. A. (Year of publication or last update). Title of page. Website name. URL.

Example : Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2020, December 11). COVID-19: How to protect yourself and others. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/prevention.html

Magazine article

Author, A. A. (Year, Month Day of publication). Title of article. Title of Magazine, volume number(issue number), page numbers.

Example : Smith, M. (2019, March 11). The power of positive thinking. Psychology Today, 52(3), 60-65.

Newspaper article:

Author, A. A. (Year, Month Day of publication). Title of article. Title of Newspaper, page numbers.

Example: Johnson, B. (2021, February 15). New study shows benefits of exercise on mental health. The New York Times, A8.

Edited book

Editor, E. E. (Ed.). (Year of publication). Title of book. Publisher.

Example : Thompson, J. P. (Ed.). (2014). Social work in the 21st century. Sage Publications.

Chapter in an edited book:

Author, A. A. (Year of publication). Title of chapter. In E. E. Editor (Ed.), Title of book (pp. page numbers). Publisher.

Example : Johnson, K. S. (2018). The future of social work: Challenges and opportunities. In J. P. Thompson (Ed.), Social work in the 21st century (pp. 105-118). Sage Publications.

MLA (Modern Language Association) Style

The MLA (Modern Language Association) Style is a widely used style for writing academic papers and essays in the humanities. Here are the different reference formats in MLA style:

Author’s Last name, First name. Title of Book. Publisher, Publication year.

Example : Smith, John. The Psychology of Social Interaction. Wiley-Blackwell, 2005.

Journal article

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Article.” Title of Journal, volume number, issue number, Publication year, page numbers.

Example : Brown, Laura M., et al. “The Role of Social Support in Coping with Stress among African American Adolescents.” Journal of Research on Adolescence, vol. 22, no. 1, 2012, pp. 218-233.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Webpage.” Website Name, Publication date, URL.

Example : Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “COVID-19: How to Protect Yourself and Others.” CDC, 11 Dec. 2020, https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/prevention.html.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Article.” Title of Magazine, Publication date, page numbers.

Example : Smith, Mary. “The Power of Positive Thinking.” Psychology Today, Mar. 2019, pp. 60-65.

Newspaper article

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Article.” Title of Newspaper, Publication date, page numbers.

Example : Johnson, Bob. “New Study Shows Benefits of Exercise on Mental Health.” The New York Times, 15 Feb. 2021, p. A8.

Editor’s Last name, First name, editor. Title of Book. Publisher, Publication year.

Example : Thompson, John P., editor. Social Work in the 21st Century. Sage Publications, 2014.

Chapter in an edited book

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Chapter.” Title of Book, edited by Editor’s First Name Last name, Publisher, Publication year, page numbers.

Example : Johnson, Karen S. “The Future of Social Work: Challenges and Opportunities.” Social Work in the 21st Century, edited by John P. Thompson, Sage Publications, 2014, pp. 105-118.

Chicago Manual of Style

The Chicago Manual of Style is a widely used style for writing academic papers, dissertations, and books in the humanities and social sciences. Here are the different reference formats in Chicago style:

Example : Smith, John K. The Psychology of Social Interaction. Wiley-Blackwell, 2005.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Article.” Title of Journal volume number, no. issue number (Publication year): page numbers.

Example : Brown, Laura M., John G. Keating, and Sarah M. Jones. “The Role of Social Support in Coping with Stress among African American Adolescents.” Journal of Research on Adolescence 22, no. 1 (2012): 218-233.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Webpage.” Website Name. Publication date. URL.

Example : Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “COVID-19: How to Protect Yourself and Others.” CDC. December 11, 2020. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/prevention.html.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Article.” Title of Magazine, Publication date.

Example : Smith, Mary. “The Power of Positive Thinking.” Psychology Today, March 2019.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Article.” Title of Newspaper, Publication date.

Example : Johnson, Bob. “New Study Shows Benefits of Exercise on Mental Health.” The New York Times, February 15, 2021.

Example : Thompson, John P., ed. Social Work in the 21st Century. Sage Publications, 2014.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Chapter.” In Title of Book, edited by Editor’s First Name Last Name, page numbers. Publisher, Publication year.

Example : Johnson, Karen S. “The Future of Social Work: Challenges and Opportunities.” In Social Work in the 21st Century, edited by John P. Thompson, 105-118. Sage Publications, 2014.

Harvard Style

The Harvard Style, also known as the Author-Date System, is a widely used style for writing academic papers and essays in the social sciences. Here are the different reference formats in Harvard Style:

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of publication. Title of Book. Place of publication: Publisher.

Example : Smith, John. 2005. The Psychology of Social Interaction. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of publication. “Title of Article.” Title of Journal volume number (issue number): page numbers.

Example: Brown, Laura M., John G. Keating, and Sarah M. Jones. 2012. “The Role of Social Support in Coping with Stress among African American Adolescents.” Journal of Research on Adolescence 22 (1): 218-233.

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of publication. “Title of Webpage.” Website Name. URL. Accessed date.

Example : Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 2020. “COVID-19: How to Protect Yourself and Others.” CDC. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/prevention.html. Accessed April 1, 2023.

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of publication. “Title of Article.” Title of Magazine, month and date of publication.

Example : Smith, Mary. 2019. “The Power of Positive Thinking.” Psychology Today, March 2019.

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of publication. “Title of Article.” Title of Newspaper, month and date of publication.

Example : Johnson, Bob. 2021. “New Study Shows Benefits of Exercise on Mental Health.” The New York Times, February 15, 2021.

Editor’s Last name, First name, ed. Year of publication. Title of Book. Place of publication: Publisher.

Example : Thompson, John P., ed. 2014. Social Work in the 21st Century. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of publication. “Title of Chapter.” In Title of Book, edited by Editor’s First Name Last Name, page numbers. Place of publication: Publisher.

Example : Johnson, Karen S. 2014. “The Future of Social Work: Challenges and Opportunities.” In Social Work in the 21st Century, edited by John P. Thompson, 105-118. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Vancouver Style

The Vancouver Style, also known as the Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals, is a widely used style for writing academic papers in the biomedical sciences. Here are the different reference formats in Vancouver Style:

Author’s Last name, First name. Title of Book. Edition number. Place of publication: Publisher; Year of publication.

Example : Smith, John K. The Psychology of Social Interaction. 2nd ed. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell; 2005.

Author’s Last name, First name. Title of Article. Abbreviated Journal Title. Year of publication; volume number(issue number):page numbers.

Example : Brown LM, Keating JG, Jones SM. The Role of Social Support in Coping with Stress among African American Adolescents. J Res Adolesc. 2012;22(1):218-233.

Author’s Last name, First name. Title of Webpage. Website Name [Internet]. Publication date. [cited date]. Available from: URL.

Example : Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. COVID-19: How to Protect Yourself and Others [Internet]. 2020 Dec 11. [cited 2023 Apr 1]. Available from: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/prevention.html.

Author’s Last name, First name. Title of Article. Title of Magazine. Year of publication; month and day of publication:page numbers.

Example : Smith M. The Power of Positive Thinking. Psychology Today. 2019 Mar 1:32-35.

Author’s Last name, First name. Title of Article. Title of Newspaper. Year of publication; month and day of publication:page numbers.

Example : Johnson B. New Study Shows Benefits of Exercise on Mental Health. The New York Times. 2021 Feb 15:A4.

Editor’s Last name, First name, editor. Title of Book. Edition number. Place of publication: Publisher; Year of publication.

Example: Thompson JP, editor. Social Work in the 21st Century. 1st ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications; 2014.

Author’s Last name, First name. Title of Chapter. In: Editor’s Last name, First name, editor. Title of Book. Edition number. Place of publication: Publisher; Year of publication. page numbers.

Example : Johnson KS. The Future of Social Work: Challenges and Opportunities. In: Thompson JP, editor. Social Work in the 21st Century. 1st ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications; 2014. p. 105-118.

Turabian Style

Turabian style is a variation of the Chicago style used in academic writing, particularly in the fields of history and humanities. Here are the different reference formats in Turabian style:

Author’s Last name, First name. Title of Book. Place of publication: Publisher, Year of publication.

Example : Smith, John K. The Psychology of Social Interaction. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2005.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Article.” Title of Journal volume number, no. issue number (Year of publication): page numbers.

Example : Brown, LM, Keating, JG, Jones, SM. “The Role of Social Support in Coping with Stress among African American Adolescents.” J Res Adolesc 22, no. 1 (2012): 218-233.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Webpage.” Name of Website. Publication date. Accessed date. URL.

Example : Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “COVID-19: How to Protect Yourself and Others.” CDC. December 11, 2020. Accessed April 1, 2023. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/prevention.html.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Article.” Title of Magazine, Month Day, Year of publication, page numbers.

Example : Smith, M. “The Power of Positive Thinking.” Psychology Today, March 1, 2019, 32-35.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Article.” Title of Newspaper, Month Day, Year of publication.

Example : Johnson, B. “New Study Shows Benefits of Exercise on Mental Health.” The New York Times, February 15, 2021.

Editor’s Last name, First name, ed. Title of Book. Place of publication: Publisher, Year of publication.

Example : Thompson, JP, ed. Social Work in the 21st Century. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2014.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Chapter.” In Title of Book, edited by Editor’s Last name, First name, page numbers. Place of publication: Publisher, Year of publication.

Example : Johnson, KS. “The Future of Social Work: Challenges and Opportunities.” In Social Work in the 21st Century, edited by Thompson, JP, 105-118. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2014.

IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) Style

IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) style is commonly used in engineering, computer science, and other technical fields. Here are the different reference formats in IEEE style:

Author’s Last name, First name. Book Title. Place of Publication: Publisher, Year of publication.

Example : Oppenheim, A. V., & Schafer, R. W. Discrete-Time Signal Processing. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2010.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Article.” Abbreviated Journal Title, vol. number, no. issue number, pp. page numbers, Month year of publication.

Example: Shannon, C. E. “A Mathematical Theory of Communication.” Bell System Technical Journal, vol. 27, no. 3, pp. 379-423, July 1948.

Conference paper

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Paper.” In Title of Conference Proceedings, Place of Conference, Date of Conference, pp. page numbers, Year of publication.

Example: Gupta, S., & Kumar, P. “An Improved System of Linear Discriminant Analysis for Face Recognition.” In Proceedings of the 2011 International Conference on Computer Science and Network Technology, Harbin, China, Dec. 2011, pp. 144-147.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Webpage.” Name of Website. Date of publication or last update. Accessed date. URL.

Example : National Aeronautics and Space Administration. “Apollo 11.” NASA. July 20, 1969. Accessed April 1, 2023. https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/apollo/apollo11.html.

Technical report

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Report.” Name of Institution or Organization, Report number, Year of publication.

Example : Smith, J. R. “Development of a New Solar Panel Technology.” National Renewable Energy Laboratory, NREL/TP-6A20-51645, 2011.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Patent.” Patent number, Issue date.

Example : Suzuki, H. “Method of Producing Carbon Nanotubes.” US Patent 7,151,019, December 19, 2006.

Standard Title. Standard number, Publication date.

Example : IEEE Standard for Floating-Point Arithmetic. IEEE Std 754-2008, August 29, 2008

ACS (American Chemical Society) Style

ACS (American Chemical Society) style is commonly used in chemistry and related fields. Here are the different reference formats in ACS style:

Author’s Last name, First name; Author’s Last name, First name. Title of Article. Abbreviated Journal Title Year, Volume, Page Numbers.

Example : Wang, Y.; Zhao, X.; Cui, Y.; Ma, Y. Facile Preparation of Fe3O4/graphene Composites Using a Hydrothermal Method for High-Performance Lithium Ion Batteries. ACS Appl. Mater. Interfaces 2012, 4, 2715-2721.

Author’s Last name, First name. Book Title; Publisher: Place of Publication, Year of Publication.

Example : Carey, F. A. Organic Chemistry; McGraw-Hill: New York, 2008.

Author’s Last name, First name. Chapter Title. In Book Title; Editor’s Last name, First name, Ed.; Publisher: Place of Publication, Year of Publication; Volume number, Chapter number, Page Numbers.

Example : Grossman, R. B. Analytical Chemistry of Aerosols. In Aerosol Measurement: Principles, Techniques, and Applications; Baron, P. A.; Willeke, K., Eds.; Wiley-Interscience: New York, 2001; Chapter 10, pp 395-424.

Author’s Last name, First name. Title of Webpage. Website Name, URL (accessed date).

Example : National Institute of Standards and Technology. Atomic Spectra Database. https://www.nist.gov/pml/atomic-spectra-database (accessed April 1, 2023).

Author’s Last name, First name. Patent Number. Patent Date.

Example : Liu, Y.; Huang, H.; Chen, H.; Zhang, W. US Patent 9,999,999, December 31, 2022.

Author’s Last name, First name; Author’s Last name, First name. Title of Article. In Title of Conference Proceedings, Publisher: Place of Publication, Year of Publication; Volume Number, Page Numbers.

Example : Jia, H.; Xu, S.; Wu, Y.; Wu, Z.; Tang, Y.; Huang, X. Fast Adsorption of Organic Pollutants by Graphene Oxide. In Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on Environmental Science and Technology, American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2017; Volume 1, pp 223-228.

AMA (American Medical Association) Style

AMA (American Medical Association) style is commonly used in medical and scientific fields. Here are the different reference formats in AMA style:

Author’s Last name, First name. Article Title. Journal Abbreviation. Year; Volume(Issue):Page Numbers.

Example : Jones, R. A.; Smith, B. C. The Role of Vitamin D in Maintaining Bone Health. JAMA. 2019;321(17):1765-1773.

Author’s Last name, First name. Book Title. Edition number. Place of Publication: Publisher; Year.

Example : Guyton, A. C.; Hall, J. E. Textbook of Medical Physiology. 13th ed. Philadelphia, PA: Saunders; 2015.

Author’s Last name, First name. Chapter Title. In: Editor’s Last name, First name, ed. Book Title. Edition number. Place of Publication: Publisher; Year: Page Numbers.

Example: Rajakumar, K. Vitamin D and Bone Health. In: Holick, M. F., ed. Vitamin D: Physiology, Molecular Biology, and Clinical Applications. 2nd ed. New York, NY: Springer; 2010:211-222.

Author’s Last name, First name. Webpage Title. Website Name. URL. Published date. Updated date. Accessed date.

Example : National Cancer Institute. Breast Cancer Prevention (PDQ®)–Patient Version. National Cancer Institute. https://www.cancer.gov/types/breast/patient/breast-prevention-pdq. Published October 11, 2022. Accessed April 1, 2023.

Author’s Last name, First name. Conference presentation title. In: Conference Title; Conference Date; Place of Conference.

Example : Smith, J. R. Vitamin D and Bone Health: A Meta-Analysis. In: Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Bone and Mineral Research; September 20-23, 2022; San Diego, CA.

Thesis or dissertation

Author’s Last name, First name. Title of Thesis or Dissertation. Degree level [Doctoral dissertation or Master’s thesis]. University Name; Year.

Example : Wilson, S. A. The Effects of Vitamin D Supplementation on Bone Health in Postmenopausal Women [Doctoral dissertation]. University of California, Los Angeles; 2018.

ASCE (American Society of Civil Engineers) Style

The ASCE (American Society of Civil Engineers) style is commonly used in civil engineering fields. Here are the different reference formats in ASCE style:

Author’s Last name, First name. “Article Title.” Journal Title, volume number, issue number (year): page numbers. DOI or URL (if available).

Example : Smith, J. R. “Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Sustainable Drainage Systems in Urban Areas.” Journal of Environmental Engineering, vol. 146, no. 3 (2020): 04020010. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)EE.1943-7870.0001668.

Example : McCuen, R. H. Hydrologic Analysis and Design. 4th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education; 2013.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Chapter Title.” In: Editor’s Last name, First name, ed. Book Title. Edition number. Place of Publication: Publisher; Year: page numbers.

Example : Maidment, D. R. “Floodplain Management in the United States.” In: Shroder, J. F., ed. Treatise on Geomorphology. San Diego, CA: Academic Press; 2013: 447-460.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Paper Title.” In: Conference Title; Conference Date; Location. Place of Publication: Publisher; Year: page numbers.

Example: Smith, J. R. “Sustainable Drainage Systems for Urban Areas.” In: Proceedings of the ASCE International Conference on Sustainable Infrastructure; November 6-9, 2019; Los Angeles, CA. Reston, VA: American Society of Civil Engineers; 2019: 156-163.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Report Title.” Report number. Place of Publication: Publisher; Year.

Example : U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. “Hurricane Sandy Coastal Risk Reduction Program, New York and New Jersey.” Report No. P-15-001. Washington, DC: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers; 2015.

CSE (Council of Science Editors) Style

The CSE (Council of Science Editors) style is commonly used in the scientific and medical fields. Here are the different reference formats in CSE style:

Author’s Last name, First Initial. Middle Initial. “Article Title.” Journal Title. Year;Volume(Issue):Page numbers.

Example : Smith, J.R. “Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Sustainable Drainage Systems in Urban Areas.” Journal of Environmental Engineering. 2020;146(3):04020010.

Author’s Last name, First Initial. Middle Initial. Book Title. Edition number. Place of Publication: Publisher; Year.

Author’s Last name, First Initial. Middle Initial. “Chapter Title.” In: Editor’s Last name, First Initial. Middle Initial., ed. Book Title. Edition number. Place of Publication: Publisher; Year:Page numbers.

Author’s Last name, First Initial. Middle Initial. “Paper Title.” In: Conference Title; Conference Date; Location. Place of Publication: Publisher; Year.

Example : Smith, J.R. “Sustainable Drainage Systems for Urban Areas.” In: Proceedings of the ASCE International Conference on Sustainable Infrastructure; November 6-9, 2019; Los Angeles, CA. Reston, VA: American Society of Civil Engineers; 2019.

Author’s Last name, First Initial. Middle Initial. “Report Title.” Report number. Place of Publication: Publisher; Year.

Bluebook Style

The Bluebook style is commonly used in the legal field for citing legal documents and sources. Here are the different reference formats in Bluebook style:

Case citation

Case name, volume source page (Court year).

Example : Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483 (1954).

Statute citation

Name of Act, volume source § section number (year).

Example : Clean Air Act, 42 U.S.C. § 7401 (1963).

Regulation citation

Name of regulation, volume source § section number (year).

Example: Clean Air Act, 40 C.F.R. § 52.01 (2019).

Book citation

Author’s Last name, First Initial. Middle Initial. Book Title. Edition number (if applicable). Place of Publication: Publisher; Year.

Example: Smith, J.R. Legal Writing and Analysis. 3rd ed. New York, NY: Aspen Publishers; 2015.

Journal article citation

Author’s Last name, First Initial. Middle Initial. “Article Title.” Journal Title. Volume number (year): first page-last page.

Example: Garcia, C. “The Right to Counsel: An International Comparison.” International Journal of Legal Information. 43 (2015): 63-94.

Website citation

Author’s Last name, First Initial. Middle Initial. “Page Title.” Website Title. URL (accessed month day, year).

Example : United Nations. “Universal Declaration of Human Rights.” United Nations. https://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ (accessed January 3, 2023).

Oxford Style

The Oxford style, also known as the Oxford referencing system or the documentary-note citation system, is commonly used in the humanities, including literature, history, and philosophy. Here are the different reference formats in Oxford style:

Author’s Last name, First name. Book Title. Place of Publication: Publisher, Year of Publication.

Example : Smith, John. The Art of Writing. New York: Penguin, 2020.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Article Title.” Journal Title volume, no. issue (year): page range.

Example: Garcia, Carlos. “The Role of Ethics in Philosophy.” Philosophy Today 67, no. 3 (2019): 53-68.

Chapter in an edited book citation

Author’s Last name, First name. “Chapter Title.” In Book Title, edited by Editor’s Name, page range. Place of Publication: Publisher, Year of Publication.

Example : Lee, Mary. “Feminism in the 21st Century.” In The Oxford Handbook of Feminism, edited by Jane Smith, 51-69. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018.

Author’s Last name, First name. “Page Title.” Website Title. URL (accessed day month year).

Example : Jones, David. “The Importance of Learning Languages.” Oxford Language Center. https://www.oxfordlanguagecenter.com/importance-of-learning-languages/ (accessed 3 January 2023).

Dissertation or thesis citation

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Dissertation/Thesis.” PhD diss., University Name, Year of Publication.

Example : Brown, Susan. “The Art of Storytelling in American Literature.” PhD diss., University of Oxford, 2020.

Newspaper article citation

Author’s Last name, First name. “Article Title.” Newspaper Title, Month Day, Year.

Example : Robinson, Andrew. “New Developments in Climate Change Research.” The Guardian, September 15, 2022.

AAA (American Anthropological Association) Style

The American Anthropological Association (AAA) style is commonly used in anthropology research papers and journals. Here are the different reference formats in AAA style:

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of Publication. Book Title. Place of Publication: Publisher.

Example : Smith, John. 2019. The Anthropology of Food. New York: Routledge.

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of Publication. “Article Title.” Journal Title volume, no. issue: page range.

Example : Garcia, Carlos. 2021. “The Role of Ethics in Anthropology.” American Anthropologist 123, no. 2: 237-251.

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of Publication. “Chapter Title.” In Book Title, edited by Editor’s Name, page range. Place of Publication: Publisher.

Example: Lee, Mary. 2018. “Feminism in Anthropology.” In The Oxford Handbook of Feminism, edited by Jane Smith, 51-69. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of Publication. “Page Title.” Website Title. URL (accessed day month year).

Example : Jones, David. 2020. “The Importance of Learning Languages.” Oxford Language Center. https://www.oxfordlanguagecenter.com/importance-of-learning-languages/ (accessed January 3, 2023).

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of Publication. “Title of Dissertation/Thesis.” PhD diss., University Name.

Example : Brown, Susan. 2022. “The Art of Storytelling in Anthropology.” PhD diss., University of California, Berkeley.

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of Publication. “Article Title.” Newspaper Title, Month Day.

Example : Robinson, Andrew. 2021. “New Developments in Anthropology Research.” The Guardian, September 15.

AIP (American Institute of Physics) Style

The American Institute of Physics (AIP) style is commonly used in physics research papers and journals. Here are the different reference formats in AIP style:

Example : Johnson, S. D. 2021. “Quantum Computing and Information.” Journal of Applied Physics 129, no. 4: 043102.

Example : Feynman, Richard. 2018. The Feynman Lectures on Physics. New York: Basic Books.

Example : Jones, David. 2020. “The Future of Quantum Computing.” In The Handbook of Physics, edited by John Smith, 125-136. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Conference proceedings citation

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of Publication. “Title of Paper.” Proceedings of Conference Name, date and location: page range. Place of Publication: Publisher.

Example : Chen, Wei. 2019. “The Applications of Nanotechnology in Solar Cells.” Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Nanotechnology, July 15-17, Tokyo, Japan: 224-229. New York: AIP Publishing.

Example : American Institute of Physics. 2022. “About AIP Publishing.” AIP Publishing. https://publishing.aip.org/about-aip-publishing/ (accessed January 3, 2023).

Patent citation

Author’s Last name, First name. Year of Publication. Patent Number.

Example : Smith, John. 2018. US Patent 9,873,644.

References Writing Guide

Here are some general guidelines for writing references:

• Follow the citation style guidelines: Different disciplines and journals may require different citation styles (e.g., APA, MLA, Chicago). It is important to follow the specific guidelines for the citation style required.
• Include all necessary information : Each citation should include enough information for readers to locate the source. For example, a journal article citation should include the author(s), title of the article, journal title, volume number, issue number, page numbers, and publication year.
• Use proper formatting: Citation styles typically have specific formatting requirements for different types of sources. Make sure to follow the proper formatting for each citation.
• Order citations alphabetically: If listing multiple sources, they should be listed alphabetically by the author’s last name.
• Be consistent: Use the same citation style throughout the entire paper or project.
• Check for accuracy: Double-check all citations to ensure accuracy, including correct spelling of author names and publication information.
• Use reputable sources: When selecting sources to cite, choose reputable and authoritative sources. Avoid sources that are biased or unreliable.
• Include all sources: Make sure to include all sources used in the research, including those that were not directly quoted but still informed the work.
• Use online tools : There are online tools available (e.g., citation generators) that can help with formatting and organizing references.

Purpose of References in Research

References in research serve several purposes:

• To give credit to the original authors or sources of information used in the research. It is important to acknowledge the work of others and avoid plagiarism.
• To provide evidence for the claims made in the research. References can support the arguments, hypotheses, or conclusions presented in the research by citing relevant studies, data, or theories.
• To allow readers to find and verify the sources used in the research. References provide the necessary information for readers to locate and access the sources cited in the research, which allows them to evaluate the quality and reliability of the information presented.
• To situate the research within the broader context of the field. References can show how the research builds on or contributes to the existing body of knowledge, and can help readers to identify gaps in the literature that the research seeks to address.

Importance of References in Research

References play an important role in research for several reasons:

• Credibility : By citing authoritative sources, references lend credibility to the research and its claims. They provide evidence that the research is based on a sound foundation of knowledge and has been carefully researched.
• Avoidance of Plagiarism : References help researchers avoid plagiarism by giving credit to the original authors or sources of information. This is important for ethical reasons and also to avoid legal repercussions.
• Reproducibility : References allow others to reproduce the research by providing detailed information on the sources used. This is important for verification of the research and for others to build on the work.
• Context : References provide context for the research by situating it within the broader body of knowledge in the field. They help researchers to understand where their work fits in and how it builds on or contributes to existing knowledge.
• Evaluation : References provide a means for others to evaluate the research by allowing them to assess the quality and reliability of the sources used.

Advantages of References in Research

There are several advantages of including references in research:

• Acknowledgment of Sources: Including references gives credit to the authors or sources of information used in the research. This is important to acknowledge the original work and avoid plagiarism.
• Evidence and Support : References can provide evidence to support the arguments, hypotheses, or conclusions presented in the research. This can add credibility and strength to the research.
• Reproducibility : References provide the necessary information for others to reproduce the research. This is important for the verification of the research and for others to build on the work.
• Context : References can help to situate the research within the broader body of knowledge in the field. This helps researchers to understand where their work fits in and how it builds on or contributes to existing knowledge.
• Evaluation : Including references allows others to evaluate the research by providing a means to assess the quality and reliability of the sources used.
• Ongoing Conversation: References allow researchers to engage in ongoing conversations and debates within their fields. They can show how the research builds on or contributes to the existing body of knowledge.

About the author

Muhammad Hassan

Researcher, Academic Writer, Web developer

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Referencing explained

Why and when to reference.

Referencing is an important part of academic work. It puts your work in context, demonstrates the breadth and depth of your research, and acknowledges other people’s work. You should reference whenever you use someone else’s idea.

View video using Microsoft Stream (link opens in a new window, available for University members only)

These webpages explain what referencing is, why it is important and give an overview of the main elements of how to reference. Our Referencing made simple tutorial opens in a new window and covers how to identify your source and create a reference with interactive examples.

Why reference?

Referencing correctly:

• helps you to avoid plagiarism by making it clear which ideas are your own and which are someone else’s
• shows your understanding of the topic
• gives supporting evidence for your ideas, arguments and opinions
• allows others to identify the sources you have used.

When to reference

Whenever you use an idea from someone else's work, for example from a journal article, textbook or website, you should cite the original author to make it clear where that idea came from. This is the case regardless of whether you have paraphrased, summarised or directly quoted their work. This is a key part of good practice in academic writing.

Read more on:

• academic integrity
• quoting, summarising, paraphrasing, and synthesising
• citing direct quotations in Leeds Harvard or citing direct quotations in Leeds Numeric styles.

University and school policies

The University referencing policy (PDF) sets out the referencing requirements that all taught students and tutors are expected to follow.

Each school in the University requires students to use a specific style of referencing. Check the referencing style used in your school before you begin.

All your citations and references should match the style you are using exactly, including any punctuation, capitalisation, italics and bold, and you should use the same referencing style throughout your assignment.

Referencing: What, Why and How

Referencing is one of the most common academic practices that students and researchers need to be familiar with.

Referencing is a basic skill required by everyone in academia.

When writing a research paper or an assignment your referencing skills shows your lecturers that you’ve understood the topic, used secondary research sources, and have academic integrity.

What is Referencing?

Referencing is a way to acknowledge the secondary research sources you have used in your assignment.

Referencing is used to describe the distinct sub-categories of citations and references.

Although the terms “citations” and “references” are related and are sometimes used interchangeably, they have distinct functions.

Citations are embedded within your document where you’ve used information sourced from other people and acknowledged it.

References describe the list at the end of your text that lists the full bibliographic detail of a source and allows the reader to locate the original source material.

Why is Referencing important?

The main purpose of referencing is to acknowledge the secondary research sources you have used in your assignment or coursework.

Referencing shows the contribution of other researchers and writers to your argument.

When you include consistent and detailed referencing in your coursework submissions it:

·         Demonstrates good academic conduct

·         Helps to avoid plagiarism

·         Serves as a fact-checking mechanism

·         Increased the quality of your work

·         Allows other researchers to build on your work

·         Provides a balanced argument and viewpoint

1. Good Academic Conduct

Referencing is mandatory for nearly all university assignments, whether it’s a literature review, poster presentation, essay, or research paper.

When you add references to your paper, you’re giving context to your work.

An academic paper with a lot of references will showcase how far and deep you went to gather your data.

Not only that but as previously mentioned, it lets you acknowledge other people’s efforts on similar topics, especially when you’re using some of their findings and ideas in your work.

2. To Avoid Plagiarism

It’s okay to include other people’s work in your paper, whether it’s a thought, idea, expression, or any original findings if you give them credit as a reference and cite them in your work.

However, if you were to take someone else’s work and include them in your assignment without referencing this is considered plagiarism. 

Plagiarism is never taken lightly and is considered a form of academic theft.

Many universities will take disciplinary against students who use others’ work and declare it as their own without acknowledging the original author in the references.

3. Serves as a Fact-Checking Tool

In addition to acknowledging other people’s contributions to your work, citations also serve as a major fact-checking tool for anyone reading or assessing your work.

Whether you’re using data from sheets, findings from research, or any form of evidence or facts, referencing the sources of your obtained data will help in adding credibility to your paper.

It will support your arguments, since they’re based on other peer-reviewed papers and findings.

4. Increases the Quality of Your Text

When you cite several sources of your work, it shows the breadth of your research and studies in whatever field you’re writing about.

In other words, it shows that you have “done your homework”.

Showing you have researched the information related to your research question, whether you’re supporting other people’s claims, comparing them to other works, or even contradicting them.

5. Help Fellow Researchers Build on Your Work

While working on your paper or research, you might have gone through many sources to fully understand, compare, and assess the information that you’ve used to base your findings.

However, after you publish your work, some researchers might use your own work as a source themselves.

By citing your sources and listing them in the references and bibliography section, you’ll help fellow researchers to follow your research.

If they want to expand, they can put an emphasis on a certain part of your work or consult the source directly.

6. To Showcase a Different Point of View

Just because you’re including a quote in your work, doesn’t necessarily mean that you agree with it.

In fact, a lot of people will cite and reference certain elements from other people’s work to showcase why they have a different point of view from the one presented in such a paper.

How to Reference

A complete reference includes both an in-text citation and a reference to the full bibliographic information on each secondary research source mentioned in your assignment.

There is a huge range of referencing formats and styles that you could use.

Your lecturer will advise you on which referencing style to use when preparing your assignment.

However, there are general rules which apply to most referencing styles.

You should reference when:

You quote, summarise, or paraphrase someone’s work

You use any charts, pictures, or diagrams that are owned by someone else

When you include any of these points in your assignment or writing you must include a citation directly next to the mention.

In most cases, the citation will include the author's surname and year of publication. There must also be a corresponding entry in the reference list.

The entry in the reference list contains the full bibliographic information on the source mentioned in your assignment writing.

Together the citation and entry in the reference list complete the referencing activity.

How you incorporate the ideas, information, and data from other authors in your assignment has a direct impact on your grades and performance.

Failure to cite and reference your sources appropriately will have a negative impact on your outcomes.

Whereas complete referencing will enhance your assignment. 

It is good academic practice to support your writing by referencing facts from statistical reports, studies, or research that agree with your views.

To further improve your assignment it’s interesting to include views that disagree with your position and create a balanced view of the published research on your subject area.

Through referencing you can create this balanced overview of the competing arguments relating to your research question and position your argument accordingly.

Referencing the other research in the field shows the foundations you are building on giving your assignment credibility and showing the scope of your research.

Introducing Harvard Referencing

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How Many References in a Research Paper?

Junior researchers frequently wonder how many references should be included in their research papers. The common response? “As many as you need.” What exactly does that mean? While we admit there are very few hard-set rules regarding this issue, in this article, we will try to provide more concrete guidelines that will help you assess whether you have enough references in your paper.

Before we do so, let us briefly explain why references matter and whether the number of references you include can project certain perceptions about the quality of your work. There is such a thing as having too many or too few.

Why are research paper references and citations necessary?

References show that you have carefully reviewed the relevant literature and are now contributing something  novel  to the academic community. You establish authority and credibility when you can critically assess other literature and distinguish your findings from previous works (if any exist). We emphasize “critically assess” in the last sentence because references are only as good as you apply them to your research. Therefore, the famous adage “quality over quantity” is the key to deciding how many references are sufficient.

Likewise, citing your references within the research paper itself (in the form of academic citations ) is crucial in any academic work that makes assertations based on external studies. Failing to cite your sources can result in plagiarism, which even if accidental can still have some devastating consequences for academic researchers hoping to publish their work or finish graduate school.

Number of Sources Used Can Impact Perceptions of Quality

We would be remiss if we didn’t tell you that being at either extreme (having too few or too many references) can reflect poorly on your intellectual aptitude and your study’s validity. Here’s why:

• If you don’t have enough references, particularly on a topic familiar to a wide audience, readers may think that you haven’t done enough research into existing literature. Surely someone else has thought about related topics or used similar techniques. If you’re sloppy in conducting your diligence, readers will wonder whether your paper is worth reading. What’s novel and valuable about your paper? Were you just as sloppy with conducting your study? The answers to these questions need to be evident.
• Additionally, readers might be concerned that you may have plagiarized by failing to properly cite information. Unless you’re John Nash, who cited only two texts in his seminal  26-page PhD thesis  (one of which was to his prior work), ensure that you’ve properly researched the relevant papers and included appropriate citations! Especially, make sure that you have found, read, and included all the latest publications on your topic before finalizing and submitting your own paper—if the drafting process took some time, new literature might have come out in the meantime, and you don’t want to give the editor the impression that you are not on top of the newest developments.
• If you have too many references, readers may wonder if you did any original research at all. Unless you’re writing a literature review, your paper’s primary focus should be on your investigation and findings. Don’t bury your hard work under strings of citations and discussion regarding other works. Show your readers what you’ve discovered and how the new information you present fits into or departs from the academic community’s current understanding of your topic.

Additionally, let us highlight the difference between the number of references versus citations. References are the source materials; therefore, each reference should be listed only once in your references section. Citations are meant to identify the source of the information you use in your paper. You can cite a reference multiple times. Therefore, the number of citations you have is typically larger than the number of references an average paper includes. The opposite situation should never happen!

Key Factors Influencing the Number of References You Use

The following are some of the many factors that may influence the number of references you use:

• The number of references required for a paper will depend largely on your work’s purpose . For example, literature and systematic reviews are surveys of existing studies. Therefore, their reference lists will be more exhaustive than those of research papers whose primary focus is the current authors’ findings. Indeed, if you examine many journals’ author guidelines , you’ll note that journals have a higher maximum reference limit for review articles than original research papers.
• The length of your reference list will also depend on your research paper’s subject matter . For example, if you are writing about a field that is less studied (such as a subfield of neuroparasitology) you may discover that there aren’t many papers to cite. Similarly, newer fields will have fewer published papers that can be referenced. If you find yourself in this situation, review the references used by relevant current literature and see if you can expand your research, and thus your reference list, with valuable content from there.
• Another factor will be your  institution or journal’s requirements . If you are preparing a dissertation or thesis, double-check your department’s requirements. While rare, they may have specific limits. More commonly, journals restrict the number of references due to printing constraints.
• It may happen that you don’t have  access to certain literature  that could have served as a reference. In such a situation, you may wish to look for an institution that may be able to provide you access to that literature for the purposes of reviewing the content or contact one of the authors directly and ask for a copy.
• Given that more papers are being published than ever before in most fields, it is likely that reference lists will grow longer simply because there are more data and discussions of existing data available to cite . Keep track of changes to the size of reference lists in publications related to your field.
• Finally, a paper’s length bears some correlation to the number of references.

So how many references should be included?

Below, we provide tips on how to decide if you have enough resources. We also provide some general reminders on how to effectively use references. After all, references are meant to enhance your paper while still maintaining your research as the focal point.

Use academic journals as a guide

• One way to gauge how many references you should have is to survey academic journals for your article type in your field. Review their author guidelines for limits on the number of references for your article type, and make sure your reference list complies with those journal restrictions.
• Read recent articles relevant to your topic; check how many references other authors have included in their papers for the same article type as yours, and how frequently those works were cited per page.
• Keep in mind that the above methods will give you an estimate of how many references you should include overall but will not tell you how many citations you’ll need per page. The latter is impossible to state simply because certain sections may have no citations at all (the results section , for example).

Statistics regarding the number of references and citations

To give you a general idea, the following are some estimates from a couple of studies that examined the citation characteristics of articles published in various disciplines.

According to  Milojević’s study  encompassing research in the fields of astronomy, mathematics, robotics, ecology, and economics, the highest and average number of references per article page were as follows:

• Ecology: highest, ~58; average reference per page, 6;
• Math and robotics: highest, ~28; average reference per page, <1; and
• Economics: highest, ~ 32; average reference per page, >1 but <2.

The above findings were based on data compiled from the first 20 years of the author’s research. Since then some fields have increased the number of references. Thus, make sure to examine your target journal’s most recent and relevant publications for a better idea of how many references to include based on the specific type of article you plan to write.

In another study by Falagas et al. (2013),  medical journals averaged  29 references for articles that were 7.88 pages long (as printed in journals).

Finally, although the sample size was small (63 journals), Gali Halevi observed the following citation trends of a broader range of disciplines.

• The average number of references per article was the highest for the social sciences, physics, and astronomy, and arts & humanities (roughly 54 references per article).
• On the other hand, health professions and earth and planetary sciences had the fewest references per article at an average of 8 and 17 references, respectively.
• Math and engineering averaged at roughly 29 references per article.
• Biochemistry, genetics and molecular and other biological sciences averaged at 51.
• Hard and natural sciences more frequently cited recent literature while social sciences and math were likely to include older sources.

Note that the Halevi study is limited in size, fails to factor in article type and does little to account for variances across different fields and journals. For example, it is possible that more review articles could have been reviewed for certain fields than others. With that said, we provide the above information to provide a rough estimate.

At the end of the day, please keep in mind the requirements of your institution or target journal and the general trends for your specific article type (by examining the most recent relevant publications).

For additional information regarding journal restrictions on the number of references, read this article on ways to grow your publication list .

Some Dos and Don’ts for Reference Citation

• Don’t repeat references within a reference list.
• Don’t repeatedly cite yourself. Make sure to balance your discussion with external literature citations.
• Be careful about citing old references. The rule of thumb is to go back at most five to six years. Exceptions to this rule should be reserved for “seminal” works relevant to explaining what prompted your research. Roughly 85% of all cited works should be less than five years old.
• Be careful not to cite several references in one place  without  discussing the relevance of each work to your research. In other words, don’t say, “We referred to previous studies in this field (1-7)” unless you later explain how each of reference #s 1-7 apply to your discussion.
• Confirm the quality of the work you cite. Are there any ethical issues regarding the paper that would disqualify it as a good source? Do your references come from reputable sources such as respected journals rather than random blogs and website links? Remember that your analysis is only as good as the verifiable information you use to conduct your research.
• One of the main purposes of citing existing literature is to show the “knowledge gap” regarding your topic. Therefore, make sure the works you reference naturally lead readers to wonder about the research question you address in your paper. To explain further, think about your favorite fictional story. A successfully written story only reveals the background information needed for the reader to follow along in the story. You’ll rarely see an author waste time writing about how the main character stubbed his toe one day while going to work unless that event relates to an important aspect of the story. Similarly, the references you cite should support the story building you create in your research paper.
• Don’t completely ignore the paper that could disprove your hypothesis. You want to show objectivity and that you took a balanced and unbiased approach to conducting your research. Mention the potentially conflicting evidence and explain why you believe it is flawed or inapplicable to your research.
• In qualitative research papers, you may have fewer references.
• Anything you cite in your paper should be listed in the references section (or reference list). Anything listed as a reference should have been quoted or paraphrased in the text. If either rule is violated, something is wrong.
• Finally, remember that a paper will typically have more citations in the Introduction section and Discussion section than in other parts.

Wordvice Academic Resources

If you need help with paraphrasing text from the sources you cite to avoid plagiarism, with different citation styles , or with finding the perfect journal to submit your paper to, then have a look at our collection of articles on the Wordvice academic resources website . We also recommend our professional English editing and proofreading services , including paper editing and academic editing services to ensure that your writing is free of errors before submitting your manuscript to a journal.

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Citing Sources: What are citations and why should I use them?

What is a citation.

Citations are a way of giving credit when certain material in your work came from another source. It also gives your readers the information necessary to find that source again-- it provides an important roadmap to your research process. Whenever you use sources such as books, journals or websites in your research, you must give credit to the original author by citing the source. 

Why do researchers cite?

Scholarship is a conversation  and scholars use citations not only to  give credit  to original creators and thinkers, but also to  add strength and authority  to their own work.  By citing their sources, scholars are  placing their work in a specific context  to show where they “fit” within the larger conversation.  Citations are also a great way to  leave a trail  intended to help others who may want to explore the conversation or use the sources in their own work.

In short, citations

(1) give credit

(2) add strength and authority to your work

(3) place your work in a specific context

(4) leave a trail for other scholars

"Good citations should reveal your sources, not conceal them. They should honeslty reflect the research you conducted." (Lipson 4)

Lipson, Charles. "Why Cite?"  Cite Right: A Quick Guide to Citation Styles--MLA, APA, Chicago, the Sciences, Professions, and More . Chicago: U of Chicago, 2006. Print.

What does a citation look like?

Different subject disciplines call for citation information to be written in very specific order, capitalization, and punctuation. There are therefore many different style formats. Three popular citation formats are MLA Style (for humanities articles) and APA or Chicago (for social sciences articles).

MLA style (print journal article):  

Whisenant, Warren A. "How Women Have Fared as Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Since the Passage of Title IX." Sex Roles Vol. 49.3 (2003): 179-182.

APA style (print journal article):

Whisenant, W. A. (2003) How Women Have Fared as Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Since the Passage of Title IX. Sex Roles , 49 (3), 179-182.

Chicago style (print journal article):

Whisenant, Warren A. "How Women Have Fared as Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Since the Passage of Title IX." Sex Roles 49, no. 3 (2003): 179-182.

No matter which style you use, all citations require the same basic information:

• Author or Creator
• Container (e.g., Journal or magazine, website, edited book)
• Date of creation or publication
• Publisher 

You are most likely to have easy access to all of your citation information when you find it in the first place. Take note of this information up front, and it will be much easier to cite it effectively later.

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• Next: When should I use a citation? >>
• Last Updated: Oct 24, 2023 3:46 PM
• URL: https://guides.lib.uw.edu/research/citations

Introduction to referencing

Why reference .

Referencing is an essential part of academic writing. As a student or researcher, you are part of a scholarly community, and it’s important to articulate which ideas in your work belong to you and which belong to researchers that have gone before you.   

Clearly acknowledging where ideas come from establishes credibility.

• If you are writing an assessment, your tutors will be able to see some of the research you have undertaken and how it’s contributed to your thinking and understanding of a topic.
• If you are writing a research paper, it quickly helps the reader to find your sources and evaluate for themselves the validity of the research you’re using and whether you’ve used it appropriately. 

Accurate referencing also ensures academic integrity. By providing references consistently in your writing, you: 

• are being honest and transparent
• avoid academic dishonesty, which can result in penalties.

Learn more about academic integrity here .

When to reference

You should provide source information:

• when you quote (use words verbatim), paraphrase, or summarise (write in your own words) another person’s ideas or arguments
• when you use or interpret facts, information, or statistics (including diagrams, datasets, images, video, or audio) in your work or to support your claims
• when you interpret or draw original conclusions from well-known facts
• when an idea or fact is too subject-specific for a general audience

You don’t need to provide source information:

• for information that is common knowledge (i.e. information that people agree about and which is available in a range of reliable sources)
• when you are presenting your own ideas or opinions, unless they have been published elsewhere.

The safest rule is: when in doubt, provide a reference!

Tip: Check with the style you’re using how to pinpoint the exact part of a particular source you’re referencing. It’s important to be clear whether you’re referring to a source in its entirety or a particular page, paragraph, section, table etc.

How to reference 

Referencing generally has two key elements:

• an in-text marker (often referred to as an in-text citation) attributing a particular quotation, paraphrase or idea to someone else
• Author: Who created the work?
• Date: When was the work published? 
• Title: What is the work called?
• Retrieval information: Where can I find the work?

The way you are required to write the in-text citation and the reference list is determined by the reference system and style you use.

Reference systems and styles 

There are two common systems for referencing:

Note systems involve the use of sequential numbers as in-text markers that refer to either:

• footnotes included at the end of each page
• endnotes provided on a separate page at the end of a paper (not to be confused with EndNote, a reference management system ).

Styles that use note systems: Vancouver, Royal Society of Chemistry, and Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).

Parenthetical systems involve the use of a partial reference in parenthesis as in-text markers (such as the author-date). The complete reference is then included in a bibliography or reference list on the last page of the document.

Styles that use parenthetical systems: American Psychological Association (APA), Harvard, and Modern Language Association (MLA).

Choose a system or style

For assignments, check with your lecturer if your faculty has a preferred style.  

If you are a researcher, you may need to follow the style of the publication you are writing for, or select a style more commonly used in your field.

Be consistent

Always be consistent when using a particular referencing system and citation style, as you can't mix formats within the same document.  

Where to learn more about a style

Reference list or bibliography

For assignments, check your assignment outline or ask your lecturer if they expect a reference list or a bibliography, otherwise check with the publications you are writing for:

• A reference list contains only the sources you refer to in your writing. 
• A bibliography includes everything you have read on a particular topic, whether you refer to it in your writing or not.  

Referencing Indigenous knowledge

For guidance about citing Indigenous knowledge, consult the Indigenous Referencing Guidance for Indigenous Knowledges .

The publication first helps you to consider if you have chosen appropriate sources, including Indigenous authored and / or those preferencing first-person experiences.  It then provides advice about how to incorporate the author’s Nation, Country or Language Group.

Referencing ChatGPT

For advice about referencing AI sources like ChatGPT, see the University of Sydney Canvas resource Acknowledging & referencing the use of AI .

Reference management tools

We recommend the use of reference management tools when you are working with large numbers of references and associated files. Find out more about their recommended use and limitations.

Academic referencing support service charter

The Library provides advice and support on how to approach referencing using the published styles commonly used by the University. Read our charter here .

Related information

We're here to help, online or in person.

Research Methodology and Scientific Writing pp 361–400 Cite as

References: How to Cite and List Correctly

• C. George Thomas 2  
• First Online: 25 February 2021

4243 Accesses

When we write an essay, research paper, thesis, or book, it is normal to include information from the work of others or support our arguments by reference to other published works. All such academic documents draw heavily on the ideas and findings of previous and current researchers available through various sources such as books, journals, theses, newspapers, magazines, government reports, or Internet sources. In all these cases, proper referencing is essential in order to ensure easy retrieval of information. Referencing is the name given to the method of showing and acknowledging the sources from which the author has obtained ideas or information.

Everything deep is also simple and can be reproduced simply as long as its reference to the whole truth is maintained. But what matters is not what is witty but what is true. Albert Schweitzer (1875–1965)

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How to Write References in Research Papers: Navigating the Maze (Part 2)

You truly are navigating a maze when it comes to ci tations and the question of how to write references in research pa per s. In part 1 of this article, we touched upon citations, which are pointers embedded in the text of a research paper, to sources of information or to other research relevant to that being described in the research paper. Those pointers lead to references in research papers , which typically appear at the end of the text. Whereas citations merely point us to sources in research papers, references describe those sources in sufficient detail for readers (1) to know the title of each source, who is responsible for its content, and when it was published; (2) to look up those sources; and (3) to obtain the documents in question if required.  

Table of Contents

Types of references in research papers

In writing a research paper, a researcher draws upon many sources of information, knowledge, opinions, and so on. One of the the most common type s of reference s  in research papers is other research papers published in journals; other common sources include technical reports, handbooks, presentations at conferences, and books. Increasingly, the sources in research papers are digital and include web pages, databases, blog posts, and even tweets and emails.  

Not all sources are considered equally credible , and some may not be accessible to all because they are behind paywalls or available only to members of a network (company intranets, for example) or because they are personal exchanges.  

How to write references in research papers

If the citations follow the Harvard system, references in a research paper s are sorted alphabetically by the last name of the first author; if the citations follow the Vancouver system, the references are arranged by numbers: the reference corresponding to the first numbered citation is numbered 1, and so on. If a source is cited again, its allocated number does not change.  

Some additional conventions govern the alphabetic sorting of references in research papers . For instance, when authors have some papers in which they are the only author and others in which they have one or more co-authors or when the same author or authors have papers published in different years or even within the same year.  

Some publishers make even greater demands of references in research papers : authors are expected to sort the list of references alphabetically, as in the Harvard system; then number the sorted list serially; and then renumber all the citations within the text so that each corresponds to its new number!  

How to add references in a research paper: Key elements

For a source of information to be described accurately, some minimum details are required. Here’s one example of w rit ing references in research paper s – ‘ Nature 171 : 737’ is a code that, if you know how to decipher it, tells you that it means an article published in Nature (a weekly journal published from the UK) that begins on page 737 of volume 171 of that journal. However, it does not tell you what the article was about, who wrote it, when it was published, or even how long it is. A complete reference in research paper s (Fig. 1), however, tells you that the title of the article was ‘Molecular structure of nucleic acids: a structure for deoxyribose nucleic acid’, that it was written by J. D. Watson and F. H. C. Crick, that it was published in 1953, and that it ran to no more than two pages.  

When thinking about how to write research references , remember that the elements that make up a reference to an article published in a journal are different from those that make up a reference to a book (edition if not the first, the publisher, and the place of publication, although the last is no longer considered essential in today’s globalized publishing). The elements that make up a reference to a technical report include the name of the organization issuing that report and the report number, if any, and that to a conference presentation gives the title of the conference, the date(s) on which it was held and the place, the name of the organizer(s) of the conference, and so on.  

Note that journals or publishers differ in the elements they expect authors to include when they state how to put references in research papers ; for example, some journals give only minimal information and exclude the titles of articles and some use the ‘elided’ form of page numbers (737–38 instead of 737–738, for example).  

Then there is the question of abbreviated names of journals: some publishers abbreviate journal titles and some don’t ( Annals of Applied Biology or Ann. Appl. Biol.). And those who do, often disagree on the correct abbreviation—and on whether the abbreviations should end in dots (whether the word ‘Journal’ should be given as J. or J or Jnl or Jnl.).  

Sequence of the elements that make up reference s in research papers  

Publishers and journals also differ in the order or sequence in which they present the elements or components of reference s in research papers : usually, British and European publishers put the year of publication after the names of authors whereas US publishers move the year closer to the volume number of the journal.  

Even within an element, the sequence of references in research paper s can have subtle differences. In Harvard system, because the last name of the first author is using for sorting, the name is ‘inverted’, that is the last name is given first, followed by initials (Watson J D instead of J D Watson). However, some journals invert the names of all the authors whereas some invert the name of only the first author. In Vancouver system, the names are seldom inverted because the sequence is not alphabetical.  

Punctuation to separate the elements that make up references in research papers

The many exasperating details that go into formatting references include punctuation marks (or their absence). In giving the initials of authors, some journals use dots, some journals use space, some use both, and some use neither (Watson J.D. or Watson J D or Watson J. D. or Watson JD). Some use a comma between the last name and the initials whereas some reserve the comma only to separate one name from the next (Watson, J D and Crick, F H C or Watson J D, Crick F H C). Some use ‘and’ some don’t, even when there are only two authors, and some use ‘&’ instead which makes it even more confusing for those struggling with how to write references in a research paper.

When the place of publication was a required element in the case of books, some publishers used the colon and some used the comma (and also changed the order, as in New York: Harper & Row or Harper & Row, New York). Some publishers end each reference with a full stop (period) and some don’t.

Typography of references in research papers  

As if the variations mentioned above were not enough, when figuring out how to add references in a research paper , you also have to contend with the differences in typography as well: journal titles in italics or in normal type, volume numbers in bold or in normal type, hyphens or en dashes between page numbers (737-738 or 737–738), and so on.  

All is not lost, however, if you despair of ever getting the references in a research paper right. For example, some publishers now insist on correct formatting only after a paper has been accepted for publication. Also, ICMJE, the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, recommends a set of uniform requirements for manuscripts (the requirements include the formatting of citations and references), and hundreds of medical journals ( www.icmje.org/journals-following-the-icmje-recommendations/ ) have agreed that as long as authors adhere to those recommendations on how to mention references for research papers , any changes to the formatting any journal wants to make will be made by the journal in question.  

Lastly, several software packages help authors to automate this mundane task of consistent formatting of references in research paper s—but that is another article and another day.  

The details involved in using citations and references correctly can be overwhelming for some of us. While this article covers the key tips to help you understand how to give reference s in research paper s , be sure to check out article 1 of this two-part series for more on what, when and how to cite in a research paper. One way to check whether these are handled correctly in your manuscript is to use Researcher.Life’s AI powered manuscript optimizer , which can flag any discrepancies, departures from standard style, and mismatches between citations and references in research paper s.  

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How, and Why, to Use References

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Baratta, A., (2022). Academic Writing: How, and Why, to Use References. In SAGE Skills: Student Success . SAGE Publications, Inc., [https:// doi. org/10.4135/9781071883464]

Baratta, Alex. "Academic Writing: How, and Why, to Use References." In SAGE Skills: Student Success . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, Inc., 2022, [https:// doi. org/10.4135/9781071883464].

Baratta, A., 2022. Academic Writing: How, and Why, to Use References in SAGE Skills: Student Success. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, Inc. Available at: doi. org/10.4135/9781071883464]>[Accessed 25 Mar 2024]

Baratta, Alex. "Academic Writing: How, and Why, to Use References." SAGE Skills: Student Success . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, Inc., 25 Mar 2024, doi:[https:// doi. org/10.4135/9781071883464].

Baratta, Alex, (2022). Academic Writing: How, and Why, to Use References. In SAGE Skills: Student Success . SAGE Publications, Inc., [https:// doi. org/10.4135/9781071883464]

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• The Many Purposes of Referencing
• How to Reference
• Making References Work for You
• By: Alex Baratta
• Module: Academic Writing
• Skill: How, and Why, to Use References
• Publisher: SAGE Publications, Inc.
• Publication year: 2022
• Online pub date: April 13, 2022
• Discipline: Referencing
• DOI: https:// doi. org/10.4135/9781071883464
• Keywords: attitudes , essays , films , journal articles , language , publications , sentencing , teaching , world Englishes Show all Show less
• Online ISBN: 9781071883464 Copyright: © SAGE Publications, Inc. 2022 More information Less information

Using references for your assessments, notably essays, is an important skill at university, and there are three aspects to consider: WHAT, WHY, and HOW.

Mostly, the sources you will use to find information will come from books, book chapters, and journal articles. However, you can also obtain useful information from additional sources, such as websites, official reports, newspapers, TV interviews, and even blogs. The sources you use will depend in part on the discipline you’re writing for, so ask your teacher if in doubt. But in the main, just seek out the books, book chapters, and journal articles that are relevant for your assessment, read them, and then decide which aspects, if any, you wish to refer to in your essay. Don’t be afraid, though, to seek out additional sources that might work well also. For example, if you’re studying linguistics and you’re writing about the language of teenagers, accessing online blogs to obtain samples of authentic “teen speak” would make a solid accompaniment to the more academic sources such as a journal article on the subject. Likewise, if you’re researching current policy on adoption, then accessing an official government report on the subject, as well as books and journal articles, would add depth.

We refer to the work of others, regardless of the source, to provide support for our own views; define concepts and theories; set up our own arguments; and provide an overview of information on a given topic. Each of these “whys” will be illustrated in turn within this Skill.

Finally, in terms of how to use quotes to maximum effect, this Skill will discuss one of four strategies you can use once you’ve chosen your quotations: agree, disagree, illustrate, and explain.

Upon completion of this Skill, you should be able to:

• Identify the various reasons for choosing quotations and references to literature in the first place
• Employ quotations to make them work for you, as a means to demonstrate your critical understanding of them
• Use paraphrase effectively, in order to present your own take on someone else’s text and avoid plagiarism at the same time
• Interpret the gist of someone else’s text as part of a summary

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What, why, when and how

What is referencing.

Showing what sources you have used and giving credit to the original authors in your assessment is called referencing or citing. Every source of information or idea that is not your own must be credited twice:

• once in the body of your work
• and in a reference list at the end of the document.

Why is referencing important?

All academic work is part of a greater body of knowledge. Showing where your work fits into this is an important part of academic practice at university. Referencing is important because it:

• allows the reader to locate the books, chapters or articles you have referred to
• provides evidence to support your argument
• protects you against charges of plagiarism
• shows that you have read widely
• distinguishes your own ideas from others.

When to reference

You should reference:

• direct quotes - the words of other people that you use in your writing
• paraphrasing - the writing of other people that you change into your own words
• other people's ideas
• images that you didn't create yourself.

You don't need to reference:

• common knowledge
• your own thoughts or opinions.

How to reference

For most subjects you will be told which referencing style to use - check the subject guide or ask the teaching staff. Depending on the style you are using, there are two ways to acknowledge sources within your writing:

• At La Trobe APA and Harvard referencing styles use in-text citations
• At La Trobe AGLC and Oxford referencing styles use footnotes

If you are using in-text citations there are two ways you can include the author's surname and the year:

• Put them in brackets at the end a sentence like this (Malik, 2020).
• Or you can choose to mention Malik (2020) as the author within your text. In that case include the year directly after the author's name. 

Whatever style you use you will have a reference list at the end of your document that includes detailed information for all the sources that you used in your writing. 

Academic Referencing Tool

La Trobe Library's  Academic Referencing Tool  is your key to referencing success. Follow the links to see examples and explanations for referencing a wide variety of sources.

This video introduces you to the Academic Referencing Tool. (Duration: 2:03) 

• The Academic Referencing Tool transcript

Example assignment

For a sample assignment with annotations explaining referencing principles, see the Word and PDF documents below.

• Example assignment - referencing [Word 76KB]
• Example assignment - referencing [PDF 246KB]

Librarian Link

Still have questions do you want to talk to an expert librarians  are available., further resources.

Another section of Achieve@Uni has information about Using sources in your writing .

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• Next: Managing your references >>

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Why reference?

Referencing is an important academic skill as it shows the reader of your work the sources you have used to research your topic, and gives support and weight to your arguments and conclusions. When writing an essay or thesis, referring to the sources you have used is an academic requirement. There are four good reasons for referencing;

•  To allow a reader of your work to find and check the sources you have used.
•  So that you can come back to your own work and know where you found a particular quotation or piece of information.
•  To avoid accusations of plagiarism.
•  To make you think twice about using outdated and inaccurate books, articles, or websites.

As a general rule you should not put your trust in any resource which does not give references.

Cite Them Right

The University has adopted the  Cite Them Right  style of referencing. According to the co-authors, Graham Shields and Richard Pears (2023):

"Referencing is the process of acknowledging other people’s work when you have used it in your assignment or research. It allows the reader to locate your source material as quickly and easily as possible so that they can read these sources themselves and verify the validity of your arguments. Referencing provides the link between what you write and the evidence on which it is based.  You identify the sources that you have used by citing them in the text of your assignment (called citations or in-text citations) and referencing them at the end of your assignment (called the reference list or end-text citations). The reference list only includes the sources cited in your text. It is not the same thing as a bibliography, which uses the same referencing style, but also includes all material, for example background readings, used in the preparation of your work." . Pears, R. and Shields, G. (2023) 'What is referencing?', in Cite them right online . DOI: 10.5040/9781350928060.3.

"Cite them right online" has an excellent Tutorial which you can sign up to as a member of the University.  This will cover all the main areas of referencing and give you a thorough grounding in the reasons for, and academic context of, referencing practice.  It is highly recommended, especially if you are newer to referencing or returning to studies.

Referencing software

Please see our Referencing Software pages for details of referencing software options.

Plagiarism is the act of using or copying someone else's work and pretending that you thought of it or created it. In order to avoid suspicion of plagiarism it is important to make appropriate use of references.

If you are in doubt about what plagiarism is and how to avoid it you should consult your tutor and read the University's  code of practice  on plagiarism, or you can look at our more detailed pages on  plagiarism .

At present copyright law allows only small extracts of items to be copied legally provided that they are referenced properly. Only copy what is completely necessary, and only when the use falls into one or more of the following categories:

•     personal private study
•     non-commercial research
•     criticism and review
•     illustration for instruction
•     parody pastiche or caricature
•     quotation

Students’ use will fall under personal private study, criticism and review, illustration, and/or quotation. For further information, see our extensive  copyright guidance .

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The art of referencing: Well begun is half done!

Department of Pediatrics, College of Medicine and Health Sciences, National University of Science and Technology, Sohar, Sultanate of Oman

Department of Pediatrics, Seth G.S. Medical College and K.E.M. Hospital, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India

Introduction

The value of scientific research lies in its wide visibility and access/availability to others; this is generally achieved by a scientific publication as an original (research) paper. The scientific inquiry typically advances based on previously laid ideas/research, making it essential to acknowledge the contribution of the previous authors. The references list is a catalog of literature sources chosen by the researcher to represent the most relevant documents pertaining to his/her study.[ 1 ] The British Standards Institution defines reference as “a set of data describing a document, sufficiently precise and detailed to identify it and enable it to be located.” [ 2 ] References lay the foundation of the paper, providing context for the hypothesis, methodology, interpretation, and justification of the study.[ 3 ] Using other's ideas/thoughts without due credit amounts to plagiarism, compromising the academic integrity of research. A well-referenced paper is thus accurate and complete, adds value and credibility to both the researcher and the source author, and enhances the scientific prestige of the chosen journal.[ 3 ] A bibliography also lists the sources used during research. However, while references only include those sources (journals, books, web information, etc.) which are actually cited in the publication, bibliography comprises all accessed sources (works consulted), irrespective of whether they are cited in the study publication or not.[ 4 ] Thus, referencing in academic writing is an important research tool to display as well as integrate knowledge on a particular subject or topic.[ 5 ]

Importance of Proper Referencing

Scientific research is usually developed on previously established ideas/scientific knowledge. A meticulous literature review at the beginning of the study enables the researcher to identify the work done in the field, identify the gaps in knowledge, and recognize the need for further research.[ 6 ] The most relevant sources from this literature search (essentially) form the list of references. Use of proper referencing is thus beneficial in many ways, such as the following:

• a) It helps the readers to identify and locate the sources used in the research and provides evidence to verify the need/rationale of the study, methodology, inferences, and implications of the study.[ 3 ]
• b) It provides an overview of the techniques/tools used, supports/convinces the reader about the appropriateness of the methodology, and offers a proper perspective in which the research findings need to be interpreted.[ 3 , 7 ]
• c) It is a proof of the author's in-depth reading and knowledge on the subject pertaining to his/her research. References not only highlight similarities in research, but also differentiate the author's ideas from his sources, indirectly acknowledging the author's own contribution to that topic.[ 4 ]
• d) References chosen by a researcher not only credit the individual author/s whose work is cited, but also demonstrate his/her appreciation toward cited authors, at times leading readers toward hitherto lesser-known/unknown author's research.[ 4 , 8 ] By providing acknowledgment to the cited idea/thought, the author also avoids being accused of plagiarism and adds credibility to his/her own work.[ 4 ]
• e) Referenced works steer the readers toward literature pertaining to a particular topic, thus advancing the readers’ interest.[ 4 ] It also allows to trace the origins of ideas and integrates newer ideas (from current research) with previous ones, thus building a web of learning about the topic of interest.[ 9 ]
• f) The reference list provides a list of experts in a specific field, thus helping editors to identify appropriate reviewers.[ 3 ]
• g) It provides peer reviewers with related sources of information to evaluate the manuscript with respect to the cited work.[ 6 ]

Organizing the References

An initial extensive literature search helps in identifying the appropriate research question, drafting the study protocol, supervising ongoing research, analyzing the results, and writing the paper.[ 3 , 7 ] Although references are displayed at the end of the article/after the text of the article, they should not be actually written after completing the text of the manuscript. While drafting the text of the manuscript, the author/s should type the references on a separate MS Word document simultaneously. This preparation allows the writer to choose adequate number of relevant and rational references, avoid bias in his/her research/writing, and limit the reference number as per the target journal for publication.[ 7 ] While citing, it is imperative not to cite broadly, but to do so with respect to the content of the article. Articles which define the topic, lay down background information regarding the study question, give current knowledge about the research, and describe previous studies on a similar study question should be mentioned in the “Introduction” section of the manuscript.[ 10 ] These studies enable to identify existing knowledge, gaps in knowledge, and justify the rationale of the study.[ 6 ] Studies which identify or refer to the method, protocols, or standards (whether new or previously published), elaborate on complex or lesser-known statistical analysis, describe diagnostic criteria, rationalize sample size estimation, or justify use of specific study design/method are best suited as references to the “Methods” section of the manuscript – they help to plan a strong and supported methodology and describe the technique and criteria of the study group.[ 3 , 10 ] Research that reflects on the study findings/results or provides supportive explanation merit mention in the “Discussion” section of the manuscript – they provide information to interpret the study based on existing published data, compare results with those of other studies, and rationalize the implications of the results.[ 10 ]

Though citation analysis treats all references equally, it is important to weigh references in terms of their value to the paper.[ 11 ] While some references are worthy to be mentioned only once in the paper, some are very relevant to the study question and referred to on multiple occasions, and it is important to re-cite only the most relevant articles.[ 3 ] Referencing is not just about stating the publication source (providing relatedness), but also adds value to the paper in terms of representation on the subject and connectivity between knowledge sources (capture the “aboutness”).[ 11 ] References can be books (author/s), legal documents, journal articles, newspaper articles, reports (e.g., official reports from government departments), university working papers, papers presented at conferences, internet sources (including weblogs – blogs and email correspondence), DVD/CD databases, radio/television/videos/audio cassette/CD-ROMs, interview transcripts, and illustrations.[ 12 ]

Choosing Appropriate References

As a rule, whenever one uses an idea, data, diagrams, tables, concepts, methods from a previously published work, it should be cited.[ 12 ] With availability of multiple search engines and abundance of online resources, the task of filtering references may seem daunting.[ 5 ] While choosing references, one should ensure that the original source is completely read and correctly interpreted before its citing.[ 6 ] It is preferable to provide direct references to original article sources as far as possible, choosing a landmark article on the topic.[ 5 ] The choice of references should serve as the most relevant, appropriate, and valuable addition, and one should stick to the most pertinent references that actively support/contradict their conclusions or experience.[ 6 ] It is preferable to use the most recent relevant resources to provide the latest and up-to-date information; however, certain landmark papers may also be cited (even if they are old). Note that very old references may not be available/accessible to reviewers as well as readers.[ 7 ] Often, there are multiple sources for the same information; always prefer references that provide the highest level of evidence (such as meta-analysis), most recent publications, or trustworthy sources such as reputed peer-reviewed journals (with higher impact factor), open access and preferably indexed on reputed databases such as MEDLINE and PubMed.[ 13 , 14 ] Citing works from the journal one wishes to submit demonstrates that author follows that particular journal's publications and values it; however, one should refrain from unethical practices such as coercive citation (when authors are coerced/directed to add irrelevant citations from the editor's journals) or padded citation (when authors pad their reference list with superfluous citations).[ 14 , 15 , 16 ] There should be a judicious combination of original as well as review articles. Review articles summarize a large body of literature and reduce the number of references; however they may be biased and may not reflect the original article accurately.[ 16 ] One should stick to the journal guidelines rigorously (in terms of style and number) to avoid rejection or delay in the processing of the manuscript.[ 6 ] Avoid citing conference abstracts as far as possible, as they provide incomplete or limited information on the subject and often lack an appropriate peer review.[ 16 ] Other sources which lack traditional review and thus may cite inappropriate, unchecked, or promotional content include online sources, such as audio and video presentations, and should therefore be used with caution.[ 17 ] It is also prudent to avoid personal communications and limit their use to situations where essential information is unavailable from a public source (if permission is necessary, then name and date of the communication should be cited in brackets in text).[ 16 ] Limit self-citations to the bare crucial ones that are necessary.[ 18 ] Articles accepted but awaiting publications should be cited as “in press.”[ 16 ] Articles submitted but not yet published should be referenced as “unpublished observations” with written permission from the source; however, since they have not undergone a peer review, they should be (preferably) avoided.[ 16 ] It is prudent to avoid citing articles published in predatory journals.[ 16 ]

There is no need to provide references to facts that are expected to be well known to the journal readers, including historical overviews, own experiences, while outlining previously referenced ideas in conclusions, or while summarizing what is regarded as “common knowledge.”[ 12 ] One should be careful with online sources. There may be errors while copying the uniform resource locator (URL) or the webpage, or the website may change or be closed/inaccessible; hence, cite them only if very essential and check for their reliability and give the date of access.[ 3 ] It is preferable to use online sources with digital object identifiers (DOIs), assuring their permanent presence.[ 13 ] Also, before submission, it is worthwhile to check the US National Library of Medicine's (NLM's) PubMed database ( http://www.pubmed.org ) for any recently published articles related to the manuscript's topic.[ 19 ]

The number of references is determined by the target journal requirements as well as the type of manuscript submitted; for example, the Journal of Postgraduate Medicine allows about 30 references for original articles, up to 15 references for brief reports/grand rounds/clinicopathological forum, 12 references for case series, up to 10 references for case reports/research letter, and five references for a letter to editor ( https://www.jpgmonline.com/contributors.asp#Ref ).

Preparing the References

Citation consists of two components – the “in-text citation” and the “reference list.”[ 7 ] In the in-text citation, quotation marks are used to cite an exact line/phrase from another source, specifically for definitions, examples, or explanations provided by another/earlier author/s.[ 13 ] To prevent plagiarism, it is suitable to interpret and then summarize the cited content in one's own words, referencing the source at the end of the sentence.[ 14 ]

The parts and order in the citation depend on the source which the author is referencing (journal, book, book chapter, or web source) and the journal guidelines. It is imperative to go through the target journal rules and follow the “Instructions to Authors” related to referencing guidelines (the style, punctuation, italics, abbreviations, issue number, volume number, and pages). All the references are generally cited and numbered as per the order in which they are mentioned in the text (and are to be inserted immediately after the source information and not necessarily at the end of the sentence, especially when multiple facts are stated in a single sentence).[ 6 ] In case of a table or a figure, the citation number should be in sequence to that of the preceding text.[ 7 ] The same reference number in which the source is first cited should be used throughout the manuscript (if cited again) as well as in the reference list.[ 7 ] The citation numbers are placed as superscript/in parentheses as per the journal guidelines.[ 7 ] In case of multiple citations, place them immediately after the fact; they should be placed in order of their chronology of publication (or alphabetically if published in the same year) separated by commas.[ 6 , 7 ] If many references are cited consecutively, the numbers can be separated by a hyphen.[ 7 ]

Any documented knowledge (text, audio, or visual) can serve as a source of reference. They can be print based or electronic and include journals, books, doctoral theses, conference papers, newspapers and magazines, web pages, and so on.[ 4 ]

The basic elements while referencing are as follows:[ 13 , 20 ]

• Journal/research paper: Name of author/s, title of paper, journal title (often abbreviated according to the style used for MEDLINE [ www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/journals ]),[ 16 ] publication year, volume number, issue number (issue number is kept optional by many journals), and page numbers (starting and ending page numbers or e-article number if the journal does not allot page numbers but allots e-article numbers only)[ 13 ]
• Book/chapter: Chapter author/s, title of chapter, editor/s, name of book, edition, publisher, city of publication, year of publication, and page numbers[ 13 ]
• Web sources: Names of author/s, title of webpage, year, weblink, date of access, and other information such as publisher, year of publication, and date of recent update (as may be applicable/available).[ 13 ] When citing a webpage, provide the DOI or URL of the original source as far as possible.[ 1 , 20 ]

Special attention needs to be paid to the punctuations while composing the reference, and the authors must adhere to the style recommended by the journal (that the manuscript will be eventually submitted to). Note that with each revision that the author makes in the manuscript, there may be changes in the order, addition, or deletion of references, and these adjustments should be meticulously ensured to avoid referencing errors.[ 3 ] It is also the author's responsibility to ensure that every citation has a corresponding reference and every reference is cited in the right place and context in the manuscript.[ 6 ] To avoid citation errors, the authors must verify each reference against an electronic bibliographic source like PubMed or print/pdf copies of original resources.[ 16 ] Authors should also verify that none of the cited references is a retracted article; this can be done via MEDLINE by searching PubMed for “Retracted publication [publication type]” or by going directly to the PubMed's list of retracted publications ( https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?termretractedpublication[publication type] ).[ 16 ]

“Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals” issued by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) provides specific information on how to cite sources, which should be followed.[ 16 ] These recommendations by the ICMJE summarize and provide regular updates on how to cite various sources (print documents; unpublished material; audio and visual media; material on CD-ROM, DVD, or disk; and material on the Internet) via Sample References ( www.nlm.nih.gov/bsd/uniform_requirements.html ) on their webpage.[ 16 ] Detailed information is also available in the NLM's Citing Medicine, 2 nd edition ( www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK7256/ ).[ 20 ] Number of references to be cited should be in accordance with/within the limits as stated in the “Author Guidelines” issued by the target journal.[ 7 ] Authors should take precaution, so as to avoid citing the same reference twice in the list of references.

Types of Referencing Formats/Styles

“Citation style” is the standard format in which the source is documented in the text as well as in the reference list at the end of the manuscript.[ 4 ] In-text citation styles can be broadly classified into numerical referencing style (Numeric style/Vancouver/Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers [IEEE] and Running notes style/Modern Humanities Research Association [MHRA]) and name referencing style (Author Date/Harvard, American Psychological Association [APA] and Modern Languages Association [MLA]).[ 12 ] The two major used citation styles are the Vancouver and the Harvard styles, and most other styles are minor modifications of these two styles.[ 4 ] The common citation styles and their examples are summarized in Table 1 .[ 3 , 12 , 13 , 16 , 20 ] Thus, there is a wide variability in the citation style in text as well as reference list; however, the author does not have a choice, but to stick to the style recommended by the journal to which he/she wishes to submit his/her research.[ 3 ]

Citation styles with examples[ 3 , 12 , 13 , 16 , 20 ]

Common Errors in Referencing

Referencing is a tedious task and if not taken seriously and performed diligently, it is prone to many (easily avoidable) errors.[ 7 ] A reference should be accurate, clear, and consistent throughout the manuscript.[ 6 ] An incorrect reference not only questions the credibility of the paper, but also makes it difficult for the reviewers and the readers to seek the cited article, thus denying the source author of due credit for his/her work.[ 3 ] It is the author's responsibility to cite the most relevant and appropriate references in his/her research.[ 3 ] The author should not only locate, read, and understand all sources cited by him/her ( intellectual pleasure ), but also confirm the source and provide all elements of the source correctly ( accuracy ).[ 6 ] The author should be careful not to copy references from an earlier article, but should actually rewrite each selected reference afresh.[ 6 ] Some common errors occurring during referencing are summarized in Table 2 .[ 6 , 7 ]

Common errors in the “in-text citation” and the “reference list”[ 6 , 7 ]

Reference Management Software

As described earlier, there is a wide variation in the journal formatting styles and it is laborious for the researcher to store, organize, and manage the references throughout the process of literature review and protocol planning till the drafting and manuscript submission.[ 21 ] Even more challenging is the addition/deletion or reordering of references (in text as well as in the reference list) with each revision or submission to a newer journal.[ 22 ] There is an increased likelihood of making errors in citing, especially while organizing the references and writing the reference list.[ 23 ] To minimize such errors, reference management software (RMS), also known as citation management software or bibliographic management software, are available to the authors/researchers.[ 21 ] They not only help to search and retrieve the online scientific sources, but also help to import them to their database for storing, organization, and subsequent retrieval.[ 22 ] Many RMS have cloud-based storage, enabling users to be able to access the information from multiple devices as well as collaborate with other researchers.[ 22 ] RMS also allow authors to retrieve citations while writing in the format of desired journal, thus permitting to “cite while you write.”[ 14 ] They also enable addition, deletion, insertion of references in the text and automatic (auto) resequencing of their order in the main manuscript (text) as well as in the reference list.[ 22 ] They can generate reference lists in multiple formats/citation styles to suit the target journal requirements and allow conversion of one format style to another with ease at the click of the mouse.[ 14 ] By linking each citation with a full reference, they ensure each citation in the text is accounted for by a corresponding full reference in the list.[ 12 ] Most of them are compatible for use with common programs such as Microsoft Word and Google Docs.[ 24 ]

There are numerous programs for reference management available in the market – independent applications, those operating within an internet interface, and combination of both these modes.[ 1 ] The most commonly used are Mendeley by Elsevier ( www.mendeley.com ), EndNote ( www.endnote.com ) by Thomson Reuters, and Zotero ( www.zotero.org ).[ 1 ] Some others are RefWorks, F1000 Workspace, JabRef, Citavi, Bibsonomy, ReadCube Papers, Colwiz, Sente, RefME, Connotea, CiteULike, BibTeX, and Microsoft Word.[ 22 , 24 , 25 ] While many of them are free, some are fee based and require a (paid) subscription.[ 13 ]

Despite the use of RMS, one cannot guarantee absence of referencing errors, as there can be errors in details (author names, journal title, dates) or duplication of references when retrieved from different databases.[ 23 ] So, ultimately, the authors (themselves) are responsible for the accuracy of the references cited by them (whether they do the referencing using RMS or manually).

Thus, referencing is an essential part of research and should be assigned due importance, right from the conception of the study question till its delivery as a publication. It plays a vital role throughout the manuscript and appears in almost all sections – from laying down the foundation for study rationale (in the “Introduction” section of the manuscript), describing/justifying the study procedure/s (in the “Methods” section), validating the results (in the “Results” section) and its implications (in the “Discussion” section of the manuscript). References are also utilized by editors to identify subject experts for peer review, by readers to obtain more resources on the subject matter, and by peer reviewers to critically evaluate the manuscript in the light of the available evidence. It is thus essential that references are chosen wisely and carefully as they are representative of the study. It is the author's responsibility to confirm the clarity, accuracy, and appropriateness of the cited sources. One should be careful to avoid common referencing errors to prevent delay/rejection by the journal of interest. As Vancouver style is the commonly preferred citation style by journals of medicine and health sciences, researchers should be well versed with it. Authors should diligently stick to the instructions and style of the target journal. The availability of reference management software such as Mendeley and EndNote has made the authors’ task of collecting, storing, organizing, retrieving, and utilizing the references more efficient and easier; however, it is still the authors’ responsibility to select appropriate references and cite them accurately and correctly.

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Why is Referencing Important?

Citations are not used simply to avoid plagiarism; they have other important roles too..

Referencing allows you to acknowledge the contribution of other writers and researchers in your work. Any university assignments that draw on the ideas, words or research of other writers must contain citations.

Referencing is also a way to give credit to the writers from whom you have borrowed words and ideas. By citing the work of a particular scholar, you acknowledge and respect the intellectual property rights of that researcher. As a student or academic, you can draw on any of the millions of ideas, insights and arguments published by other writers, many of whom have spent years researching and writing. All you need to do is acknowledge their contribution to your assignment.

Referencing is a way to provide evidence to support the assertions and claims in your own assignments. By citing experts in your field, you are showing your marker that you are aware of the field in which you are operating. Your citations map the space of your discipline and allow you to navigate your way through your chosen field of study, in the same way that sailors steer by the stars.

References should always be accurate, allowing your readers to trace the sources of information you have used. The best way to make sure you reference accurately is to keep a record of all the sources you used when reading and researching for an assignment.

Citations also make your writing more persuasive. 

Exercise: Look at the two paragraphs below: which one seems more authoritative?

The paragraphs are identical, except for the absence of citations from paragraph 1.

The first paragraph may be just as interesting as the second, but within an academic context, a context that requires you to show from where you have taken ideas, the second has far more authority, it is more persuasive. It shows that the ideas you are discussing are matters that are important to your particular academic community.

What kind of information do I need to reference?

Printed books are not the only sources that require acknowledgement. ANY words, ideas or information taken from ANY source requires a reference.

Reference when you are using words or ideas from:

• books and journal articles
• newspapers and magazines
• pamphlets or brochures
• films, documentaries, television programs or advertisements
• websites or electronic resources
• letters, emails, online discussion forums
• personal interviews
• lecturers or tutors. (Not always necessary but check with your lecturer or tutor about their preferences before you draw on their ideas.)

You also need to reference when you reprint any diagrams, illustrations, charts or pictures.

No need to reference when you are:

• writing your own observations or experiment results, for example, a report on a field trip
• writing about your own experiences, for example, a reflective journal
• writing your own thoughts, comments or conclusions in an assignment
• evaluating or offering your own analysis
• using 'common knowledge' (facts that can be found in numerous places and are likely to be known by a lot of people) or folklore
• using generally accepted facts or information. This will vary in different disciplines of study. If in doubt, ask your tutor.
• Academic Integrity & Plagiarism
• Academic integrity online module
• What is plagiarism?
• Intellectual insecurity
• Poor time management
• Lack of a clear argument
• Lack of critical and analytical skills
• Inadequate research
• Poor notetaking
• Why is referencing important?
• Underdeveloped writing skills
• Avoiding plagiarism
• Other plagiarism resources

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Citing sources: Overview

• Citation style guides

Manage your references

Use these tools to help you organize and cite your references:

• Citation Management and Writing Tools

If you have questions after consulting this guide about how to cite, please contact your advisor/professor or the writing and communication center .

Why citing is important

It's important to cite sources you used in your research for several reasons:

• To show your reader you've done proper research by listing sources you used to get your information
• To be a responsible scholar by giving credit to other researchers and acknowledging their ideas
• To avoid plagiarism by quoting words and ideas used by other authors
• To allow your reader to track down the sources you used by citing them accurately in your paper by way of footnotes, a bibliography or reference list

About citations

Citing a source means that you show, within the body of your text, that you took words, ideas, figures, images, etc. from another place.

Citations are a short way to uniquely identify a published work (e.g. book, article, chapter, web site).  They are found in bibliographies and reference lists and are also collected in article and book databases.

Citations consist of standard elements, and contain all the information necessary to identify and track down publications, including:

• author name(s)
• titles of books, articles, and journals
• date of publication
• page numbers
• volume and issue numbers (for articles)

Citations may look different, depending on what is being cited and which style was used to create them. Choose an appropriate style guide for your needs.  Here is an example of an article citation using four different citation styles.  Notice the common elements as mentioned above:

Author - R. Langer

Article Title - New Methods of Drug Delivery

Source Title - Science

Volume and issue - Vol 249, issue 4976

Publication Date - 1990

Page numbers - 1527-1533

American Chemical Society (ACS) style:

Langer, R. New Methods of Drug Delivery. Science 1990 , 249 , 1527-1533.

IEEE Style:

R. Langer, " New Methods of Drug Delivery," Science , vol. 249 , pp. 1527-1533 , SEP 28, 1990 .

American Psychological Association   (APA) style:

Langer, R. (1990) . New methods of drug delivery. Science , 249 (4976), 1527-1533.

Modern Language Association (MLA) style:

Langer, R. " New Methods of Drug Delivery." Science 249.4976 (1990) : 1527-33.

What to cite

You must cite:

• Facts, figures, ideas, or other information that is not common knowledge

Publications that must be cited include:  books, book chapters, articles, web pages, theses, etc.

Another person's exact words should be quoted and cited to show proper credit 

When in doubt, be safe and cite your source!

Avoiding plagiarism

Plagiarism occurs when you borrow another's words (or ideas) and do not acknowledge that you have done so. In this culture, we consider our words and ideas intellectual property; like a car or any other possession, we believe our words belong to us and cannot be used without our permission.

Plagiarism is a very serious offense. If it is found that you have plagiarized -- deliberately or inadvertently -- you may face serious consequences. In some instances, plagiarism has meant that students have had to leave the institutions where they were studying.

The best way to avoid plagiarism is to cite your sources - both within the body of your paper and in a bibliography of sources you used at the end of your paper.

Some useful links about plagiarism:

• MIT Academic Integrity Overview on citing sources and avoiding plagiarism at MIT.
• Avoiding Plagiarism From the MIT Writing and Communication Center.
• Plagiarism: What It is and How to Recognize and Avoid It From Indiana University's Writing Tutorial Services.
• Plagiarism- Overview A resource from Purdue University.
• Next: Citation style guides >>
• Last Updated: Jan 16, 2024 7:02 AM
• URL: https://libguides.mit.edu/citing

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Writing Research Papers

• What Types of References Are Appropriate?

When writing a research paper, there are many different types of sources that you might consider citing.  Which are appropriate?  Which are less appropriate?  Here we discuss the different types of sources that you may wish to use when working on a research paper.   

Please note that the following represents a general set of recommended guidelines that is not specific to any class and does not represent department policy.  The types of allowable sources may vary by course and instructor.

Highly appropriate: peer-reviewed journal articles

In general, you should primarily cite peer-reviewed journal articles in your research papers.  Peer-reviewed journal articles are research papers that have been accepted for publication after having undergone a rigorous editorial review process.  During that review process, the article was carefully evaluated by at least one journal editor and a group of reviewers (usually scientists that are experts in the field or topic under investigation).  Often the article underwent revisions before it was judged to be satisfactory for publication. 

Most articles submitted to high quality journals are not accepted for publication.  As such, research that is successfully published in a respected peer-reviewed journal is generally regarded as higher quality than research that is not published or is published elsewhere, such as in a book, magazine, or on a website.  However, just because a study was published in a peer-reviewed journal does not mean that it is free from error or that its conclusions are correct.  Accordingly, it is important to critically read and carefully evaluate all sources, including peer-reviewed journal articles.

Tips for finding and using peer-reviewed journal articles:

• Many databases, such as PsycINFO, can be set to only search for peer-reviewed journal articles. Other search engines, such as Google Scholar, typically include both peer-reviewed and not peer-reviewed articles in search results, and thus should be used with greater caution. 
• Even though a peer-reviewed journal article is, by definition, a source that has been carefully vetted through an editorial process, it should still be critically evaluated by the reader. 

Potentially appropriate: books, encyclopedias, and other scholarly works

Another potential source that you might use when writing a research paper is a book, encyclopedia, or an official online source (such as demographic data drawn from a government website).  When relying on such sources, it is important to carefully consider its accuracy and trustworthiness.  For example, books vary in quality; most have not undergone any form of review process other than basic copyediting.  In many cases, a book’s content is little more than the author’s informed or uninformed opinion. 

However, there are books that have been edited prior to publication, as is the case with many reputable encyclopedias; also, many books from academic publishers are comprised of multiple chapters, each written by one or more researchers, with the entire volume carefully reviewed by one or more editors.  In those cases, the book has undergone a form of peer review, albeit often not as rigorous as that for a peer-reviewed journal article.

Tips for using books, encyclopedias, and other scholarly works:

• When using books, encyclopedias, and other scholarly works (that is, works written or produced by researchers, official agencies, or corporations), it is important to very carefully evaluate the quality of that source.
• If the source is an edited volume (in which case in the editor(s) will be listed on the cover), is published by a reputable source (such as Academic Press, MIT Press, and others), or is written by a major expert in the field (such as a researcher with a track record of peer-reviewed journal articles on the subject), then it is more likely to be trustworthy.
• For online encyclopedias such as Wikipedia, an instructor may or may not consider that an acceptable source (by default, don’t assume that a non-peer reviewed source will be considered acceptable). It is best to ask the instructor for clarification. 1

Usually inappropriate: magazines, blogs, and websites  

Most research papers can be written using only peer-reviewed journal articles as sources.  However, for many topics it is possible to find a plethora of sources that have not been peer-reviewed but also discuss the topic.  These may include articles in popular magazines or postings in blogs, forums, and other websites.  In general, although these sources may be well-written and easy to understand, their scientific value is often not as high as that of peer-reviewed articles.  Exceptions include some magazine and newspaper articles that might be cited in a research paper to make a point about public awareness of a given topic, to illustrate beliefs and attitudes about a given topic among journalists, or to refer to a news event that is relevant to a given topic. 

Tips for using magazines, blogs, and websites:

• Avoid such references if possible. You should primarily focus on peer-reviewed journal articles as sources for your research paper.  High quality research papers typically do not rely on non-academic and not peer-reviewed sources.
• Refer to non-academic, not peer-reviewed sources sparingly, and if you do, be sure to carefully evaluate the accuracy and scientific merit of the source.

Downloadable Resources

• How to Write APA Style Research Papers (a comprehensive guide) [ PDF ]
• Tips for Writing APA Style Research Papers (a brief summary) [ PDF ]

Further Resources

How-To Videos     

• Writing Research Paper Videos

Databases and Search Engines (may require connection to UCSD network)

• Google Scholar
• PubMed (NIH/NLM)
• Web of Science  

UCSD Resources on Finding and Evaluating Sources

• UCSD Library Databases A-Z
• UCSD Library Psychology Research Guide: Start Page
• UCSD Library Psychology Research Guide : Finding Articles
• UCSD Library Psychology Research Guide : Evaluating Sources

External Resources

• Critically Reading Journal Articles from PSU/ Colby College
• How to Seriously Read a Journal Article from Science Magazine
• How to Read Journal Articles from Harvard University
• How to Read a Scientific Paper Infographic from Elsevier Publishing
• Tips for searching PsycINFO from UC Berkeley Library
• Tips for using PsycINFO effectively from the APA Student Science Council

1 Wikipedia articles vary in quality; the site has a peer review system and the very best articles ( Featured Articles ), which go through a multi-stage review process, rival those in traditional encyclopedias and are considered the highest quality articles on the site.

Prepared by s. c. pan for ucsd psychology, graphic adapted from  t-x-generic-apply.svg , a public domain creation by the tango desktop project..

Back to top

• Research Paper Structure
• Formatting Research Papers
• Using Databases and Finding References
• Evaluating References and Taking Notes
• Citing References
• Writing a Literature Review
• Writing Process and Revising
• Improving Scientific Writing
• Academic Integrity and Avoiding Plagiarism
• Writing Research Papers Videos

Enhance the Value of a Research Paper: Choosing the Right References and Writing them Accurately

Affiliation.

• 1 Professor and Head, Department of Pediatrics, Topiwala National Medical College and BYL Nair Ch. Hospital, Mumbai, Maharashtra.
• PMID: 27731560

References help readers identify and locate sources used for justifying the need for conducting the research study, verify methods employed in the study and for discussing the interpretation of results and implications of the study. It is extremely essential that references are accurate and complete. This article provides suggestions regarding choosing references and writing reference list. References are a list of sources that are selected by authors to represent the best documents concerning the research study.1 They constitute the foundation of any research paper. Although generally written towards the end of the article-writing process, they are nevertheless extremely important. They provide the context for the hypothesis and help justify the need for conducting the research study. Authors use references to inform readers about the techniques used for conducting the study and convince them about the appropriateness of methodology used. References help provide appropriate perspective in which the research findings should be seen and interpreted. This communication will discuss the purpose of citations, how to select quality sources for citing and the importance of accuracy while writing the reference list.

© Journal of the Association of Physicians of India 2011.

• Bibliographies as Topic*
• Manuscripts, Medical as Topic*
• Periodicals as Topic / standards*

Want to create or adapt books like this? Learn more about how Pressbooks supports open publishing practices.

11.1 The Purpose of Research Writing

Learning objectives.

• Identify reasons to research writing projects.
• Outline the steps of the research writing process.

Why was the Great Wall of China built? What have scientists learned about the possibility of life on Mars? What roles did women play in the American Revolution? How does the human brain create, store, and retrieve memories? Who invented the game of football, and how has it changed over the years?

You may know the answers to these questions off the top of your head. If you are like most people, however, you find answers to tough questions like these by searching the Internet, visiting the library, or asking others for information. To put it simply, you perform research.

Whether you are a scientist, an artist, a paralegal, or a parent, you probably perform research in your everyday life. When your boss, your instructor, or a family member asks you a question that you do not know the answer to, you locate relevant information, analyze your findings, and share your results. Locating, analyzing, and sharing information are key steps in the research process, and in this chapter, you will learn more about each step. By developing your research writing skills, you will prepare yourself to answer any question no matter how challenging.

Reasons for Research

When you perform research, you are essentially trying to solve a mystery—you want to know how something works or why something happened. In other words, you want to answer a question that you (and other people) have about the world. This is one of the most basic reasons for performing research.

But the research process does not end when you have solved your mystery. Imagine what would happen if a detective collected enough evidence to solve a criminal case, but she never shared her solution with the authorities. Presenting what you have learned from research can be just as important as performing the research. Research results can be presented in a variety of ways, but one of the most popular—and effective—presentation forms is the research paper . A research paper presents an original thesis, or purpose statement, about a topic and develops that thesis with information gathered from a variety of sources.

If you are curious about the possibility of life on Mars, for example, you might choose to research the topic. What will you do, though, when your research is complete? You will need a way to put your thoughts together in a logical, coherent manner. You may want to use the facts you have learned to create a narrative or to support an argument. And you may want to show the results of your research to your friends, your teachers, or even the editors of magazines and journals. Writing a research paper is an ideal way to organize thoughts, craft narratives or make arguments based on research, and share your newfound knowledge with the world.

Write a paragraph about a time when you used research in your everyday life. Did you look for the cheapest way to travel from Houston to Denver? Did you search for a way to remove gum from the bottom of your shoe? In your paragraph, explain what you wanted to research, how you performed the research, and what you learned as a result.

Research Writing and the Academic Paper

No matter what field of study you are interested in, you will most likely be asked to write a research paper during your academic career. For example, a student in an art history course might write a research paper about an artist’s work. Similarly, a student in a psychology course might write a research paper about current findings in childhood development.

Having to write a research paper may feel intimidating at first. After all, researching and writing a long paper requires a lot of time, effort, and organization. However, writing a research paper can also be a great opportunity to explore a topic that is particularly interesting to you. The research process allows you to gain expertise on a topic of your choice, and the writing process helps you remember what you have learned and understand it on a deeper level.

Research Writing at Work

Knowing how to write a good research paper is a valuable skill that will serve you well throughout your career. Whether you are developing a new product, studying the best way to perform a procedure, or learning about challenges and opportunities in your field of employment, you will use research techniques to guide your exploration. You may even need to create a written report of your findings. And because effective communication is essential to any company, employers seek to hire people who can write clearly and professionally.

Writing at Work

Take a few minutes to think about each of the following careers. How might each of these professionals use researching and research writing skills on the job?

• Medical laboratory technician
• Small business owner
• Information technology professional
• Freelance magazine writer

A medical laboratory technician or information technology professional might do research to learn about the latest technological developments in either of these fields. A small business owner might conduct research to learn about the latest trends in his or her industry. A freelance magazine writer may need to research a given topic to write an informed, up-to-date article.

Think about the job of your dreams. How might you use research writing skills to perform that job? Create a list of ways in which strong researching, organizing, writing, and critical thinking skills could help you succeed at your dream job. How might these skills help you obtain that job?

Steps of the Research Writing Process

How does a research paper grow from a folder of brainstormed notes to a polished final draft? No two projects are identical, but most projects follow a series of six basic steps.

These are the steps in the research writing process:

• Choose a topic.
• Plan and schedule time to research and write.
• Conduct research.
• Organize research and ideas.
• Draft your paper.
• Revise and edit your paper.

Each of these steps will be discussed in more detail later in this chapter. For now, though, we will take a brief look at what each step involves.

Step 1: Choosing a Topic

As you may recall from Chapter 8 “The Writing Process: How Do I Begin?” , to narrow the focus of your topic, you may try freewriting exercises, such as brainstorming. You may also need to ask a specific research question —a broad, open-ended question that will guide your research—as well as propose a possible answer, or a working thesis . You may use your research question and your working thesis to create a research proposal . In a research proposal, you present your main research question, any related subquestions you plan to explore, and your working thesis.

Step 2: Planning and Scheduling

Before you start researching your topic, take time to plan your researching and writing schedule. Research projects can take days, weeks, or even months to complete. Creating a schedule is a good way to ensure that you do not end up being overwhelmed by all the work you have to do as the deadline approaches.

During this step of the process, it is also a good idea to plan the resources and organizational tools you will use to keep yourself on track throughout the project. Flowcharts, calendars, and checklists can all help you stick to your schedule. See Chapter 11 “Writing from Research: What Will I Learn?” , Section 11.2 “Steps in Developing a Research Proposal” for an example of a research schedule.

Step 3: Conducting Research

When going about your research, you will likely use a variety of sources—anything from books and periodicals to video presentations and in-person interviews.

Your sources will include both primary sources and secondary sources . Primary sources provide firsthand information or raw data. For example, surveys, in-person interviews, and historical documents are primary sources. Secondary sources, such as biographies, literary reviews, or magazine articles, include some analysis or interpretation of the information presented. As you conduct research, you will take detailed, careful notes about your discoveries. You will also evaluate the reliability of each source you find.

Step 4: Organizing Research and the Writer’s Ideas

When your research is complete, you will organize your findings and decide which sources to cite in your paper. You will also have an opportunity to evaluate the evidence you have collected and determine whether it supports your thesis, or the focus of your paper. You may decide to adjust your thesis or conduct additional research to ensure that your thesis is well supported.

Remember, your working thesis is not set in stone. You can and should change your working thesis throughout the research writing process if the evidence you find does not support your original thesis. Never try to force evidence to fit your argument. For example, your working thesis is “Mars cannot support life-forms.” Yet, a week into researching your topic, you find an article in the New York Times detailing new findings of bacteria under the Martian surface. Instead of trying to argue that bacteria are not life forms, you might instead alter your thesis to “Mars cannot support complex life-forms.”

Step 5: Drafting Your Paper

Now you are ready to combine your research findings with your critical analysis of the results in a rough draft. You will incorporate source materials into your paper and discuss each source thoughtfully in relation to your thesis or purpose statement.

When you cite your reference sources, it is important to pay close attention to standard conventions for citing sources in order to avoid plagiarism , or the practice of using someone else’s words without acknowledging the source. Later in this chapter, you will learn how to incorporate sources in your paper and avoid some of the most common pitfalls of attributing information.

Step 6: Revising and Editing Your Paper

In the final step of the research writing process, you will revise and polish your paper. You might reorganize your paper’s structure or revise for unity and cohesion, ensuring that each element in your paper flows into the next logically and naturally. You will also make sure that your paper uses an appropriate and consistent tone.

Once you feel confident in the strength of your writing, you will edit your paper for proper spelling, grammar, punctuation, mechanics, and formatting. When you complete this final step, you will have transformed a simple idea or question into a thoroughly researched and well-written paper you can be proud of!

Review the steps of the research writing process. Then answer the questions on your own sheet of paper.

• In which steps of the research writing process are you allowed to change your thesis?
• In step 2, which types of information should you include in your project schedule?
• What might happen if you eliminated step 4 from the research writing process?

Key Takeaways

• People undertake research projects throughout their academic and professional careers in order to answer specific questions, share their findings with others, increase their understanding of challenging topics, and strengthen their researching, writing, and analytical skills.
• The research writing process generally comprises six steps: choosing a topic, scheduling and planning time for research and writing, conducting research, organizing research and ideas, drafting a paper, and revising and editing the paper.

Writing for Success Copyright © 2015 by University of Minnesota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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• Published: 06 March 2024

Artificial intelligence and illusions of understanding in scientific research

• Lisa Messeri   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-0964-123X 1   na1 &
• M. J. Crockett   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-8800-410X 2 , 3   na1  

Nature volume  627 ,  pages 49–58 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

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• Human behaviour
• Interdisciplinary studies
• Research management
• Social anthropology

Scientists are enthusiastically imagining ways in which artificial intelligence (AI) tools might improve research. Why are AI tools so attractive and what are the risks of implementing them across the research pipeline? Here we develop a taxonomy of scientists’ visions for AI, observing that their appeal comes from promises to improve productivity and objectivity by overcoming human shortcomings. But proposed AI solutions can also exploit our cognitive limitations, making us vulnerable to illusions of understanding in which we believe we understand more about the world than we actually do. Such illusions obscure the scientific community’s ability to see the formation of scientific monocultures, in which some types of methods, questions and viewpoints come to dominate alternative approaches, making science less innovative and more vulnerable to errors. The proliferation of AI tools in science risks introducing a phase of scientific enquiry in which we produce more but understand less. By analysing the appeal of these tools, we provide a framework for advancing discussions of responsible knowledge production in the age of AI.

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Acknowledgements

We thank D. S. Bassett, W. J. Brady, S. Helmreich, S. Kapoor, T. Lombrozo, A. Narayanan, M. Salganik and A. J. te Velthuis for comments. We also thank C. Buckner and P. Winter for their feedback and suggestions.

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Lisa Messeri

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M. J. Crockett

University Center for Human Values, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, USA

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Messeri, L., Crockett, M.J. Artificial intelligence and illusions of understanding in scientific research. Nature 627 , 49–58 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-024-07146-0

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How to Write a Research Paper | A Beginner's Guide

A research paper is a piece of academic writing that provides analysis, interpretation, and argument based on in-depth independent research.

Research papers are similar to academic essays , but they are usually longer and more detailed assignments, designed to assess not only your writing skills but also your skills in scholarly research. Writing a research paper requires you to demonstrate a strong knowledge of your topic, engage with a variety of sources, and make an original contribution to the debate.

This step-by-step guide takes you through the entire writing process, from understanding your assignment to proofreading your final draft.

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Table of contents

Understand the assignment, choose a research paper topic, conduct preliminary research, develop a thesis statement, create a research paper outline, write a first draft of the research paper, write the introduction, write a compelling body of text, write the conclusion, the second draft, the revision process, research paper checklist, free lecture slides.

Completing a research paper successfully means accomplishing the specific tasks set out for you. Before you start, make sure you thoroughly understanding the assignment task sheet:

• Read it carefully, looking for anything confusing you might need to clarify with your professor.
• Identify the assignment goal, deadline, length specifications, formatting, and submission method.
• Make a bulleted list of the key points, then go back and cross completed items off as you’re writing.

Carefully consider your timeframe and word limit: be realistic, and plan enough time to research, write, and edit.

Prevent plagiarism. Run a free check.

There are many ways to generate an idea for a research paper, from brainstorming with pen and paper to talking it through with a fellow student or professor.

You can try free writing, which involves taking a broad topic and writing continuously for two or three minutes to identify absolutely anything relevant that could be interesting.

You can also gain inspiration from other research. The discussion or recommendations sections of research papers often include ideas for other specific topics that require further examination.

Once you have a broad subject area, narrow it down to choose a topic that interests you, m eets the criteria of your assignment, and i s possible to research. Aim for ideas that are both original and specific:

• A paper following the chronology of World War II would not be original or specific enough.
• A paper on the experience of Danish citizens living close to the German border during World War II would be specific and could be original enough.

Note any discussions that seem important to the topic, and try to find an issue that you can focus your paper around. Use a variety of sources , including journals, books, and reliable websites, to ensure you do not miss anything glaring.

Do not only verify the ideas you have in mind, but look for sources that contradict your point of view.

• Is there anything people seem to overlook in the sources you research?
• Are there any heated debates you can address?
• Do you have a unique take on your topic?
• Have there been some recent developments that build on the extant research?

In this stage, you might find it helpful to formulate some research questions to help guide you. To write research questions, try to finish the following sentence: “I want to know how/what/why…”

A thesis statement is a statement of your central argument — it establishes the purpose and position of your paper. If you started with a research question, the thesis statement should answer it. It should also show what evidence and reasoning you’ll use to support that answer.

The thesis statement should be concise, contentious, and coherent. That means it should briefly summarize your argument in a sentence or two, make a claim that requires further evidence or analysis, and make a coherent point that relates to every part of the paper.

You will probably revise and refine the thesis statement as you do more research, but it can serve as a guide throughout the writing process. Every paragraph should aim to support and develop this central claim.

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• Missing commas and periods
• Incorrect usage of “et al.”
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A research paper outline is essentially a list of the key topics, arguments, and evidence you want to include, divided into sections with headings so that you know roughly what the paper will look like before you start writing.

A structure outline can help make the writing process much more efficient, so it’s worth dedicating some time to create one.

Your first draft won’t be perfect — you can polish later on. Your priorities at this stage are as follows:

• Maintaining forward momentum — write now, perfect later.
• Paying attention to clear organization and logical ordering of paragraphs and sentences, which will help when you come to the second draft.
• Expressing your ideas as clearly as possible, so you know what you were trying to say when you come back to the text.

You do not need to start by writing the introduction. Begin where it feels most natural for you — some prefer to finish the most difficult sections first, while others choose to start with the easiest part. If you created an outline, use it as a map while you work.

Do not delete large sections of text. If you begin to dislike something you have written or find it doesn’t quite fit, move it to a different document, but don’t lose it completely — you never know if it might come in useful later.

Paragraph structure

Paragraphs are the basic building blocks of research papers. Each one should focus on a single claim or idea that helps to establish the overall argument or purpose of the paper.

Example paragraph

George Orwell’s 1946 essay “Politics and the English Language” has had an enduring impact on thought about the relationship between politics and language. This impact is particularly obvious in light of the various critical review articles that have recently referenced the essay. For example, consider Mark Falcoff’s 2009 article in The National Review Online, “The Perversion of Language; or, Orwell Revisited,” in which he analyzes several common words (“activist,” “civil-rights leader,” “diversity,” and more). Falcoff’s close analysis of the ambiguity built into political language intentionally mirrors Orwell’s own point-by-point analysis of the political language of his day. Even 63 years after its publication, Orwell’s essay is emulated by contemporary thinkers.

Citing sources

It’s also important to keep track of citations at this stage to avoid accidental plagiarism . Each time you use a source, make sure to take note of where the information came from.

You can use our free citation generators to automatically create citations and save your reference list as you go.

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The research paper introduction should address three questions: What, why, and how? After finishing the introduction, the reader should know what the paper is about, why it is worth reading, and how you’ll build your arguments.

What? Be specific about the topic of the paper, introduce the background, and define key terms or concepts.

Why? This is the most important, but also the most difficult, part of the introduction. Try to provide brief answers to the following questions: What new material or insight are you offering? What important issues does your essay help define or answer?

How? To let the reader know what to expect from the rest of the paper, the introduction should include a “map” of what will be discussed, briefly presenting the key elements of the paper in chronological order.

The major struggle faced by most writers is how to organize the information presented in the paper, which is one reason an outline is so useful. However, remember that the outline is only a guide and, when writing, you can be flexible with the order in which the information and arguments are presented.

One way to stay on track is to use your thesis statement and topic sentences . Check:

• topic sentences against the thesis statement;
• topic sentences against each other, for similarities and logical ordering;
• and each sentence against the topic sentence of that paragraph.

Be aware of paragraphs that seem to cover the same things. If two paragraphs discuss something similar, they must approach that topic in different ways. Aim to create smooth transitions between sentences, paragraphs, and sections.

The research paper conclusion is designed to help your reader out of the paper’s argument, giving them a sense of finality.

Trace the course of the paper, emphasizing how it all comes together to prove your thesis statement. Give the paper a sense of finality by making sure the reader understands how you’ve settled the issues raised in the introduction.

You might also discuss the more general consequences of the argument, outline what the paper offers to future students of the topic, and suggest any questions the paper’s argument raises but cannot or does not try to answer.

You should not :

• Offer new arguments or essential information
• Take up any more space than necessary
• Begin with stock phrases that signal you are ending the paper (e.g. “In conclusion”)

There are four main considerations when it comes to the second draft.

• Check how your vision of the paper lines up with the first draft and, more importantly, that your paper still answers the assignment.
• Identify any assumptions that might require (more substantial) justification, keeping your reader’s perspective foremost in mind. Remove these points if you cannot substantiate them further.
• Be open to rearranging your ideas. Check whether any sections feel out of place and whether your ideas could be better organized.
• If you find that old ideas do not fit as well as you anticipated, you should cut them out or condense them. You might also find that new and well-suited ideas occurred to you during the writing of the first draft — now is the time to make them part of the paper.

The goal during the revision and proofreading process is to ensure you have completed all the necessary tasks and that the paper is as well-articulated as possible. You can speed up the proofreading process by using the AI proofreader .

Global concerns

• Confirm that your paper completes every task specified in your assignment sheet.
• Check for logical organization and flow of paragraphs.
• Check paragraphs against the introduction and thesis statement.

Fine-grained details

Check the content of each paragraph, making sure that:

• each sentence helps support the topic sentence.
• no unnecessary or irrelevant information is present.
• all technical terms your audience might not know are identified.

Next, think about sentence structure , grammatical errors, and formatting . Check that you have correctly used transition words and phrases to show the connections between your ideas. Look for typos, cut unnecessary words, and check for consistency in aspects such as heading formatting and spellings .

Finally, you need to make sure your paper is correctly formatted according to the rules of the citation style you are using. For example, you might need to include an MLA heading  or create an APA title page .

Scribbr’s professional editors can help with the revision process with our award-winning proofreading services.

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Checklist: Research paper

I have followed all instructions in the assignment sheet.

My introduction presents my topic in an engaging way and provides necessary background information.

My introduction presents a clear, focused research problem and/or thesis statement .

My paper is logically organized using paragraphs and (if relevant) section headings .

Each paragraph is clearly focused on one central idea, expressed in a clear topic sentence .

Each paragraph is relevant to my research problem or thesis statement.

I have used appropriate transitions  to clarify the connections between sections, paragraphs, and sentences.

My conclusion provides a concise answer to the research question or emphasizes how the thesis has been supported.

My conclusion shows how my research has contributed to knowledge or understanding of my topic.

My conclusion does not present any new points or information essential to my argument.

I have provided an in-text citation every time I refer to ideas or information from a source.

I have included a reference list at the end of my paper, consistently formatted according to a specific citation style .

I have thoroughly revised my paper and addressed any feedback from my professor or supervisor.

I have followed all formatting guidelines (page numbers, headers, spacing, etc.).

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Watching a solar eclipse without the right filters can cause eye damage. Here's why

Nell Greenfieldboyce

A woman watches an annular solar eclipse on October 14, 2023 using special solar filter glasses at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. Carlos Tischler/ Eyepix Group/Future Publishing via Getty Images hide caption

A woman watches an annular solar eclipse on October 14, 2023 using special solar filter glasses at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.

On April 8, as millions of people try to watch a solar eclipse sweep over North America, eye doctors across the United States will be on high alert.

That's because, while a solar eclipse is a stunning celestial event, it can also be dangerous. Looking at any part of the exposed sun without the right kind of protection can permanently injure the eye's light-sensitive retina.

And if past eclipses are prologue, it's likely that some eclipse-gazers will show up at doctors' offices with significant eye damage.

For April's eclipse, going from 'meh' to 'OMG' might mean just driving across town

In 2017, during the solar eclipse seen across the United States, that happened to multiple people despite abundant media coverage about the danger of looking at the sun when it is anything less than fully and completely covered by the moon.

In New York City, for example, one young woman came to the New York Eye and Ear Infirmary of Mount Sinai, complaining of blurred and distorted vision.

She had peeked up at the crescent sun without eyewear at first, then looked at it longer while wearing what she thought were appropriate eclipse glasses.

Everything you need to know about solar eclipse glasses before April 8

"But the problem was she was handed glasses from someone else," says ophthalmologist Avnish Deobhakta , so she didn't know if the eyewear really met safety standards .

Doctors found a permanent, crescent-shaped wound on her retina; there's no treatment for that kind of injury, which is similar to the kind of light-induced damage caused by pointing a laser into the eye.

Other eclipse-related eye injuries were reported in California and Utah .

Given that more than 150 million people directly viewed either a partial eclipse or a total solar eclipse, however, the number who suffered eye problems may seem relatively small.

Plan to watch the eclipse from a wild mountain summit? Be ready for harsh conditions

"We've got less than 100 cases across Canada and the U.S.," says Ralph Chou , an eclipse eye safety expert with the University of Waterloo in Canada.

But no one knows for sure how many people damaged their eyes in 2017, he says, because not every case gets written up for a medical journal, and people may not seek help for less severe vision troubles.

"A lot of them, if they actually happened, were probably relatively minor and, you know, they resolved on their own within weeks or months," says Chou, who says that about half of those who experience significant blurring on the day after an eclipse will recover almost completely.

Some of that recovery may just be the brain learning to compensate and "fill in" the blanks, says Deobhakta, who notes that "there's two eyes, and often there's asymmetric injury. Your brain kind of gets used to it."

The eclipse gives astronomy clubs an opportunity to shine

He notes that there are ways to enjoy the eclipse without looking up at all; everyday household objects like colanders allow you to create pinhole projectors that let you watch an image of the sun becoming more and more crescent-shaped.

"My advice is to not look at the sun, because you may not realize that it is affecting your retina. It does not hurt. It doesn't burn at the time. It's not as if you feel it," says Deobhakta.

If you do choose to look up at the sun when it is partially eclipsed, says Deobhakta, "make sure you really are sure that you have the standard glasses that have the right filters."

The American Astronomical Society has a list of vetted suppliers .

Will you be celebrating the solar eclipse? NPR wants to hear from you

If you still have reliable eclipse viewers from 2017 that are in good condition, those should still work fine, says Chou.

He notes that eclipse viewers usually have a "best by" date on them, but that is to satisfy European regulations related to personal protective equipment.

"It's essentially meaningless because the filters do not age," says Chou. "If you've taken good care of the viewers from 2017, they haven't been crushed or folded or whatever to damage the mountings, then they're perfectly safe to use for this eclipse."

Despite the warnings, some people try to glimpse the partially-eclipsed sun without eye protection, thinking that a quick look won't cause any harm. While an initial glance at the sun may not cause lasting damage, says Chou, repeated peeks do add up.

"At some point, you may tip yourself over the critical threshold," says Chou. "Unfortunately, you don't realize that until far too late."

The eye damage only becomes apparent hours after it occurs. Typically, people wake up the morning after observing an eclipse and see a spot of extreme fuzziness in the center of their field of vision.

There is one time when it's safe to look up at the sun with the naked eye, experts say, and that's when the sun is totally covered by the moon.

This eclipse phase is only visible from the so-called " path of totality ," a stretch of land from Texas to Maine. And the experience of totality doesn't last long — up to four and a half minutes or so, depending on your location.

When the sun is 100% obscured, the sky abruptly darkens and the once-bright sun becomes a dark circle surrounded by a ghostly white ring called the corona.

If people wear super-dark eclipse eyewear during these dramatic moments, they'll miss the whole show.

"People get so concerned to not hurt their eyes, which of course is super important, that they don't take their glasses off when the moon completely covers the sun," says Laura Peticolas , a space physicist at Sonoma State University. "And then they're like, 'I never saw the corona.'"

So knowing when to take the glasses off, and when to put them on, is key.

Chou says that in the last moments before the sun gets totally covered, the thin crescent of the bright sun breaks into discrete points of bright light. These are called " Baily's beads ," and they are the last bits of light from the disk of the sun shining through the valleys on the edge of the moon.

"And as they go out, their disappearance is a signal that it is now safe to remove the filters and look at the sun without a protective filter," he explains.

As soon as the sun starts to re-emerge, the glasses need to immediately go back on.

"It is possible to observe the eclipse in perfect safety," says Chou, who has seen 19 total solar eclipses.

He encourages people to go out and enjoy an event that won't happen again in the United States until 2044, even as he realizes that some people will be too fearful of eye damage.

"I recognize that there are going to be people who just don't trust the science and just don't trust the public service announcements and are just going to ignore the eclipse as much as they can," says Chou. "It's an unfortunate thing."

• eclipse glasses
• eclipse 2024
• total solar eclipse
• total eclipse
• Opthalmology

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Use of Abortion Pills Has Risen Significantly Post Roe, Research Shows

By Pam Belluck

Pam Belluck has been reporting about reproductive health for over a decade.

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On the eve of oral arguments in a Supreme Court case that could affect future access to abortion pills, new research shows the fast-growing use of medication abortion nationally and the many ways women have obtained access to the method since Roe v. Wade was overturned in June 2022.

The Details

A study, published on Monday in the medical journal JAMA , found that the number of abortions using pills obtained outside the formal health system soared in the six months after the national right to abortion was overturned. Another report, published last week by the Guttmacher Institute , a research organization that supports abortion rights, found that medication abortions now account for nearly two-thirds of all abortions provided by the country’s formal health system, which includes clinics and telemedicine abortion services.

The JAMA study evaluated data from overseas telemedicine organizations, online vendors and networks of community volunteers that generally obtain pills from outside the United States. Before Roe was overturned, these avenues provided abortion pills to about 1,400 women per month, but in the six months afterward, the average jumped to 5,900 per month, the study reported.

Overall, the study found that while abortions in the formal health care system declined by about 32,000 from July through December 2022, much of that decline was offset by about 26,000 medication abortions from pills provided by sources outside the formal health system.

“We see what we see elsewhere in the world in the U.S. — that when anti-abortion laws go into effect, oftentimes outside of the formal health care setting is where people look, and the locus of care gets shifted,” said Dr. Abigail Aiken, who is an associate professor at the University of Texas at Austin and the lead author of the JAMA study.

The co-authors were a statistics professor at the university; the founder of Aid Access, a Europe-based organization that helped pioneer telemedicine abortion in the United States; and a leader of Plan C, an organization that provides consumers with information about medication abortion. Before publication, the study went through the rigorous peer review process required by a major medical journal.

The telemedicine organizations in the study evaluated prospective patients using written medical questionnaires, issued prescriptions from doctors who were typically in Europe and had pills shipped from pharmacies in India, generally charging about $100. Community networks typically asked for some information about the pregnancy and either delivered or mailed pills with detailed instructions, often for free.

Online vendors, which supplied a small percentage of the pills in the study and charged between $39 and $470, generally did not ask for women’s medical history and shipped the pills with the least detailed instructions. Vendors in the study were vetted by Plan C and found to be providing genuine abortion pills, Dr. Aiken said.

The Guttmacher report, focusing on the formal health care system, included data from clinics and telemedicine abortion services within the United States that provided abortion to patients who lived in or traveled to states with legal abortion between January and December 2023.

It found that pills accounted for 63 percent of those abortions, up from 53 percent in 2020. The total number of abortions in the report was over a million for the first time in more than a decade.

Why This Matters

Overall, the new reports suggest how rapidly the provision of abortion has adjusted amid post-Roe abortion bans in 14 states and tight restrictions in others.

The numbers may be an undercount and do not reflect the most recent shift: shield laws in six states allowing abortion providers to prescribe and mail pills to tens of thousands of women in states with bans without requiring them to travel. Since last summer, for example, Aid Access has stopped shipping medication from overseas and operating outside the formal health system; it is instead mailing pills to states with bans from within the United States with the protection of shield laws.

What’s Next

In the case that will be argued before the Supreme Court on Tuesday, the plaintiffs, who oppose abortion, are suing the Food and Drug Administration, seeking to block or drastically limit the availability of mifepristone, the first pill in the two-drug medication abortion regimen.

The JAMA study suggests that such a ruling could prompt more women to use avenues outside the formal American health care system, such as pills from other countries.

“There’s so many unknowns about what will happen with the decision,” Dr. Aiken said.

She added: “It’s possible that a decision by the Supreme Court in favor of the plaintiffs could have a knock-on effect where more people are looking to access outside the formal health care setting, either because they’re worried that access is going away or they’re having more trouble accessing the medications.”

Pam Belluck is a health and science reporter, covering a range of subjects, including reproductive health, long Covid, brain science, neurological disorders, mental health and genetics. More about Pam Belluck