Research Strategies

First Year, Transfer, & Student Success Librarian

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Samantha Hilton
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Academic Ethics

Why cite sources?  It is part of academic integrity.  It is important to cite sources for the following reasons:

  • To show the reader that you've done proper research and to allow the reader to track down your sources
  • To be a responsible scholar by giving credit to other researchers and acknowledging their ideas
  • To avoid plagiarism

Citation: A (very) brief introduction (YouTube)

Or read these for some more information:

Occidental College Academic Ethics

Avoiding plagiarism

Plagiarism.org

Citation Management

 

zotero.org logo

Zotero is a free, easy to use citation management platform built by scholars for scholars. Learn how to install it and use it from our Zotero guide, or set up a consultation with us and we'll walk you though it. 

Don't like Zotero?

Try Endnote or Refworks for a subscription-based, desktop reference management or free browser-based platforms like Mendeley.

Citation Styles

Each discipline has its own citation style and usually the name of the course will clue you in to which style to use (e.g Psychology uses the style of the American Psychological Association (APA), and English uses the Modern Language Association (MLA)). Be sure to check with your professor about which style they prefer you to use.

The Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL) offers detailed information about the most common citation formats: APA, MLA, and Chicago Manual of Style. These links will take you to general format information. Use the left sidebar on the Purdue OWL page to find more specific information about citation styles for different types of sources or review our Citation Style Help guide.

Citing Generative AI

Although there is general agreement that the output of a chatbot such as ChatGPT when incorporated into a person's work should be acknowledged, there is no current standard for accomplishing that.  Some publishers are recommending against citation since ChatGPT doesn't meet the qualifications of an author.  In addition, there is discussion about the extent of the citation as in whether it should include the original text prompt to the chatbot.

Some guidelines have been published by the following organizations:  

This research guide from the University of Waterloo gives some helpful examples of citations in the most common citation styles.

Citing Sources When Writing Code

You do need to cite sources when using or adapting another's work when writing your code just as you would when you write a research paper.  This guide to citing sources in code projects can help you properly cite your source.