| Once your research is completed, you need to list the information sources you have identified and evaluated to support your research question.
These sources will be presented in a bibliography or works cited, which is a list of the information sources you used in preparing your work. Citations are also sometimes shown by using in-text references (in other words, short citations within the text of your paper), which readers can use in conjunction with the bibliography to distinguish your ideas from those you cite. To present your list of sources in a uniform and appropriate format, you use a citation style. There are many documentation styles in use, often determined by the discipline of study.
Although the form of the citation may vary in terms of punctuation and ordering of the descriptive elements, their common purpose is to provide sufficient information to allow a reader to easily find and locate the exact book, journal article, or Web page you referenced in your research paper.
The three documentation styles most commonly used by college students are:
- American Psychological Association (APA)
APA is used in the social sciences, education and the behavioral sciences. Citations to original sources are inserted in the text of the paper using parentheses. They are placed immediately following the information drawn from the source(s).
- Modern Languages Association (MLA)
MLA is used in humanities research. This style also uses citations in parentheses within the text to point to sources in an alphabetized list of works cited that appears at the end of the research paper. These in-text citations are very similar to those used with the APA system.
- Chicago Manual of Style and Turabian's Manual for Writers (Chicago/Turabian)
These styles originated at the University of Chicago and are accepted for use in all disciplines. Unlike MLA and APA, this style is most commonly thought of as a footnote system. In recent years Chicago/Turabian have included instructions for parenthetical documentation and reference lists. Check with your mentor to determine whether you should use footnote or parenthetical citation form in your text.
Empire State College makes EndNote software available to its students at a substantial discount through the ESC Bookstore. Use EndNote to import, format, and keep track of bibliographic information, and insert citations into your MS Word documents. |  | Follow these links to learn more about creating citations and a bibliography and to see specific format guidelines and examples for each of the widely used citation styles:
Understanding Citations - multimedia tutorial
(or access a print version)
Writing Resource Center: Documenting Sources - Empire State College
Contains detailed explanations and links for documenting sources and avoiding plagiarism, including specifics for the APA and MLA styles.
Diane Hacker's Research and Documentation Online
See links to resources, example citations and sample papers using most of the major styles.
ONLINE! A Reference Guide to Using Internet Resources: Citation Styles
Details and examples for citing web and other electronic sources in a variety of styles.
Understanding Citations - Ryerson University
Shows several citation examples with each part of the citation labeled.
Son of Citation Machine
Use this tool to input your citation information and have the citation formatted according to the citation style you choose (using buttons in upper left).
Writing an Annotated Bibliography
How to write and format one, including samples. |
