Common Citation Questions - Academic Skills

What to Cite and How to Cite It

How do I know what kind of source I am using?
1. How do I know if a source is scholarly or peer reviewed?
Where do I find publication information?
What citation style should I use?
When do I need to include a citation?
Should I reference digital content, such as pictures of artwork, or infographics when I include them in an essay or PowerPoint presentation?
How do I make a Reference list, Bibliography, or Works Cited page? How do I know which one to use?
How do I cite an article, book, website, or other source? What information do I need to include in a reference entry?
How do I format my paper?
How do I avoid plagiarism?
Should I use citation generators?

How do I know what kind of source I am using?

In order to know what format your reference should take, you must first identify what kind of source you are citing. At times this can be difficult: Is it an article in a scholarly journal or an article in a popular magazine or newspaper? Is it a report published on a website or a general webpage?

To answer these questions, you need to pay close attention to where the source was originally published.

Scholarly Journals, Popular Magazines, and Newspapers or News agencies

For instance, if an article was published in a print copy or on the website of Maclean’s or The New York Times, you would reference it as an article in a magazine or newspaper; however, if an article is peer reviewed, then it is almost certainly published in a scholarly journal, and you would use the appropriate citation style.

If you are unsure, look carefully at the information attached to the article.

Newspapers and magazines generally include full dates for their articles, including month, day, and year.
Scholarly journals generally only have a year as their publication date but include a volume number (and sometimes an issue number) to indicate when in the year an article was published.

Webpages and Online Reports or Documents

If you download a document (often as a PDF) from a website, and the document has an author and publication date, then you would cite it as a document or report and include information to show that you accessed it online.

In contrast, if you are citing information that you found on a webpage, you would use a referencing style for a webpage or website.

How do I know if a source is scholarly or peer reviewed?

Most academic assignments require you to use scholarly or peer reviewed sources. These words indicate that a source has been independently reviewed and approved by experts in the field, a process known as peer-review.

The easiest way to determine if a source is scholarly is to use a database from Trent’s Bata Library. From the search results page, scroll to the article you would like to use, and click on the “Get it at Trent” button. This will take you to a new page. If the source is scholarly, you will see the words “Peer Reviewed” at the top of the page.

Trent’s Bata Library also provides an excellent tutorial on how to identify scholarly sources when you do not have access to the “Get it at Trent” button.

Where do I find publication information?

The location of publication information for a source will depend on the type of source it is and how you accessed the source.

What citation style should I use?

Each discipline follows different rules for citation. Start with Find Documentation Style by Discipline. Remember to refer to your syllabus and assignment instructions for particular course requirements for citation.

When do I need to include a citation?

Cite all paraphrases or summaries of ideas or information that are not your own.
Cite all direct quotations of two or more consecutive words. In fact, a single distinctive term taken from a source should be placed in quotation marks and cited.
Cite all sources that inform your work, including data, charts, films, maps, graphs, web pages, photographs, television news reports, lectures, and video/audio files.

Should I reference digital content, such as pictures of artwork, or infographics when I include them in an essay or PowerPoint presentation?

There are several ways that you might use digital images created by others in your academic work. For instance, you might use a picture, or drawing, to enhance the visual impact of a presentation, or you might paste an infographic into a report to help you illustrate a concept. If you are using images and graphics for aesthetic purposes (background or visual appeal), you should use the clip art, or stock images licensed to you by the software that you have purchased (PowerPoint, Microsoft Word, Canva, and other licensed software). Otherwise, you must reference the source of the image as it will most likely be copyrighted. While it might be visually stunning to create a PowerPoint slide with a background image of a pop culture icon, you may be doing something illegal. The example below illustrates the proper way to reference a copyrighted image using APA documentation requirements.

Figure 1

Woman's face depicted in bright colours on orange backdrop.

Image from Marilyn Diptych, 1962 by Andy Warhol

So, if you would like to use an image you have found on the internet in your academic work for something other than visual appeal you need to follow the guidelines set out by the documentation style you are using. Most of these documentation styles require that you create a figure to house the item, and include a copyright attribution in the figure note.

Note: You may use these images because the The Copyright Act allows copyrighted images to be used in an ‘education’ setting under the ‘fair dealing’ exception.

How to cite a picture, drawing, or other image, from a public website using APA documentation style.

How do I make a Reference list, Bibliography, or Works Cited list? How do I know which one to use?

Each citation style has slightly different requirements of the reference list, and they have different titles, too. See the details for the four major styles:

How do I cite an article, book, website, or other source? What information do I need to include in a reference entry?

The information in a reference entry is important; it allows the reader to retrieve the source. However, different types of sources provide different information.

It is your goal to offer a complete reference entry, so all styles require information about the author (an individual, group, or agency), the title (article, journal, book, website, video, etc.), the year of publication and other relevant retrieval information.

Find the site map for each major style to locate instructions and examples for in-text and reference entries for print and electronic sources, ranging from books, journal articles, and websites to government documents, blog posts, and video files:

How do I format my paper?

Most styles adhere to standard 1” (2.54 cm) margins, a simple font (like Times New Roman) in 12 point, double-spaced with indented paragraphs, and pagination in the upper right corner.

Formatting guidelines and sample papers are available for the four major styles:

How do I avoid plagiarism?

Follow the conventions for citation and referencing that your discipline requires. Include both in-text citations and complete reference lists.
Learn to paraphrase and summarize effectively. Read Paraphrasing and Summarizing: "Putting It In Your Own Words"
Practice good research and writing techniques. Review the Avoiding Plagiarism section of How to Use Sources.

Should I use citation generators?

Citation generators, like those available in Microsoft Word or in article databases such as ProQuest or Scholar’s Portal, are helpful tools; however, much like spell checkers, their capacities are limited. It is important to check any citations you download from a citation generator to ensure they follow the style’s conventions for punctuation, capitalization and to ensure the required elements are all present and in the correct order.