A List Of Basic Rules For Citing Sources In A Dissertation

The reason for making citations in your dissertation is to let your readers know that a specific piece of information (data, idea, etc.) you are using is not of you own reasoning or observation, but rather comes from somebody else. In most cases, the credibility and strength of your dissertation depends on the validity of the works you cite, as well as your ability to cite those works clearly without committing plagiarism.

Even in instances where you fail to cite a source, or do so incorrectly, without intention, the consequences of your actions can be punished heavily, potentially tarnishing your academic and professional careers. So we put together this list of basic rules for properly citing sources in your dissertation:

Gathering Information about Each Source: The first rule is to figure out what type of information is required from each kind of source. It’s good to get this stuff out of the way as you conduct your research, rather than wait until you are done and then have to go back to each source to get everything down.

Books: Books are pretty straightforward. You’ll want to take down the full names of authors, the title of each book, the city in which it was published, the publishing house’s name, and the year in which it was published. All of this information will be located on the book’s title page.

Journal/Magazine Articles: Citing journal and magazine articles is pretty similar to one another. Take down the title of the journal, the title of the article and author’s name. Also take down the volume and issue number, the date in which it was published and the page number that the article appears in.

Newspaper Articles: Newspapers are a little different. Again you’ll want to take down the article’s author, the article’s title, as well as the newspaper’s name, and the date of publication. You’ll also want to take down the section, page and column in which the article appears. For online newspapers you’ll want to take down the URL and the date in which you accessed the article.

Websites: Now that the internet spreads information so quickly, more and more students are turning to online sources when writing their dissertations. To cite properly you need to take down the author’s name, the title of the work you are citing, the group responsible for the information on the website, the date in which the website was last updated, the date you accessed the website and the URL.