Academic referencing is a skill every student needs. From High School right up to a Doctoral Degree, you will need to know how to reference any quotes you include in any projects, essays, or other assignments.
Are you confused about how to cite a reference? Check out how to do it, what you will need, and what referencing style you should be using for your work.
What Is Academic Referencing?
Academic Referencing is the information used to cite a source of information. This referencing allows you to use the information of someone else’s work to support the purpose of your paper, without claiming the work as your own.
Referencing your sources of information lets your audience know that you did not conduct the study or research yourself, but the information is correct and legitimate.
Why Is Referencing Important?
Referencing the information you use is important because you are using the information that someone else did the work to find. Referencing is important for your audience to be able to find where you got the information so that they can research further if they are interested.
Also, if you do not reference the work, you are officially claiming the work as your own. This is known as plagiarism, and will result in many consequences that can be severely damaging to your reputation and your future.
What Are The Consequences Of Plagiarism?
If you do not reference your sources, you can be accused of plagiarism. This is a very serious accusation, and can result in legal action being taken against you.
This can result in many things, such as you having to pay a fine, having to pay royalties to the original author or company, benign suspended or expelled from your institution of study, failing the assignment, or going to jail.
What Are The Different Types Of Referencing?
There are many types, or styles, of referencing. Each type works slightly differently, and some will require information that others do not. The most common referencing styles are:
- American Psychological Association (APA)
- Chicago/Turabian
- Harvard
- Modern Language Association (MLA)
- Oxford
- Vancouver
The referencing style you use will depend on the type of paper you are submitting, and the requirements of the institution where you will submit your paper.
What Is The Most Commonly Used Reference Style?
In South Africa, the most commonly used reference styles are APA and Harvard. The main difference between the two is that the APA referencing style is used mainly in education, social and behavioural science related academic work, and the Harvard referencing style is used mainly for academic and scientific writing.
What To Include In Referencing?
The information you will need to create a proper academic reference is as follows:
- The author’s name and surname
- Year of publication
- Edition (book source)
- City Published (book source)
- Article title (journal source)
- Journal (journal source)
- Volume number (journal source)
- Issue number (journal source)
- Pages used (journal source and book source)
- Date accessed (journal source)
- Website name (online sources)
- Page title (online source)
- URL (online source)
- Publisher
- Date accessed
If a company or group published the work, you will list the group or company name in place of an author’s name.
What Should An Academic Reference Look Like?
This depends on the referencing style you use. You will also reference the work in two ways, which are called “citation” and “referencing”.
First, you will reference the source in your writing with citations. Note that you will need to cite your source every time you include information from your source, even if you paraphrase it.
Then, at the end of your paper, you will start a new page for your references, and you will reference, in alphabetical order, each work you cited in your paper.
An example of referencing would be this one from Business Balls:
Studies have been done that indicate long-term smoking is linked to respiratory diseases (Jones et al., 1995; Smith and Davies, 1998).
You will notice that in this reference, the author is listed as “Jones et al.”, and this is done when there are more than five authors. You will list the first author (alphabetically) and then write “et al.” instead of writing out all names.
Here are examples of the different types of referencing styles:
| For APA referencing style: |
Within your writing, you will cite: Author’s Surname (Year of publication) For example: Ashbourn (2014) At the end of your paper, you will reference: Author’s Surname, Author’s Initials. (Year of publication). Title of the work, (edition). Place of publication: publisher. For example: Ashbourn, J. (2014). Biometrics in the new world: the cloud, mobile technology and pervasive identity, (2nd ed) London: Springer. |
What Do I Do If I Am Missing A Piece Of Information?
This depends on what piece of information you are missing. If you cannot find the author’s name, you will list it as “Anonymous” in place of the Author’s Name in the reference and citation.
For example:
| APA: | Harvard: |
Anonymous (2014) – for citation Anonymous (2014). Biometrics in the new world: the cloud, mobile technology and pervasive identity, (2nd ed) London: Springer. – for referencing | (Anonymous, 2014) – for citation Anonymous (2014) Biometrics in the new world: the cloud, mobile technology and pervasive identity. 2nd edn. London: Springer. – for referencing |
If you are missing the date, you will write “No date” in place of the date.
For example:
| APA: | Harvard: |
Ashbourn (no date) – for citation Ashbourn, J. (no date) Biometrics in the new world: the cloud, mobile technology and pervasive identity. 2nd edn. London: Springer. – for referencing | (Ashbourn, no date) – for citation Ashbourn, J. (no date) Biometrics in the new world: the cloud, mobile technology and pervasive identity. 2nd edn. London: Springer. – for referencing |
There are also referencing tools available to help you structure your references.
Referencing Tools
There are also many tools that can help you reference your sources in the correct format required by your teacher or lecturer.
Here are a few:
Author: Chloe Bydawell
Editor: Sive Ncanywa
Date: September 19, 2022