by George Brosi

The key to documenting research papers is common courtesy--really! Those who have written for publication deserve to get credit for their words and ideas. Those who read publications benefit greatly from documentation which tells them where they can look to get more detailed information.

What needs to be documented is simply material which one individual or a group of individuals deserve credit for. Thus commonly known facts don't need documentation. No particular source made these facts known to the world.

On the other hand, all statistics need documentation. Statistics are created by individuals who work hard to produce them and deserve credit for this work. Also those who read statistics may legitimately want to know more information which they can only get from the source. If you didn't realize it before, now you know that statistics simply are not facts!

Direct quotations always need documentation.

So do ideas about causes, effects, solutions and so forth.

Documentation is just as necessary whether a written source is quoted, paraphrased or summarized.

All sources need to be documented in three different ways:

First, in the body--narrative--of your paper, introduce the author and source. The first time the author is mentioned, give the full name and a little background biographical information establishing the authors' credentials as an authority. Consider also telling the name of the book or the name of the article and/or the periodical in which it appeared. Whenever the author is mentioned subsequently, only the last name needs to be given unless this author has more than one source or there are additional authors with this last name. Mentioning, or introducing, the author establishes in the readers' minds that the writer of the paper is now utilizing the source.

When you are done utilizing the source and want to go back into your own words, supply parenthetical documentation. If you have just cited the author, simply put the page number(s) you are utilizing in parenthesis between the end of your quote, paraphrase or summary and the ending punctuation.

At the end of the paper, on a new page, attach a Works Cited page. This page is numbered with a "running head" and lists all sources you have used alphabetically by author.