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Citing Scientific Literature

One of the most important aspects of a scientific record is the literature upon which it is based. References
are essential in scientific writing, as authors must allow readers to assess the merit of their work and how it
contributes to the scientific record. Therefore, when summarizing or referring to information taken from
another scientists work, writers must provide the specific piece of work from which the information was
obtained. In this course, we will be citing scientific sources in weekly discussion posts as well as in the
literature review assignment, so correct and complete citations of sources are very important. You should
use this document to understand how scientific sources should be cited, keeping in mind that there are a
lot of small details you need to follow. You should also note that citing lecture materials or the textbook in
the weekly discussion posts is not discussed here because citing those materials is only relevant to the
discussion board (and not the literature review assignment). Guidelines for citing these lecture materials
and the textbook as sources are outlined in How to Maximize Your Discussion Grade in the Week 1 folder.
What is appropriate to cite for your literature review:
Cite only what was directly addressed by the authors in each paper. The information within a paper that
you could cite would be located in the results section, which is summarized in the abstract and given
additional context in the discussion. If you cite a paper that was cited in the introduction, then you are
liable to make an incorrect assumption on the material.

For instance, if I'm writing a paper titled "Two pink horses found in Oregon" and I write in the introduction:
"Pink animals have been found elsewhere. Mikey et al. (1935) documented a pink elephant in New York."
You could NOT cite me about pink elephants. In fact, the phenomena occurred in 1935 when I wasn't born
- my paper has nothing to do with elephants. You would need to read Mikey et al. (1935) to make sure that
study related to your topic. You could spread false information if you do not read the source article.
Maybe the elephant was painted and I cited it incorrectly as well - rumors upon rumors. As such, it's quite
common for literature cited sections to be long. Be prepared to use more than 5 papers if you need
additional information about your species but do not go over the page limit. It's essential that you
understand how to properly cite literature as you advance within the scientific fields.
How to cite within your literature review:
Although you need to cite your sources in your writing, providing the entire citation is cumbersome and can
make a piece of writing difficult to read. If you have read scientific articles previously, you know that within
a piece of writing sources are cited for specific points via short, in-text citations, and at the end of the
article there is a separate section (used labeled Literature Cited) which provides details for each citation
that allow readers to locate it for further study.


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In-text citations
The structure of in-text citations varies depending on the number of authors. When there are more than
two authors, the Latin term et al. is used (translation: and others). This is shorthand that gets around
having to cite every author on a paper (which can sometimes number in the hundreds in some disciplines!).
Be sure to include the period because et al. is itself an abbreviation for et alii and the period is needed
to be correct. Here are some examples of in-text citations with different numbers of authors:
Single author: Mule deer often have twins under good foraging conditions (Orrico 2007).

Two authors: Mule deer often have twins under good foraging conditions (Orrico and Senyck 2007).

More than two authors: Mule deer often have twins under good foraging conditions (Orrico et al.
2007).

Use care with multiple in-text citations. When citing >1 references at one point in a paper, the references
should be listed in chronological order (i.e., oldest most recent); if multiple citations are listed for a
particular year, the references should be listed alphabetically for that year. Heres an example:
Mule deer often have twins under good foraging conditions (Samuels 1993, Johnson et al. 2004, Wilkins
2004, Brown and Elder 2007, Orrico 2007).

There are two ways to display in-text citations. Indirect citations are most commonly used because they
place emphasis on the evidence being cited; in contrast, direct citations emphasize the authors. Here are
two examples:
Indirect citation: Mule deer often have twins under good foraging conditions (Orrico 2007).

Direct citation: Orrico (2007) found mule deer often have twins under good foraging conditions.

Citations in the Literature Cited section
Each reference must include details that allow a reader to locate it and review it for himself/herself.
There are five different types of scientific references that you may cite in this course (in addition to lecture
notes and the textbook within the context of the discussion board), and each one contains slightly different
details. Many students lose points in discussion posts and in the literature review assignment because they
dont pay close attention to how these references are put together, so make sure you put in the time to
understand how these references are structured (e.g., journal volume number is included but issue number
is not; books only include the city of publication and not the state or country).
Journal article
Olson, K. A. 2011. Death by a thousand huts? Effects of household presence on density and distribution
of Mongolian gazelles. Conservation Biology 16:1304-1312.

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Brown, J. S., and N. B. Pavlovic. 1992. Evolution in heterogeneous environments: effects of migration on
habitat specialization. Evolutionary Ecology 6:360382.

Nevo, E., V. Simosen, C. M. Orrico, and A. R. Templeton. 2007. Starch gel electrophoresis of enzymesa
compilation of recipes. Biochemical Genetics 21:221-231.

Book
Mock, D. W., and G. A. Parker. 1997. The evolution of sibling rivalry. Oxford University Press, Oxford.

Book chapter/conference proceeding
Chappell, M. A., and G. C. Bachman. 2002. Energetic costs of begging behavior. Pp. 143-162 in The
evolution of begging (J. Wright and M. L. Leonard, eds.). Kluwer Academic, Amsterdam.

Technical Report
Goodwin, J. C., and R. B. Hungerford. 1979. Rodent population densities and food habitats in Arizona
ponderosa pine forests. United States Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain
Forest and Range Experiment Station, Research Paper RM-214:112.

Thesis or Dissertation
Stewart, P. D. 1997. The social behavior of the European badger, Meles meles. Ph.D. dissertation,
University of Oxford, Oxford.
The citation for the Mammalian Species Accounts should be written like a journal article. Each account is
considered as a separate volume, with the page numbers representing the length of the account:
Woods, C. A., and D. K. Boraker. 1975. Octodon degus. Mammalian Species 67:1-5.
Smith, A. T., and M. L. Weston. 1990. Ochotona princeps. Mammalian Species 352:1-8.
Clark, Jr., H. O., D. P. Newman, J. D. Murdoch, J. Tseng, Z. H. Wang, and R. B. Harris. 2008. Vulpes
ferrilata. Mammalian Species 821:1-6.

References are organized alphabetically in the Literature Cited section by the last name of the first
author. The Literature Cited section must list all sources that have been cited and should be organized in
alphabetical order. When there are multiple references for an author, they should be organized
chronologically, with single-authored works listed first. If multiple multi-author references are from the
same year, they should be listed alphabetically by additional authors, starting with the second author. The
following list of references is a good model to follow for content and format when putting together your
Literature Cited section.
Reichman, O. J. 1983. Comparison of the diets of a caching and a non-caching rodent. American Naturalist
122:576-581.
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Reichman, O. J. 1985. Spatial and temporal variation in seed distributions in desert soils. Journal of
Biogeography 11:1-11.
Reichman, O. J. 1988. Konza: A tallgrass natural history. University Press of Kansas, Lawrence.
Reichman, O. J. 1991. Desert mammal communities. Pp. 311-347 in Desert Communities (G. Polis, ed.).
University of Arizona Press, Tucson.
Reichman, O. J., and C. Rebar. 1982. Seed preference by desert rodents based on levels of moldiness.
Animal Behavior 33:726-729.
Reichman, O. J., and S. Smith. 1982. Impact of pocket gopher burrows on overlying vegetation. Journal of
Mammalogy 66:720-725.
Reichman, O. J., A. Fattaey, and K. Fattaey. 1986. Management of sterile and moldy seeds by a desert
rodent. Animal Behavior 34:221-225.
Reichman, O. J., and J. U. M. Jarvis. 1989. The impact of three species of sympatric fossorial herbivorous
mole-rats (Rodentia: Bathyergidae) on overlying vegetation. Journal of Mammalogy 70:763-771.
Reichman, O. J., and S. Smith. 1991. Effects of simulated leaf and root herbivory on mortality, biomass,
reproduction, and nutrient allocation in a biennial, Tragopogon dubius. Ecology 72:116-124.