References - WikiofScience

References

Editing on WikiofScience- Index » References

Text content should follow accepted conventions in scientific and academic circles in regards to referencing. In-text referencing is 'author-year of work' instead of a numeric footnote.

This site also works with a particular referencing style. This style aims to achieve two goals: firstly, to provide as much information as possible about the reference; secondly, to make it as user-friendly as possible. This is achieved by considering each reference as composed of three sections:

author section	title section	location section
SURNAME Name (date work).	Title.	Location, date publication, ISBN

Eg:
CASNER Stephen M (2008). General aviation pilots' attitudes toward advanced cockpit systems. International Journal of Applied Aviation Studies, 2008, volume 8, number 1, pages 88-112.
RESERVE BANK OF NEW ZEALAND (2010). New Zealand inflation calculator. Retrieved from the Reserve Bank of New Zealand on 24 July 2011.
SUROWIECKI James (2004). The wisdom of crowds (ISBN 9780349116051). Abacus (London, UK), 2005.

Notice that, when referencing outside WikiofScience, the appropriate date is the date of publication (found in the location section) and not the date the work was done (as in the author section).

author section	title section	location section
SURNAME Name (date work).	Title.	Location, date publication, ISBN

The author section

The author section identifies both authors and the date the work was carried out. This section is bold typed in the references section (or in a bibliography).

Authors

Each author comprises a unity formed by his SURNAME and names, without any further need for punctuation in between. A colon (,) serves to separate different authors, and (&) is used instead of a colon to separate the last author from the one before last. (Eg, SMITH John Adams, Joanna SMITH & Lewis JOHNSON)
- Authors' SURNAMES are capitalized but not so their names. The capitalization allows to differentiate between names and surnames easily, so that we can dispense with punctuation symbols. (Eg, SMITH John, Felipe RODRIGUEZ MELINA & LANG Lee)
- Names should be spelled out if the information is available, as this provides more information about the author and helps solve ambiguities between different authors with similar names. Otherwise use initial capitals without separation, unless this creates further confusion. (Eg, SMITH John Adams, SMITH Joanna, JOHNSON L, CARPENTER JC, WANG L Y O).
- Use the order 'SURNAME name' at the beginning of the reference, in order to facilitate its alphabetical ordering among other references. Beyond this, the ordering of the remaining authors can be done conventionally, or in a way which is more advantageous to a particular population. (Eg, SMITH John Adams & Lewis JOHNSON; CARPENTER JC & WANG L Y O).
The actual authors of the work identifies the particular piece of work referred to (as it is convention). The following points may help identify the authors of the work:
- If the reference is to a book, the book author.
- If the reference is to a chapter in an edited book, the author of the chapter.
- If the reference is to a journal article (news report, etc), the author of the article.

Date of work

The date the work was done follows the authors, is written between parentheses and is separated from the following section by a stop (.) [Eg, SMITH John Adams (2001).]
The date of work informs of the date the data was collected or the work was first done, and helps put the work in a better 'historical' context. This date goes a bit against convention as it is not necessarily the same than the date of publication of the work in question.
The following points may help identify the date the work was done:
- The methods section may indicate when data collection took place or, if data mining, the period covered. Use the year the data collection was stopped or the last year of the period as indicative of the latest possible date of the work (ie, how 'young' the data is).
- Some journals inform of when articles were first submitted. Because some articles take far too long from first submission to final acceptance and publication, we may assume that no new data has been collected in the interim (unless there is an indication to the contrary). Thus, lacking any other information, the date of first submission represents, reasonably, a date closer to when the sample was collected than the date of publication.
- Some book authors date their forewords, maybe a year earlier than publication. Thus, lacking any other information, the date in a foreword represents, reasonably, a date closer to when the book was actually finished (and the author stopped thinking about it) than the date when it was officially published.
- Books may carry over several editions, but many have are not been edited any further (especially if the author has passed away). Thus, the date of the first edition should be the date of the work for books which have been simply reprinted (ie, those that have not been altered, other than cosmetically, by the author).
- Books which have been re-edited should be considered as 'new' books, and the latter date should be used as the date of the work (ie, we may assume the author has reviewed and updated the book contents as appropriate; whatever remains represents the contemporary thinking of the author up till that date).
- If no other information about the date of the work is clearly available on the work in question (ie, no double guessing, deduction or external corroboration allowed), then use the date of publication instead.

The title section

The title section identifies the actual title of the work referred to. This section is italicized in the references section (or in a bibliography), and it is written in lower capitals, as appropriate, instead of in title capitals. (Eg, The wisdom of crowds.)
The actual title of the work identifies the particular piece of work referred to. (It goes a bit against convention, namely with journals, as it represents the actual title of an article and not the name of a journal.)
The following points may help identify the title of the work:
- If the reference is to a book, the book title. (Eg, The wisdom of crowds.)
- If the reference is to a chapter in an edited book, the title of the chapter. (Eg, …)
- If the reference is to a journal article (news report, etc), the title of the article. (Eg, In praise of the null hypothesis statistical test.)

The location section

The location section informs of where to find the work referred to. This section uses normal font, and goes at the end of the reference. It goes a bit against convention, as it needs to provide the information that goes, conventionally, earlier on, and we want to provide as much information as possible without in a user-friendly manner.
The following hints may be useful:
- For journal articles, provide: Name of the journal (ISSN), year publication, volume, issue, pages. (+ further optional information, such as DOI, internet linkage -for freely available articles, only-, etc). Do not shorten the name of the journal, nor use vol., pp., etc. [Eg, American Psychologist (ISSn 0003-066X), volume 52, number 1, pages 15-24.]
- For books, provide: Title of the book, year of publication. Editorial (locality, country). ISBN. (Eg, The craft of researchers, 2008. Wiley & Sons (Chicago, USA). ISBN 9786330065663.)
- For book chapters, provide: Full reference to the book itself, including editors, etc. following a note such as "Chapter 3 in,". (Eg, Chapter 6 in, SMITH John & Joanna SMITH [ed] (2000). The craft of researchers (3rd edition), 2008. Wiley & Sons (Chicago, USA). ISBN 9786330065663.)
for websites, provide: Retrieved from http://…, on date (with the internet address doubling as a link to the website). (Eg, Retrieved from http://www.wikipedia.org/, on 3 September 2010.)