Referencing and Citations

STA 2313 Research Methodology for Statistics
Athiany, H.K.O
BSc Statistics and Biostatistics

February 14, 2020
Jan, 2020
Athiany, H.K.O (JKUAT) STA 2313 Research Methodology for Statistics Jan, 2020 1 / 19
Outline of the Lecture
1 Literature Review
Referencing, citations and bibliographies
Referencing (Illustrations)
Learning Activities and Revision Questions
Referencing and citations involves acknowledging the source of what you

are saying. This is very essential in academic research, publication, reports
among others.
Failure to acknowledge the source of the material will tantamount to
Plagiarism. Both Plagiarism and falsifying research data are totally
unacceptable in academic circles. Either of these crimes will result in your
losing employment, funding, and credibility, and lead to expulsion
from your degree course or to failure.
Definition 1. Plagiarism is defined as stealing the writings or ideas of

another. It occurs when you are using work that you do not
acknowledge, even if you have put those ideas into your own
words.
You are expected to use other people’s ideas and even on occasion their
words, but you must always acknowledge that you are using them.
There are many different styles of providing the sources of your

information, but all systems involve citing the author in the text where
you use their ideas (either in brackets or in a footnote).
In addition you must provide the full reference to the citation – usually in
a reference list at the end but sometimes by providing the information in
footnotes throughout the text. The detailed references must provide all
the information needed for your reader to access the original source.
Why provide citations and references?
To provide evidence – the most important part of contributing to

humanity’s store of knowledge is to be sure that the contribution is
valid (within the limits of what is known at the time). As an academic
you should never make unsupported assertions. Evidence and support
come from: - empirical facts which you obtain by carrying out
experiments or collecting data which ‘prove’ that this is a reflection
of the real world; - theoretical principles (and in some cases you may
need to show how these were derived or why they are valid); -
literature – what other people have found out. You need to say where
you got this information from – hence citations and references
To allow your readers to check what was said and to ensure that you
have interpreted it correctly
To allow your readers to discover more information and read more
deeply on the topic.
A bibliography
A bibliography or reference list gives all the work you have cited in
alphabetical order by author’s surname, or institutional (corporate)
name, or by title where no name is given and is usually situated at the
end of the main body of your work, but before the appendices.
There are many different styles of referencing (APA, Havard,
Vancuver, Numbered, Numbered Superscript, e.t.c) and you can
chose to use any system, provided you are consistent.
You also need to consult the university on the correct mode of
referencing.
When you are publishing journal articles you will need to check and
see what system is used by that journal.
The elements are the same in all reference lists but they may use a
different order and different punctuation.
A bibliography
The Royal Agricultural College Library has compiled a comprehensive

description of the Harvard System also known as the Author-Year or
Name-Date system.
In the text (citation) you should include the author or editors surname
in brackets after the presentation of her/his ideas or a direct
quotation (e.g., Rachier and Amolo). It is also common to include
the date with the surname/s (e.g., Rachier and Amolo, 2004) but
this is only essential when you have more than one publication by the
same author/editors.
If you have more than one by the same author in the same year, then
you also use alphabetical letters (e.g.,Rachier and Amolo, 2004b)
to distinguish them.
It is only for quotations (using the other author’s words) or where you
want to provide your reader with direct access to the source, that you
include the page numbers in your citation in the text.
A bibliography
When you quote directly from another work you must indicate this
with quotation marks and then beneath where it appears in your text,
insert the author/editor name and the page number(s) of the original
text. This will correspond to the name/s as they appear in the
alphabetical sequence of citations in your bibliography or reference
list.
Generally textural quotations should correspond precisely to the
original in wording, spelling, capitalization and punctuation. With
short quotations incorporate passages of not more than four lines
directly into your text, identified by quotation marks, e.g., Wanjala
(1984) ‘The natural cycles of biodiversity are affected where there is
habitat destruction,. . . ..monoculture crops or forest plantations.’
With longer quotations (two or more sentences or more than four
lines) set the quotation off from your text and indent from the left
margin.
How to prepare main elements of reference list
Author
Surname first, followed by initial(s)
Where more than one author, list them with ‘and’ before the last one. (When
citing in the text if there are more than three, put first named followed by... et al.
(meaning ‘and the rest’. But all their names must appear in the Reference List at
the end)
If they are editors, put ed. or eds. in brackets after the name(s)
Corporate authors: where initials are commonly used, e.g., FAO (Food and
Agriculture Organization of the United Nations), make sure that somewhere in
your paper, (perhaps as a separate appendix) you have a list of acronyms giving
their full expansions.
Title
Must be in italics
Capital letter for the first word only, or second word if the first is an article
Take the wording from the title-page of the book (not the cover as it may differ)
A colon precedes the sub-title. (Always include sub-titles because they often give
extra useful information.)
Books: Personal author

Surname, initial(s). (Year) Title: sub-title. Edition (if more than one).
Publisher. Place of Publication e.g Venkatesan, V. (1994) Seed Systems in
Sub-Saharan Africa: Issues and Options. World Bank, Washington DC,
USA.
Chapter in book
Cite the author(s) of the chapter, use the word In: to indicate where that
chapter is, then give the title of the book in italics and editor name(s)
publishing details and lastly the page numbers in the book e.g. Ondiege,
P. (1996) Land tenure and soil conservation. In: C. Juma and J.B. Ojwang
(Eds) In Land We Trust: Environment, Private Property and
Constitutional Change Initiatives Publishers, Nairobi, Kenya, and Zed
Books, London, UK. pp. 117-142.
Conference proceedings
A paper in a collection of conference proceedings is cited in similar
fashion: Malaa. D and M. Vabi (2006) The role of market women in
ensuring food secuirty in the Republic of Cameroon in G. Tusiime and M
Mwanjololo (Eds) Enhancing Women’s Role and Participation in Science
for Food and Nutritional Security in Africa Proceedings of the
CTA-FARARUFORUM Women’s Conference 2-7 July Entebbe Uganda B.
Evans (Ed). Cambridge Environmental Initiative: 37-53.
Journal articles
Author(s). (Year) Title of article. Title of journal. Volume (part number):
page nos e.g Adebooye, O., S. Ajayi, J. Baidu-Forson and J. Opabode
(2005) Seed constraint to cultivation and productivity of African
indigenous leafy vegetables. African Journal of Biotechnology 4(13),
1480-1484.
Unpublished dissertations or theses
Olupot, G (2004) Effect of enriching kraal manure on the yield of sorghum
in integrated nutrient management in Kumi Disctrict. Unplublished M.Sc
thesis, Faculty of Agriculture, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda.
Personal communication
Guveya, E. and Mokitimi N. (2007 May 22) Conversation about the role of
secure tenure in sustainable resource use. Roma University, Maseru,
Lesotho.
Internet
Author. (Year) Title. [online]. Edition. Publisher. Available from: URL
[Date accessed] e.g
Environment Agency. (2002) Fisheries action plans [online]. Environment
Agency. Available from: http://www.environmentagency.
gov.uk/subjects/fish/ [Date accessed: August 2007]
The term Publisher is used to cover the organization responsible for
maintaining the site on the Internet (corporate author).
If it is not immediately obvious, delete sections of the URL one by one,
going higher up the chain of the Internet address to find out who created
the website.It is worth keeping copies of key Internet pages on your
computer as they can disappear.
Electronic journal articles
Author (Year) Title of article. Journal title. [online or CDROM] volume
(issue), pagination. Available from: URL. [Date accessed]
e.g Horesh, R. (2002 Sept) Better than Kyoto: climate stability bonds.
Economic Affairs. [online]. 22(3):48-52 Available from:
http://www.iea.org.uk [Date accessed: August 2007]
E-mail communications
Discussion lists generate e-mail messages which are sent directly to the
subscriber. References to these messages should be treated in a similar
fashion to journal references. Use the list name in place of the journal title
and the subject line of the message in place of the article title. After
‘Available from’, use the e-mail address of the list administrator or URL of
the archive.
Author (Year, month, day). Subject of message. Discussion list [online].
Available from: list email address [Date accessed]
e.g Francis, J. and R. Rege (2007 February) Information and
Communication Management Strategies email list serve CTA S&T
Knowledge for Development also available from http://knowledge.[Date
accessed: 15.7.2007]
Remark: Most typesetting software have a research component that
allows for automatic insertion of bibiliography and list of references based
on existing styles. Software such a LYX (LATEX) allows users to create a
database of the reference resources. During the document preparation, the
user just points at the desired reference and the computer is able to cite
and at the same time produce the list at specified points on the document.
Citation
Simply taking a face-to-face course and converting it into an online one is

not likely to be successful (Whitlock (2001)). eLearning is becoming the
way to go if student-centred learning is to be encouraged and if education
is to be made available to all irrespective of location, time and status in the
society.
Hadengue (2005) describes online learning......Kangethe et al. (2008) has
documented this but an experimental study has not been done. An attempt
has been made to explain how e-learning brings efficiency in learning and
grading. Hsu et al. (2009) used Moodle, to design an elearning platform for
mathematics...Recently, the Aga Khan University-Institute for Educational
Development...benefit (Onguko (2010)).
Bibliography
Hadengue, Veronique (2005), ‘E-learning for information literacy: A case study’, Library
Review 54(1), 36–46. URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/00242530510574147
Hsu, Chun-Yi, Francis Mou Te Chang and Yu Sheng Lo (2009), Promoting students
learning achievement and efficiency on elearning, in ‘International Symposium on
Computing, Communication, and Control’.
Kangethe, S. M., A. N. Simiyu, J. M. Kihoro and J. N. Gichuru (2008), Elearning
challenges and opportunities in kenyan institution of higher learning; a case of jkuat, in
‘In Proceedings of 2008 JKUAT Scientific Technological and Industrial Conference’.
Onguko, Brown (2010), Design, implementation and institutionalization of mobile
learning in higher education, Technical report, Aga Khan University, Institute for
Educational Development, Eastern Africa and University of Calgary,
http://wikieducator.org. Last Accessed 12/9/2011.
Whitlock, Q. (2001), ‘Course design for online learning- what’s gone wrong’, In J.
Stephenson,Teaching and Learning .
Learning Activities and Revision Questions
Learning Activity
Discuss the stages involved in internet search.
Revision Questions
Exercise 1. List three reasons why literature review is important
Exercise 2: What is the difference between theoretical and conceptual
model?
Exercise 3: State three reasons why we provide citations and references in
academic research
Exercise 4: State how you can conduct literature search
Solution to Exercises
Exercise 1.
To avoid re-inventing the wheel i.e avoid wasting time on the areas that
has been researched on; to advance the knowledge gap; to describe the
problem you are researching and to explain why you consider it worthy of
research; provide for the logic behind the hypotheses and for the
interpretation of your results; identify evidence to support statements,
both theoretical and empirical, during the course of writing your entire
thesis/project/dissertation.
Exercise 2.
A theoretical framework specifies which key variables influence a
phenomenon of interest and therefore what variables to measure and the
rationale for relationships between the variables. Conceptual model is an
illustrated representation of an idea or body of knowledge based on
individual understanding of the relationships between the variables. The
illustration shows the variables and the hypothesized relationship between
them.
Solution to Exercises
Exercise 3.
Allow our readers to check what was said and to ensure that you have
interpreted it correctly, provide evidence and allow your readers to discover
more information and read more deeply on the topic.
Exercise 4.
Look at the materials that have been recommended to you in reading lists
for your courses; Use the subject index in your library to go to the shelves
and see what is easily available in your area; Go to government offices,
farmers’ organisations, NGOs, research organisations and the information
libraries of various international agencies and embassy services; use some
of the journals and CD systems available which provide abstracts (and
sometimes the entire article) of recent research

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STA 2313 Research Methodology for Statistics

BSc Statistics and Biostatistics

Referencing and citations involves acknowledging the source of what you

Definition 1. Plagiarism is defined as stealing the writings or ideas of

There are many different styles of providing the sources of your

To provide evidence – the most important part of contributing to

The Royal Agricultural College Library has compiled a comprehensive

Books: Personal author

Simply taking a face-to-face course and converting it into an online one is

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