We all encounter more information in our daily lives that ever before in human history, but not all information is useful in every context or even accurate. It is important to look at any information you encounter either in print or online with a critical eye. In a research context, you should be evaluating information a few different ways:
When you are conducting research, you are joining the scholarly conversation around your topic and by having useful, appropriate, and accurate information you are showing your audience that you understand the existing conversation, but also have something to say yourself that is worth listening to.
Zotero is a great option for creating and managing your citations.
It is also important to cite your primary sources, you need to provide evidence of the resources you are analyzing. People should be able to go and find the resources that you used to build your argument, whether they are primary or secondary.
One advantage of using library databases for your research is they offer an auto citation tool. It is still best practice to double check the citations that the database generates for you, but the tool is a great way to get quick citations that are more accurate than free citation generation websites like EasyBib. Look for quotation icons in the database when you have selected a specific article, this will allow you to generate citations.
Once you click on the quotation mark icon, a new window will pop up that allows you to select the citation style you need, APA is the default.
Need help formatting your citations? The Purdue OWL (Online Writing Lab) site is an excellent source for questions about how to cite in a particular style. The links below will take you to Purdue OWL's pages for each citation style:
Citation managers like Zotero and EndNote can help with formatting citations as well.
