The citation struggle: Seeing the forest for the trees

The citation struggle: Seeing the forest for the trees Roën Janyk & Leanna Jantzi | Okanagan Col lege L ibrary | Connections 2012

• To discuss the citation challenges students face

• To have a better understanding of the role of

information literacy in citation

• To learn a few APA tips and tricks

Objectives

The citation struggle | Connections 2012

Some background: Survey


Purpose: • To foster citation support and instruction offered at

Okanagan College Library by incorporating evidence-based decision making practices

Methodology: • Business, Science, Arts, Health, and Technologies departments • Online, confidential, and voluntary surveys • All faculty • Stratified random sample of students

Some background: Survey

Faculty Surveys sent = 280 Sample size required = 84 (30% response rate) Surveys returned= 81 (28.92% response rate) Students Surveys sent = 1180 Sample size required = 350 (30% response rate) Surveys bounced = 2 Surveys not completed = 50 Surveys returned = 191 (16.19% response rate)


Yes 49%

No 32%

Not sure 19% Does your department

require students to use a specific citation style?

What citation style does your department require students to use?

Citation survey: Faculty

28

8

4 2

0


What is your expectation of students' comprehension of the purpose of citation?

How do you rate students' comprehension of the purpose of citation?

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

1 Noexpectation

2 3 4 5 Extremelyhigh

expectation

Notapplicable

1st year

2nd year

3rd year

4th year

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

1 Poor 2 3 4 5 Excellent Notapplicable

1st year

2nd year

3rd year

4th year


What is your expectation of students' ability to create proper citations?

How do you rate students' ability to create proper citations?

1 Noexpectation

2 3 4 5 Extremelyhigh

expectation

Notapplicable

1st year

2nd year

3rd year

4th year

1 Poor 2 3 4 5 Excellent Notapplicable

1st year

2nd year

3rd year

4th year


Did you receive citation instruction in high school?

Have you received citation instruction from: an OC course instructor; an OC librarian?

Citation survey: Students

Yes 42%

No 40%

Not sure 18%

The citation struggle | Connections 2012 Yes No Not Sure

Librarian

Instructor

70.7%

24.6%

4.7%

52.1%

42.1%

5.8%

Please rate your confidence level in terms of your ability to create citations.

What is your instructor's perception of your ability to create citations?

0

20

40

60

80

1 Noconfidence

23

45 Extremely

confident

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

1 Not able 23

45 Very ableThe citation struggle | Connections 2012

Citation survey: Students

Citation @ reference desks

September 2011 – July 2012 All campuses

Directional 34%

Citation 16%

Reference 38%

Research 7%

Technical 5%


I’ve never learned how to do this.

What students are saying

I spent more time on my references

than I did on my paper.

This is time-consuming.

This is difficult.

“Citations take a long time to do.”

“[Citations] are frustrating .”

“It would be nice if they stopped changing the rules regarding citations so that we only have to learn it once.”

“I was never told to or taught how to cite anything in high school, so I had to completely learn how to do so during first year.”


“To make judgments about citations – the kind of work cited, the

value of the work in the academic discipline, and the creation of

citations to support arguments or prove facts – involves

understanding disciplinary conversations and why citations are

so important in academia” (Elmborg, 2006, p. 197).

Information literacy & citation


“Information Literacy is the set of skills needed to find, retrieve, analyze, and use information”

- Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL)

Information literacy


• Know

• Access

• Evaluate

• Use

• Ethical / Legal

- Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL)

Information literacy competency standards


“I'm just going to Google it for

one time I'll need it before I die.

It's not serious business.”

What students are saying

“I can't particularly understand why different

instructors require different citation styles. It

would be rather interesting to learn why the

differences are necessary for different

subjects, I would think :)”

“…there is a large amount

of grey area around what

should be cited…”

“Can be difficult to know when it

is important to [c]ite in class

handouts and slides .”


What students are asking

How do I cite this?

What is “this”?

I don’t know.

Journal article?

Secondary source? Streaming video?

Blog post?

Newspaper article?

Book chapter?


Challenge

“One challenge students face when citing a resource begins at

the material identification stage . . . If a student does not

understand what type of material s/he is examining, then it is

impossible to use the manual to select the correct citation

format” (Park, Mardis, & Ury, 2011, p. 45).


Struzik, E. (2008, Aug 23). Polar bears’ long swims blamed on global warming:

Satellite images show little ice in region. Calgary Herald. Retrieved

from http://www.calgaryherald.com

Newspaper article, online

(Struzik, 2008) Struzik (2008) writes . . . “Direct quote” (Struzik, 2008, para. 3).


APA Quick tips: electronic articles

• everything online is not a website! • database name not required • retrieval date not required • use DOI (digital object identifier) if available, if not

available, provide the homepage URL of the journal, book or report, etc.



Who is the author/editor?

What is the year of publication?

Where is the place of publication?


Bonson, A. (2002) Jessie Nagle and Susan Nagle. In K. Carter (Ed.),

The small details of life: Twenty diaries by women in Canada,

1830-1996 (pp. 119-122). Toronto, ON: University of Toronto

Press.

(Bonson, 2002)

According to Bonson (2002)…

“direct quote” (Bonson, 2002, p. 120)

Chapter in an edited book


APA Quick tips: chapter in a book

• cite the author’s largest work • an item on the reference list indicates that you have read

that whole item • look for a book’s publication (bibliographic) information

on both sides of the title page – not the cover



How do I cite this?


http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.okanagan.bc.ca/10.1016/j.iheduc.2011.01.003

In their study, Rainie and Tancer found that . . . (as cited in Biddix, Chung,

& Park, 2011).

Secondary sources (a source in another source)

Biddix, J. P., Chung, C. J., & Park, H. W. (2011). Convenience or credibility? A study of college student online research behaviors. The Internet and Higher Education, 14, 175-182. doi:10.1016/j.iheduc.2011.01.003


“Pew researchers (Rainie & Tancer, 2007) found 50% of college graduates

used the site (86% if those with college experience were included), while

46% of current full- or part-time college students used Wikipedia”(Biddix,

Chung, & Park, 2011, p. 176).

Citation in a direct quote (a source in another source)

Biddix, J. P., Chung, C. J., & Park, H. W. (2011). Convenience or credibility? A study of college student online research behaviors. The Internet and Higher Education, 14, 175-182. doi:10.1016/j.iheduc.2011.01.003


APA Quick tips: secondary sources

• do your best to find the original



How do I cite this? There’s not an example.

Pamphlet

Course PowerPoint

Movie on Netflix

Professor’s lecture

My class notes

Image from the web


Challenge

“It is also difficult for the citation manuals to keep up with

constantly shifting and expanding technology. The holes in

citation manuals necessitate that students try to plug elements

into examples of other resources, which might not be

comparable” (Park, Mardis, & Ury, 2011, p. 45).


Rempel, K. (2007). Chapter ten: Motivating and rewarding employees

[PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from http://moodle.okanagan.bc.ca

(Rempel, 2007)

According to Rempel (2007)…

“direct quote” (Rempel, 2007, p. 120)

PowerPoint presentation on Moodle


APA Quick tips: no example

• follow the closest example • ALL citations should have:

• who • when • what • where



If I’ve already cited it once in text, do I have to repeat the citation again and again?

Yes . . .

. . . and no.



Smith (2010) stated that three in five subjects responded positively to treatment. Smith also stated that those who responded positively found that their symptoms began to lessen after two weeks of treatment. The study also showed that the female subjects demonstrated a higher rate of recovery (Smith, 2010).

Three in five subjects responded positively to treatment (Smith, 2010). Smith (2010) also stated that those who responded positively found that their symptoms began to lessen after two weeks of treatment. The study also showed that the female subjects demonstrated a higher rate of recovery (Smith, 2010).



What do I have to cite?

Anything that is not your original thought or common knowledge.

But every sentence will be a citation!


APA Quick tips: multiple citations

• over-citing is not plagiarism (it may be poor writing), but not citing is plagiarism



How do I paraphrase?

How do I put this information in my paper?

I have all this information, but now what?


Can’t I just change a couple words?


• Rewriting • Paraphrasing • Quoting • Separating “my words” from “your

words” (Buranen, 2009, p. 30)

“Even ‘good’ students who are ‘good writers’ need to be given instruction in close reading, summarizing, and paraphrasing (never mind documentation), but also enough time to reach the point at which they ‘own’ the language and the ideas enough to write about something ‘in their own words’” (Buranen, 2009, p.27 ).

Comprehension & writing skills




“However, many of these students appear to have difficulty using the

information they have found in a critical way. Half of the students

involved in this study (20 in total) provided little or no evidence that they

derived any benefits from the literature they were required to consult”

(Rosenblatt, 2010, p. 60).




“Citation counts for little if what is being cited is a fragmentary

representation of the source. Plagiarism is difficult to avoid if one is

constructing an argument from isolated sentences pulled from sources”

(Rosenblatt, 2010, p. 60).


Information Literacy?

Writing Skills?

Citation mechanics?

Theoretical aspects of citation?


Where should the focus be?

Comprehension?


“The ability to parse a journal citation or to read a catalog record results from

an understanding of its deep structures and derives from a disciplined and

grammatical approach to information. The citation functions to distill the

elements of publication into concise code. We can treat this citation either

prescriptively (there is a “right way” to cite and a universal truth reflected in

its structure) or as a social construct (by focusing on why citation matters in

the academy and what conversations are implied in networks of citation)”

(Elmborg, 2006, p. 197).


Okanagan College Library Research, Writing and Citing (Full Version) Research, Writing and Citing (Condensed Version) Style & Citation guides Guide to Plagiarism and Cyber-Plagiarism: University of Alberta Library http://guides.library.ualberta.ca/content.php?pid=62200&sid=457651 Academic Integrity (Faculty resource): Dalhousie University http://academicintegrity.dal.ca/Faculty%20Resources/ Academic Integrity (Faculty resource): Ryerson University http://www.ryerson.ca/academicintegrity/faculty/index.html


Resources

http://libguides.okanagan.bc.ca/aecontent.php?pid=222122




http://www.okanagan.bc.ca/administration/students/library/help/style.html?

http://guides.library.ualberta.ca/content.php?pid=62200&sid=457651

http://academicintegrity.dal.ca/Faculty Resources/

http://www.ryerson.ca/academicintegrity/faculty/index.html

Buranen, L. (2009). A Safe Place: The Role of Librarians and Writing Centers in Addressing

Citation Practices and Plagiarism. Knowledge Quest, 37(3), 24-33. Retrieved

from http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/aasl/aaslpubsandjournals

/knowledgequest/knowledgequest.cfm

Elmborg, J. (2006). Critical information literacy: Implications for instructional practice.

The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 32. 192-199. doi:

10.1016/j.acalib.2005.12.004

Park, S., Mardis, L. A., & Ury, C. (2011). I've lost my identity - oh, there it is … in a style

manual: Teaching citation styles and academic honesty. Reference Services

Review, 39, 42-57. doi:10.1108/00907321111108105


References

The citation struggle: Seeing the forest for the trees

Education

Transcript of The citation struggle: Seeing the forest for the trees