Chemistry

Referencing is important in academic writing and an essential part of any of your assignments. It:

• allows you to acknowledge your sources,
• gives academic credibility to your work,
• demonstrates your knowledge of a subject area,
• prevents accusations of plagiarism.

You should always reference a source when:

• using a direct quote
• summarising a theory
• discussing someone else's opinion
• using case studies
• quoting statistics or visual data
• but not when stating your own opinion, observation or experience.

Plagiarism is "the wrongful... publication as one's own, of the ideas, or the expression of the ideas of another" (Oxford English Dictionary)

Further information on referencing, and the importance of academic integrity is available here: Referencing & Academic Integrity

The School of Chemistry uses the Royal Society of Chemistry (Chemistry) and Harvard (Forensics) referencing styles.

Find out all about using the Harvard style and download your copy of the Harvard guide

You can also pick up a print copy from the Library.

The guide provides examples of different information sources: how to cite them within your text and how to include them in your reference list.

Guidance on the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) style of referencing can be found here:

Reference management software helps you to:

• store references
• organise your references
• generate citations
• generate reference lists
• share references

The Library provides students and staff with access to and support for the following software:

You can find out more about RefWorks here or view our webinar

You can find out more about EndNote here or view our webinar