When writing an assignment, a dissertation, or an essay for your college, it is very important to include sources and references in your writing.
But what is a viable source? What is a reference? How do you find a good source? How many references for a 5000-word essay?
The questions above might pop up in your head. If you read ahead, we will answer these questions and much more in this blog!
What are sources and references?
Let’s start with the fundamentals and understand what sources and references. It is very easy.
A source is a place where you find evidence to back up your theory. For example, if your teacher asked you to find references of “How Covid-19 changed the world for the better?”. You will go online and search for the answer to this question. The websites on which you find the answer will be your source.
However, it is important to remember that while they often go hand in hand, there is a difference between a source and a reference.
A reference is the actual mention of the source in the paper. This means that mentioning the website name, author name, or journal name where you found the information is known as referencing.
Now, people have quite a few questions about sources and references, especially when it comes to writing essays and dissertations. The following are a few of the basic questions that all students should know.
Why are sources important when writing a dissertation?
In any academic writing, dissertations, essays, research papers, etc., it is very important to add references. References elevate your dissertation and make it more credible. When referencing, you look at the works done by others and draw on their findings.
At the same time, you reference their works in yours, ensuring that the work supports your argument and, therefore, makes your argument more credible. The way you can reference someone else’s work on your own is known as a citation.
How many sources for a dissertation?
Writing a dissertation is an arduous process. It requires a lot of research, and therefore, a lot of sources need to be added to make the dissertation more credible. Therefore, it is important to know the average number of sources you should use in a dissertation.
While many factors can go into deciding the number of dissertations to be included, on average, a 10,000-word dissertation will include about 45 – 50 sources. But, again, it is important to remember that these can be increased or decreased according to other variables.
Can you have too many references in an essay?
In short, yes, you can have too many references in an essay.
Here’s how this works. See, when you write an essay or a dissertation, you should remember that the references you add will add up to the net word count of the dissertation. This means that if you use too many sources, then you will lose valuable words and will not be able to explain your point properly.
For this reason, it is advisable to use approximately 1 to 3 sources to explain one main point of your essay. This depends on the subject and other factors, but it is the best approach because, ultimately, you will have enough space to fully explain your thoughts with evidence.
Things to do before you go looking for a source
Before you start looking for a source, there are a few things that, if you do them, might help you in your search and make the process a little easier.
The first thing to do is to familiarize yourself with the topic. You must understand what it is asking of you, and you must be able to figure out a few of the keywords. You can then use these keywords to search in the library or even online. Keep adding to this list of keywords and keep looking for resources. Your essay will be much more credible if you have all primary, secondary, and tertiary sources.
Consider the question you are asking. Now, you have to ask yourself what type of source will go well with this question. Chances are you will know the answer, and this will help narrow down your search.
How to find resources for your essay?
Now that the fundamentals are clear let’s have a look at how we can find these sources.
There are many ways in which you can find sources for your essay or dissertations, but you have to be sure that they are credible sources. First, let’s look at the three main ways you can find sources, and then we will look at how to determine their credibility.
Research databases
One of the best ways to find sources for your essay is to search online databases such as Google Scholar. These databases store a multitude of papers, journals, studies, etc.
You can simply input the keywords of your topic and get a plethora of sources to choose from. On the contrary, if you know a book, journal, or author, you can simply input their name into the database, and it will give you the desired results.
Google Scholar – One of the best and most well-known resources to find sources online in Google Scholar. Google Scholar is an academic database that contains numerous studies, journals and books. It can provide you with almost anything you ask for.
Google Scholar also has a cited function, which gives you information on how many times the article has already been cited by other users. This can tell you the importance of the study or article in the field and say something about its credibility.
Boolean operators – This is another helpful tool that can narrow down your search or increase it exponentially. Here, you use Boolean Operators, words like OR, NOT, and AND. This can include or exclude words from the results as you please.
Please. For example, if you search “Viking Berserkers NOT Vikings”, the search engine will filter out results related to Viking and only show you results related to Viking Berserkers.
Library resources
You can find books, journal articles, newspapers etc. in a library. You can search the library’s database to find these resources. Once you have located the hard copy, you can look at the books beside it because they might give you some valuable secondary or tertiary sources.
Other Online Resources
We live in a digital age, and it is easy for students to find sources nowadays. They can use search engines to find websites, crowdfunded encyclopedias (Wikipedia, etc), and blogs. These can provide you with great results, but you need to be sure that the sources are credible.
How do we check the viability of these resources?
As stated above, let’s have a look at how we can check for the credibility of the resources we found.
Website credibility – As stated above, you cannot trust all the online website resources. An easy way to check if the source is credible is to check if the website URL ends in a .edu or .gov. If this is the case, then you can rest assured that these are official websites, so your source will also be viable.
Credibility of writer – You should evaluate the writer and the content itself before using it as a source. Check if the writer is an expert in their field and if the publisher is well-known. You can also look at the content and see if you find any misgivings about it.
Furthermore, you can use Google Scholar’s cited feature to see how many people have cited the article. If a lot of people have cited it, then it is a genuine article. Otherwise, use it after fully researching and knowing that it is credible.
Still having trouble? Get help
While the above tips will be helpful, to some, this might still seem difficult. After all, we are living in the digital age and have all the information just a finger’s touch away. It is easy to see how someone can get overwhelmed by so much information.
If this seems like you, then there is no need to worry. You can simply go online, and instead of searching for the sources and getting a headache, you can just search for assignment writers UK and find the best assignment help experts in the United Kingdom.
Conclusion
Hopefully, the above article was helpful. You should keep in mind that you will not find all the sources the first time around. It is a long process that requires patience and consistency. Don’t stop researching; keep on incorporating new words into your keywords. Eventually, you will find viable sources that you can refer to in your essay to make it credible and stand out.