Developing your skills to verify citations will help you:

• identify if the cited reference actually exists
• identify if a citation is complete or accurate
• determine what type of reference, or information resource, is being cited (eg. book, chapter, article, thesis)
• select appropriate tools for verification

Strategies

1. Gather as much information as you can such as, author(s) names, date of publication, subject of the citation and the title of the journal or book that contains it.
2. Determine the type of resource by:
   • asking the person who gave you the incomplete reference
   • look for clues in the information you have - if there is a publication location or an ISBN it is probably a book. If it has a volume and issue number it is probably a journal article
3. Search in appropriate databases and catalogues depending on their coverage of topics and types of resources. Try a variety of search combinations such as: author & title; author & year; author & subject; words in the title. This will help with citations that have errors in them.
4. Ask a librarian for advice

Databases and catalogues to search

• Library Search indexes millions of books, articles and other resources so is a good place to start. If the citation exists, and if you believe the citation is appropriate for your research or assignment you can view it online immediately, or request a digital copy.
  Tip: Try Advanced Search to combine the fields, or, paste in the whole citation. Library Search now has an AI enhancement to find results when you paste in the whole citation.
• Google Scholar
• Choose a discipline-specific resource from the list of research databases and tools. If you find the citation in one of these you will most likely have access to the full text of the resource.

Faculty librarians are available for consultations.

Make an appointment