When you are writing for academic purposes you need to show that you have read about your subject thoroughly, and that what you have read has helped you to form your opinions on the topic you are discussing.

It is a good idea to use a variety of sources and not to rely too heavily on just one kind. As well as books you can use reliable online sources and journals. Journals are collections of articles written by experts in a certain field. Using journal articles in your research can help you to gain insights in to current practice and thinking relating to your subject area.

There are certain things you need to take into account when you are thinking about what sources to use. It is NOT a good idea to assume that all the materials you read are going to be good materials to use. For example, there are many places on the internet where people can post or blog information that may just be their own personal opinion without having any evidence to prove their points. In academic writing we are constantly looking for evidence from a valid source.

If you use a journal article then there is a good chance that this will have been reviewed by experts before going to print so in this way we can class the information as reliable. A book will have been edited and again this means that its content will usually have been reviewed before publication. Even in these cases there are still things we have to take in to account when we are considering the value of a source.

It is not enough to just mention a source, you have to show why you think it is important enough to be included in your assignment. This means that you are going to have to discuss the source you are using. You could explain its importance or show how it supports your argument.

Many students think of citations as being a bit like a full stop, they state something in their assignment, then use a quotation or comment about a text that says exactly the same as what they have just said, to finish their statement off. This is not what you should be doing. You should be showing your reader how the source adds to what you are saying, not simply repeating what the author is saying.

Don't provide collections of sources without explaining each one. Some students worry so much about using enough sources in their work that they group lots of sources together in each paragraph but they do not provide any of their own comments on the texts. Your tutors will most likely have read your sources before, they want to know your opinions on their work.

Academic writing follows a number of rules. For example academic writing is formal and does not use slang or shortened versions of words. Data and citations are used to back up points. Academic writing also tries to avoid personal pronouns so in many types of academic writing  words like" I" or "my" are often avoided.

You should look carefully at what you are reading and decide if the author is trying to follow the majority of the academic rules as this will give an indication of how experienced they are at writing for an academic audience.

Once you have decided what sources to use and have made notes on the ones that are most useful to you, you will then have to plan how you will use the sources in your writing.

Using citations -  a citation is where, in the text that you are writing, you show that you are talking about the writing of somebody else. You do this by putting the name of the author of the text and the date of publication. For example, if the focus of your sentence is the main subject of your sentence  you put the name of the author outside of the brackets and then the date the work was published inside the brackets 

Example: Green (2014) argues that.......

If you are discussing someone else's work in the middle of your sentence (so the citation is not the subject), then you talk about the person's work first and then put the citation after it and inside the brackets.

Example: Obesity is one of the major burdens on the National Health Service in today's society. (Green 2014)

Reference list  - at the end of your assignment you will be expected to provide a reference list. This is a list of ALL the sources you have used in your assignment.. You will be expected to give full details of the sources you have used.

To find out more about how to use citations and write a reference list go to:

http://www.citethemrightonline.com/

Who has written the text? - you need to think about who has written the text and their background and experience. Has the author of the text got enough experience that you can seriously consider their information? In a journal article, book, and often in an online source information about the author will be provided. You could consider their educational background for example or the job roles they have had.

You need to be sure that the information you are reading is reliable. This is not always easy, however there are a number of things you should think about as you are reading.

What is the author's purpose? Is it clear why the author is writing? Are they trying to inform and provide proof for the points they are making or are they trying to sway your viewpoint by giving their own opinions without any evidence to back it up? It is important that you try to find authoritative information.

Does the author look like they have done a lot of their own research? A reliable author will have gone out of their way to research their topic thoroughly. When you are reading, you should consider the amount of citations and data being used and see if it is relevant and helpful to support the points the author is making.

Another thing to think about when you are reading is would the text you are using still be helpful today?

Is the information current? When we talk about a text being current, it means that the information is up to date.  How you decide if something is current or not will depend very much on the subject you are doing. For subjects like technology or education, for example, where things are changing all the time, it is essential to make sure the information you are using is current. You would expect a text to have been written within a couple of years of the time you are doing your research, but that doesn't mean that older material cannot be used.

Is the information relevant? On some occasions, a text may seem out of date or old fashioned but it may still be relevant today. For example, there may be times when a text has been the only thing written about a certain subject and so it might be still relevant. However, if you know that things have progressed further from the examples being talked about in a text you are reading think twice about using that text.

Use journals. The good thing about journal articles is they are published annually about three or four times a year so you are assured that the information within them will be current.

What does being objective mean? Academic writing should not play on the emotions or sound too personal. When we are being objective it means we are considering a subject from all viewpoints not just one. Objectivity means that we discuss things from a distance, this means without allowing emotion or personal opinions to interfere with what we are discussing.

How to tell if a text is objective. 

If a text is objective it will have considered more than one aspect of the topic being discussed.

There will be citations and evidence of reading and research.

The text will avoid absolutes. Words like "al"l and "everyone" are absolutes,  they are used to try to convince people that everybody thinks the same way or does the same thing. If  the information you are reading is not a concrete fact that can be clearly proven, then the objective author will avoid using absolute language and will use less extreme language instead. So for example" All women like chocolate" is an absolute that is not a definite fact, whereas saying" it could be said that a number of women like chocolate" is more cautious and therefore more objective.