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Referencing

The Harvard system of referencing is the one in which the name of the author and the date of publication appear in the body of the text and the full reference is listed at the end. It is the system we prefer you to use. It is essential that you learn to use the Harvard system properly. Here is an example of the end of a paper in which the system has been used :

The writer has discussed the question of whether or not all clients should attend group therapy sessions in another paper (Brown 1987). Other writers have also discussed this issue, most notably Davis (1989) and Anderson (1990, 1991).


References

Anderson, P. 1990 Group Therapy for In Patients : British Journal of Group Work, 2, 4, 34 - 46

Anderson, P. 1991 Working With Groups, Heinemann, Oxford.

Brown, D. 1991 Does Group Work Make a Difference? Nursing Times, 3, 5, 67 - 68.

Davis, L. 1989 Against Groups, Pan, London.

The points that you need to pay close attention to with the Harvard system of referencing are these :

• Only the author's surname and the date of publication appear in the body of the text.

• In the reference list at the end of the essay, references are listed alphabetically, by author.

• If an author has two publications in the same year and both are referred to, one is called a and the other b (e.g. Brown 1989a, 1989b) Full references are listed at the end, noting, correctly, reference a and reference b.

• In the reference list, the following are always listed and in this order : author's surname, author's initials, date of publication, title, publisher, place of publication. This is true when the publication is a book. For journal references, the order is as follows : author's surname, author's initials, date of publication, title of journal, volume number, edition number, pages. In the list, book titles are underlined or italicised. With references to journal papers, the name of the journal is underlined. It is important to get this right.

Some variants of the basic Harvard system

The basic Harvard system, then, involves the quotation of a surname and date, in brackets, in the main body of the text, with a full list of the references used, alphabetically by author, at the end of the text. There is a range of variations of this method and some of these are now described. These should be used as guidelines: there are sometimes ‘local’ variations in colleges and departments: personal preferences of lecturers and journal editors sometimes mean that approaches other than the ones listed here are used. Overall, the really important issue is that you are consistent in the way that you use references.

Works having two or three authors

Where a book or paper has two or three authors, these should be listed, in the order they appear in the original publication, in brackets with the date, in the text. E.g. (Brown, Smith and Jones 1993).

Works having more than three authors

Where a book or paper has more than three authors, the first should be quoted, followed by ‘et al.’ in brackets, before the date. E.g. (Davies et al. 1995). In the list of references, at the back of the paper, all authors should be quoted in full. Some authorities prefer the use of ‘et al.’ for books and papers that have more than two authors while others prefer to use where there are two or more.

When a work has a corporate author

When a book or paper has no individual’s name offered as author, it is usual to quote the organisation’s name as the author. E.g. (British Association of Health Workers 1994). An alternative is to abbreviate the organisation when you cite the reference the first time and, subsequently, to use that abbreviation. Example:

First citation: This point was developed in a report on handwashing in the workplace (British Association of Health Workers [BAHW] 1994).

Second and subsequent citations: The issue of washing hands both before and after handling food has been dealt with elsewhere (BAHW 1994).

When an author has published more than one book or paper in the same year

It is sometimes necessary to quote various papers, by the same author, published in the same year. In this case, it is usual to designate each an ‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’ and so on. E.g. (James 1992a, 1992b, 1992c). In the reference list, these are written out in full, complete with the appropriate letter after the date.

When a reference is to a chapter in a book edited by another author

It is quite often necessary to quote a chapter (by one author) in a book edited by another. Here, the name of the author of the chapter is cited in brackets, with the date. In the reference list, full details of both the chapter and the book are written out. Here is an example of both the reference in the text and the listing in the reference list.

Various writers have discussed the question of health care funding in areas where there is a large population of elderly people. Davies (1994) has suggested that local funding is rarely adequate.


Davies, P.D. (1994) Local Funding of Health Care. In P. Brown and T. Smith, The Economics of Local Health Care, Chapman and Hall, London.

When one author is quoted by another

Sometimes, it is impossible to go back to primary sources and to find out what an author wrote, directly. In this case, it becomes necessary to use another author’s quoting of the original author. Imagine, for example, that you have picked up a book called Counselling in the Health Services by an author called David Smith, published in 1995. In this book, Smith writes as follows:

The concept of empathy is a difficult one. We probably all know what if feels like to be understood but being totally understood is another matter. Brown writes about it as follows:


No single person can ever fully understand another. The idea that empathy is something that can be taught is fraught with problems. We do not get ‘taught’ to empathise. Instead, we learn it through the process of growing up with other people (Brown 1993).

If you wanted to use this information about Brown in your own work, you would have to quote it as follows:

Brown (cited by Smith 1995) suggests that we probably cannot be taught to empathise but have to learn it through the process of living alongside others.

In the reference list, you would quote the Smith book as follows:

Smith, D. (1995) Counselling in the Health Services, Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford.

This is a rather complicated issue. Wherever possible, it is best to avoid this sort of citation. Wherever possible, go back to the original source of the information. In this case, you would try to find Brown’s book and work, directly from that. It is certainly not good practice to rely on one or two textbooks and to use lots of ‘cited by’ references by pulling out information from these one or two sources.

When two authors have the same surname

When two different authors, with the same name, are referred to in a paper of manuscript, it is important to include their initials so that the reader can be sure about to which one you are referring. E.g. I.J. Davies (1994) discusses a range of issues to do with GP practice and the use of antibiotics. In another paper, P.D. Davies (1994) identifies some of the more common side effects of the broad-spectrum antibiotics.

Personal communications

Personal communications may include letters, memos, telephone conversations and face-to-face conversations. Generally, it is not good practice to cite personal communications in papers and manuscripts but sometimes this is the only way of identifying a source of information. When ‘personal communication’ is cited, the reference is only placed in the body of the text and not included in the reference list at the end of the document. It is usual to offer the initials and surname of the other person, along with the full date. E.g. For some, it is important to help depressed patients to externalise aggression by forcing the person into a heated debate or argument (J. Richards, personal communication, 12th May 1996).

Plagiarism

Plagiarism is the attempt at passing off someone else’s written work as your own. In other words, copying straight out of books, articles and papers. It is not permitted in any sort of written work, although it crops up mostly in essays. To plagiarise is to break copyright, it is illegal and is one of the very few things that can get you thrown straight off a university or college course. Sometimes, it is done unwittingly. Some people take notes directly out of books and papers and then transfer them into essays. Others don’t know that it is wrong to copy directly. Nor is plagiarism always clear cut. In the following examples I show varieties of what is and what is not plagiarism: with a borderline case in between.

Sample text

The following is an (imaginary) piece of text from a book called Counselling for Health Workers by Allan Jones, published in 1994 by Jacobs and Jacobs, London.

There are debates about whether or not counselling ‘works’. Various outcome studies have been conducted (e.g. Davies 1992, Andrews 1993, Jowett 1993) in which researchers have tested clients both before and after counselling sessions as an attempt to try to establish (or otherwise) the efficacy of counselling. The problem with undertaking these sorts of studies is that they cannot control all of the variables that are present. Do clients get better because of counselling or do they ‘just recover’? Do their families help them and support them while they are being counselled? What is it that ‘works’? The counselling or the relationship that they have with the counsellor? All of these things (and, no doubt, many others) make outcome studies difficult.

 

Outright plagiarism

In the following example, a student has simply copied out the above text and included it, without any sort of reference, in his own essay. This is an obvious case of plagiarism and, if spotted by an examiner, would land the student in serious trouble.

Research into counselling is difficult. There are debates about whether or not counselling ‘works’. Various outcome studies have been conducted (e.g. Davies 1992, Andrews 1993, Jowett 1993) in which researchers have tested clients both before and after counselling sessions as an attempt to try to establish (or otherwise) the efficacy of counselling. The problem with undertaking these sorts of studies is that they cannot control all of the variables that are present. Do clients get better because of counselling or do they ‘just recover’? Do their families help them and support them while they are being counselled? What is it that ‘works’? The counselling or the relationship that they have with the counsellor? All of these things (and, no doubt, many others) make outcome studies difficult.

A borderline case

The following example shows that plagiarism is not always black and white. Some people quote direct chunks of other people’s work and offer a reference to the original work. In the following example, though, it is still unclear what the student is claiming as his own work and what he is expecting the reader to attribute to Jones.

Research into counselling is difficult. Jones (1994) points out that there are debates about whether or not counselling ‘works’. Various outcome studies have been conducted (e.g. Davies 1992, Andrews 1993, Jowett 1993) in which researchers have tested clients both before and after counselling sessions as an attempt to try to establish (or otherwise) the efficacy of counselling. The problem with undertaking these sorts of studies is that they cannot control all of the variables that are present. This means that attempts at really clarifying whether or not counselling makes a difference are likely to be thwarted.

In this example, the student has skilfully (or unskilfully, depending on your point of view) intermeshed Jones direct words with his own. Some might argue that the inclusion of a reference to Jones’ work renders the above example acceptable. The fact is, though, that the student is still passing off Jones’ work as if it were his own.

Not plagiarism

The following two examples show how the student might have tackled the issue by using Jones’ work but not attempting to claim the words as the student’s own.

Example one

In this example, the student paraphrases what Jones has written and makes it clear when he is referring, directly, to Jones work. The student does not quote directly from the work of Jones.

Attempts at trying to find out whether or not counselling works have been problematic. Jones (1994) points out that outcome studies are likely to be difficult because so many variables are at work. Jones suggests that in outcome studies it is difficult knowing whether or not it is the ‘counselling’ that works or if other factors, such as the client’s relatives or even the relationship between client and counsellor contribute to the client getting better.

Example two

In this example, the student quotes directly from Jones’ work but makes it very clear that he is using a direct quote by indenting the paragraph and citing the reference and page number. This is not plagiarism but appropriate quotation from another writer’s work.

It is nearly always difficult to find out whether or not counselling makes a difference to clients. Jones (1984) writes clearly and at length on this topic. He argues that:

‘Various outcome studies have been conducted (e.g. Davies 1992, Andrews 1993, Jowett 1993) in which researchers have tested clients both before and after counselling sessions as an attempt to try to establish (or otherwise) the efficacy of counselling. The problem with undertaking these sorts of studies is that they cannot control all of the variables that are present’ (Jones 1994, p 24).

It is almost impossible to overstate how important it is to guard against plagiarism. In recent years there have been court cases over students who have had their degrees withdrawn after it has been established that their essays and/or dissertations have been found to contain large chunks of other people’s work. If you have any doubts about whether or not you are plagiarising as you write, check your work with a colleague or a lecturer.

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