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How to Cite

Data: Citation Styles

Once you've tracked down all the right elements, you'll need to put them together by using the appropriate style guidelines, consistent with the rest of your citation list.

However, many of the major style guides do not yet include specific instructions about how to cite datasets. In order to create a citation for a dataset, you'll need the same basic pieces of information as you would for any other citation. As described in the UBC library's general How to Cite guide, these are found by asking Who/What/When/Where about the item you are citing.

At this point, APA is the only major style that has given specific examples of how to create a data citation.

For other styles, you will need to arrange the elements in the same way as other resources with similar elements. Think about the similarities between the elements you have and the ones in more common resources (ie: a repository may be like a publisher, a series within a table may be like a chapter within a book). This can help you to build out your citation even if you don't have a specific example to model.

Links to style guide resources can be found on the library's How to Cite guide.

 

source: http://wiki.ubc.ca/Library:How_to_Cite_Data