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Biostatistics & Research Methodology: Research Tools

What is Referencing?

When you write any paper, assignment, you are required to refer to the work of other authors. Each time you do so, it is necessary to identify their work by making reference to it— both in the text of your assignment and in a list at the end of your assignment. This practice of acknowledging authors is known as referencing.  References must be provided whenever you use someone else’s opinions, theories, data or organization of material. You need to reference information from books, articles, videos, computers, other print or electronic sources, and personal communications. 

Tools For Research

Mendeley

Mendeley is a free reference manager and academic social network. Make your own fully-searchable library in seconds, cite as you write, and read and your PDFs on any device.

Online Reference Works

Online Reference Works offer a rich compendium of knowledge for students, researchers and clinicians.

 

 

Zotero

Zotero is the only research tool that automatically senses content in your web browser, allowing you to add it to your personal library with a single click. Whether you're searching for a preprint

SPSS

IBM SPSS Statistics is the world’s leading statistical software used to solve business and research problems by means of ad-hoc analysis, hypothesis testing, and predictive analytics

 

Turnitin

TurnItIn is a product that can analyze the content of student assignments for exact or close matches to material found on the web, in scholarly and popular articles and books and other students' essays.

Useful Tools

Endnote

More than just a reference manager. EndNote moves you through the

research process as you search, organize, write, publish and share.

 

 

The Chicago Manual of Style Online

The Chicago Manual of Style Online also provides convenient Tools,

such as sample correspondence, proofreaders’ marks,

and a quick guide to citation.

 

Reference Manager

EndNote and Reference Manager are both quality reference

management solutions, used by thousands of researchers

around the world. Endnote, known for its advanced referencemanagement and bibliography creation tools,

 

Nvivo

NVivo is a platform for analysing unstructured data. It helps you to organise, explore and share your work easily and quickly. Whatever your materials,

Popular Referencing Styles

  • APA: (American Psychological Association) used for Education, Psychology, and Sciences
  • Chicago/Turabian:  used for Business, History, and the Fine Arts
  • Harvard: Author-Date referencing style
  • MLA: (Modern Language Association) is used for the Humanities
  • Vancouver: (Numbered Referencing Style) used for Medicine

Importance of Referencing

  • Used to avoid plagiarism
  • If readers want it provides original source
  • Helps to Improve writing skills
  • It makes your arguments authentic.
  • Shows that you have read widely.
  • Can be helpful in getting good scores in exam