The majority of students are entangled in myths about how to cite a dissertation. Nonetheless, it deems fit that you understand the MLA, APA, and Chicago styles where you need to cite your resources appropriately.
You will agree with me that proper citation is necessary when writing and handing in your dissertation. The majority of students are always in confusion when it comes to the format of different citation styles. There are three citation styles available; MLA, APA, and Chicago.
For you to ace in writing your dissertation, you need knowledge on how to cite a dissertation. This post will manage to understand the three different citations, their format, and where they are applicable.
What Is The Importance Of Citations In Your Dissertation?
Before you understand the importance of citation, you need to acknowledge what a dissertation is. A dissertation is an academic project handed in by Ph.D. students as they culminate in their graduate studies. Ph. D. students are allowed to delve into a subject of their interest, hence showcasing their knowledge, understanding, and standpoint. A student must, therefore, facilitate thorough studies and research, which helps them craft a dissertation.
You will have resources where you outsource irrefutable shreds of evidence for your arguments during your dissertation writing. The resources necessitate citing. Through citations, you have a platform to support your ideas, thoughts, and convictions. Therefore, quotes are other people’s views and standpoints that help support your opinions throughout the dissertation.
Reasons Why Citations In A Dissertation Are Significant
- Through citations, your dissertation readers understand how thorough you were with your research
- Your dissertation will be plagiarism-free
- Citations help affirm your credibility
- Through citations, your dissertation helps appreciate and give credit to other scholars
- You help your readers identify additional resources and scholarships with identical ideas to yours for further study
How To Cite A Dissertation Using APA Style
The American Psychological Association (APA) citation style is, in most cases, preferable to dissertations done by social science students. Therefore, Sociology, Criminal Justice, Psychology, and Education students are, in most cases, the ones using the APA citation style.
APA style is overly strict with dates. Therefore, you need to incorporate the dates of the publication when citing a specific resource. The first name of the author is not as important as the ideas and their research. Therefore, APA doesn’t advocate citing the author’s first name.
The APA citation format starts with the author’s name, followed by the publication date, title of the dissertation or scholarship, and the University, state, or country.
Citing Your Dissertation Using The MLA Style
Modern Language Association (MLA) style is commonly used by language and literature students for citing their resources in their assignments, letters, essays, research paper, thesis, and dissertations.
Where you extracted your information from an internet publication, MLA overrules the use of URL. Therefore, you are to write the institution’s name, followed by the word Web when citing your work. Unlike the APA style, MLA requires you to write the author’s name in full. You are to include the dates of the scholarship.
For a proper MLA citation format, ensure to start with the author’s name with the last name preceding the first. The scholarship title is followed by the work type, institution’s name, and the year the work was published.
The Chicago Dissertation Citation Style
The majority of students tend to confuse Chicago style with APA as these two are closely similar. Nonetheless, there are noticeable differences that you need to acknowledge when figuring out how to cite your dissertation. Mostly, students in the Humanities faculty settle for Chicago citation style when writing their dissertations. Chicago style uses different footnotes and bibliography formats as compared to APA.
When citing using Chicago style, you need to capitalize on every word’s first letter in the title. When citing your resource, you need to start with the author’s name, where the last name precedes the first, the title of the resource, level of studies (dissertation or thesis), Institution name, and publication dates.
As elaborated above, there are three citation styles to settle for when writing your research. Nonetheless, you need to understand your study field and select a method for suiting your work. Therefore, ensure to understand all the three types in length. Your dissertation supervisor and advisor will help you identify the right dissertation citation style for your research and project.
How do you cite a dissertation in APA 6th edition?
Here is how to cite in APA 6th edition; author last name, initials, italicized title(master thesis), institution name, geographical location.
How do you cite a dissertation in APA 7th edition?
Here is the standard APA 7th edition format; dissertation title: author. initials(year), the title for dissertation use sentence case: unpublished doctoral dissertation/master thesis, name of institution awarding the degree
