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Referencing

What is referencing?

Referencing is an ordered method of showing the sources of your information in your assessment or any other written work. It is a very easy way for the person who is reading it to see where the information came from.

Some assessments will expect you to use a minimum amount of references as it will show that you have read the literature required for that topic or assessment.

Referencing is also called citation.

When do you need to reference?

You will need to reference anything that is not your own, such as:

  • If you are quoting any person word for word (direct quotation). It doesn’t matter whether it is a phrase, sentence or paragraph, you will need to provide a reference to the source 
  • If you are paraphrasing or summarising ideas or data obtained from other sources 
  • If you are using statistics in your work obtained from other sources 
  • If you are using tables, figures, diagrams or pictures/images from someone or somewhere else. 

If it is not yours then it must be referenced!

Referencing at EIT:

EIT’s preferred referencing style for our teaching materials and for student assessments is IEEE.

About the IEEE referencing style:

What is it?

IEEE is a numeric style of referencing, predominantly used in electrical engineering, computer science, and other technical fields. It is based on the IEEE Referencing Guide created and managed by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). The IEEE referencing style comprises two key components:

  1. In-text references, where references are numbered [1] in the order of appearance in the text, using square brackets.
  1. A reference list, displayed at the end of the text which provides full details of all references cited in-text. The references are ordered as they appear in the in-text references (in order of citation, not in alphabetical order). 

How does it work?

EIT has compiled a guide on referencing based on the IEEE referencing style, with examples. We have put this together in a handy, summarised document that should help you to appropriately reference using the IEEE referencing style.

Alternatively, the video below talks you through what the IEEE referencing style is and how it works: IEEE referencing – The Basics from Victoria University Library on Vimeo.

Further information:

IEEE provides instructions for authors for each type of publication such as journals, magazines, newsletters, and standards.