Answered By: Mary Ann Cullen
Last Updated: Aug 10, 2021     Views: 148

Understandably sometimes you can lose a citation or not have all the pieces of a citation you need. If you have the original source, that is always a great place to start but if you find yourself without your source, there are a few things you can do to try to find it again so you can complete your citation properly.

For books, DVDs, and other physical items, you can look for the item in the library catalog (GIL-Find). Look up the item by title or author. Once you find the source, all the information you need will be in the item record, except for page numbers and possibly information about individual chapters. The item record is under Details, as shown with the arrow in the image below.

An entry from the library catalog highlighting the details tab and citation tool.

This information will include title, author, publisher, etc. The catalog also has an automatic citation generator that will give you a formatted citation in a variety of citation styles. This tool has been highlighted in the image above with a red box. After you click the citation tool, you’ll be able to select which style of citation you need and copy the citation, as shown in the image below. (Be sure to double-check the formatting of these citations because they can contain formatting errors.)

the citation tool opened to show what a citation looks like from the catalog.

 

For articles and other items you located in research databases, you can search for the item again. Use the original database if you know it.  If you have any important information like author or title, you can start by searching for these items in the Discover Search on the library homepage. If you don’t have any big information pieces about the article, the next best way to search for a source is by recreating the original search you used to find it. Once you do find it, our How do I cite FAQ will be helpful in answering any further questions.

Lastly, if these basic strategies don't work, you can try to locate the journal the article was published within by doing a Journal Search. Search for the article’s journal name to find the GSU databases that subscribe to that journal. You can also search by DOI or PMID if you have that information.

If these strategies aren't working, you can try Google Scholar to identify more information about the article, then try locating the article in the original site again. You can also connect Google Scholar to GSU resources.

If none of the above works, contact a librarian. Librarians are experts at tracking down articles with only partial information.

Update 8/10/21 mac

 

 

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