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Referencing

In academic writing, it's essential you cite (state) your sources of information and ideas. To ensure readers know where you found the information, you must include references. 

You need to reference all the sources you use in your assignments by citing them in the main body of your assignment (an in-text reference) and compiling a full reference list at the end of your work. 

The University primarily uses the Harvard Solent referencing style - though Law courses use OSCOLA and Psychology courses use APA.  There are guides available to help you get to grips with referencing.

Referencing support

If you can’t find the answer you’re looking for in our online guides, or if you require further support for complex referencing issues, please contact referencing.support@solent.ac.uk. The team will deal with your query as quickly as possible, but please allow up to 72 hours for a response. Alternatively, if your query can’t be easily dealt with by email, you can make an appointment to speak to a member of the team for advice.

Reference management software: RefWorks

Online software is available to store, manage, and utilise your references. 

The library supports RefWorks which can generate your in-text references and final reference lists in our Harvard Solent style. It integrates with Word and provides lots of other features including saving the full text of some documents. It can also generate lists in many other styles including APA and OSCOLA.

Other free products are available but these do not contain our institutional style.

Find out more about referencing