Referencing - Spot the Errors

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Aim:
This exercise is about referencing, and involves correcting some APA-style references. For students taking the ELC's University English and English for Academic Purposes courses, this is based on the 'Using Sources' chapter of the book and will help students prepare for the academic writing assignment.

Instructions:
Fill in your personal details below to make the references, and then complete the exercise. Don't worry about privacy, your personal details will not be sent over the internet!

1. Your family name (e.g. Chan):

2. Your other names (e.g. if your name is 'Chan Wai Man', Wai Man are your other names. If your name is Smith, John Adam, type John Adam here)

3. Your department/school (e.g. English):
Click one: ABCT, ACCT, AMA, AP, APSS, BRE, BSE, BUSS, CBS, COMP, CPBE, CSE, EE, EIE, ENGL, HTM, HTI, ISE, ITC, LSGI, ME, MF, MGT, NHS, OR, RS, SD, SPEED, LGT, or type it into this box:

Department/School of 

4. The full name of your favourite course in your department (e.g. English for Academic Purposes):

Language Analysis: see the Referencing Pages, or the Reference Machine.

Exercise

The following bibliographical references have mistakes. Correct them, then check your answers below. Ignore the lack of italics for the title.

1.
   

2.
   

3.
   

4.
   

5.
   

6.
   

7.
   

8.
   


Your score is
 

Answers

1. Your answer was

The correct answer was:

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The mistake was the lack of brackets around the date. (Back to Q.1)

2. Your answer was

The correct answer was:

.

 

The mistake is that the publisher's name and the place of publication are the wrong way round. The place of publication should be first, and the name of the publisher should be last. (Back to Q.2)

3. Your answer was

The correct answer was:

.

 

The mistake is that only the first letter of paper and book titles should be capital letters. All the other words in the title should start with lower case letters, unless they are the name of a language; e.g. 'Chinese' or 'English'. Journal titles should have a capital letter at the start of each word, unless the word is an article or preposition. The first word of the journal title should always start with a capital letter. (Back to Q.3)

4. Your answer was

The correct answer was:

.

 

The mistake is that the family name of the editor should come after his initials. (Back to Q.4)

5. Your answer was

The correct answer was:

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The mistake is that there are 2 editors, and the abbreviation for this is (Ed .), not (Ed.). (Back to Q.5)

6. Your answer was

The correct answer was:

.

 

The mistake is that the month and the date are missing from this reference to a newspaper or magazine. (Back to Q.6)

7. Your answer was

The correct answer was:

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The mistake is that the day of the month in the date of retrieval from the Internet is missing. (Back to Q.7)

8. Your answer was

The correct answer was:

.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The mistake is that the references are not in the right order. They should be in alphabetical order by the author's family name. (Back to Q.8)


Related pages: EAP pages | Online Exercises

Referencing Resources on the Internet


Tips

Tip for Question 1:
It's a problem with the date. Back to the exercise

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Tip for Question 2:
It's a problem with the place of publication and the publisher. Back to the exercise

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Tip for Question 3:
It's a problem with the titles. Back to the exercise

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Tip for Question 4:
It's a problem with the editor. Back to the exercise

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Tip for Question 5:
It's a problem with the editors. Back to the exercise

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Tip for Question 6:
It's a problem with the date. Please use today's date: . Back to the exercise

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Tip for Question 7:
It's a problem with the date. Please use today's date: Back to the exercise

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Tip for Question 8
It's a problem with the order of the references. Back to the exercise

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Last updated on: Friday, August 19, 2016