How many quotes should be in a research paper

Print Tweet Share on Facebook Was this helpful? Comments 0. Add a public comment to this FAQ Entry. Answers by Topic. Today's Hours. More Ways to Ask. Get more on:. Powered by Springshare ; All rights reserved. It is NOT a series of direct quotations strung together. A common complaint of faculty is that students use too many direct quotes in their papers instead of formulating their own ideas about the paper topic and using quotes rather sparingly as one way to substantiate their point of view on the topic.

Use summaries and paraphrases most often to support your own ideas. Use direct quotations only when the information is so well-presented or in the interest of clarity, emphasis, or accuracy , that you think the exact language of the source should be used.

Remember that when you do choose to use direct quotations, you need to retain the exact wording, spelling, capitalization, and punctuation of the original source.

And remember, too, that just like when using a direct quotation, you must cite your source when summarizing or paraphrasing. Yes, you can leave out words you deem unnecessary in a quotation, but you can't take out words that will change its meaning. For example, if the quotation is "This movie is wonderful drivel," you can't quote it as "This movie is wonderful. A direct quote is when you use the exact wording from the text. This is usually used if you want to use part of a sentence or a whole sentence to help prove your points.

You can use a direct quote if it is longer but you would need to put it in a different context in your paper. You would put parenthesis around sources that are about a sentence or less long and you would put longer direct quotes in a single spaced and indented box paragraph separate from the paragraph. This is your paper and you will use the quotes to enhance it but not to explain each and every thing you want to discuss.

It is important to both use quotations effectively and cite them properly to write an effective paper and avoid plagiarizing. To quote in a research paper in APA style, use in-text parenthetical citations at the end of quotes that have the author's last name and the year the text was published.

If you mention the author's name in the sentence with the quote, just include the year the text was published in the citation.

If you're citing a quote in MLA style, do the same thing you would for APA style, but use the page number instead of the year the text was published. To learn how to quote a research paper in Chicago style, scroll down! Did this summary help you? Yes No. Log in Social login does not work in incognito and private browsers. Please log in with your username or email to continue. No account yet? Create an account.

Edit this Article. We use cookies to make wikiHow great. By using our site, you agree to our cookie policy. Cookie Settings. Learn why people trust wikiHow. Download Article Explore this Article methods. Quote Help. Tips and Warnings. Related Articles. Article Summary. Quote Help Sample Short Quotes.

Sample Modified Quotes. Sample Block Quotes. Method 1. Understand how to use dropped quotes. Dropped quotes are partial phrases taken from the middle of a piece of text. Dropped quotes are comprised of only a few words and give no information about the speaker.

These must always be introduced within a sentence, and cannot comprise a complete sentence on their own. Use a complete sentence to incorporate a dropped quote. Understand how to use full sentence quotes. As the name implies, full sentence quotes are created by quoting complete sentences that take up less than 4 lines.

Although these are complete sentences, they cannot be used as stand-alone sentences in your paper. Introduce them with an additional complete sentence or a signal phrase. Use a complete sentence to introduce a full sentence quote. Use a signal phrase to introduce your full sentence quote. Understand how to use block quotes. Block quotes are multiple sentences quoted directly from a source which take up more than 4 lines in your paper, or no more than 3 if you are quoting verse.

Incorporate a block quote by adding a complete line space between your own content and the quote, and offsetting it by indenting the entire quote to the right a single time. Introduce your block quote with a colon.

Ex: According to Wallace: add a line break here, and then indent the entire quote. Block quotes do not use quotation marks. Add the in-text parenthetical citation after the period at the end of the quote, though. Simply add another line break and begin writing along the left margin with no indent.