Reference

• Reference sources contain broad overviews of specialized topics and/or fields of study, and thus are where you should begin your research. They will acquaint you with the vocabulary you need to begin researching your own topic.
• Reference sources represent what we call tertiary sources (see the introduction at the beginning of this tutorial). Tertiary sources are the least authoritative sources you can cite for your papers, as they are "thrice removed" from the original source.
• Reference sources also provide bibliographies of secondary and primary sources.

Click "Next" below to try using some Web-based reference sources.