Why You Should be Following Citations

• Amy McInerney
• Published on 11/13/2025
• Updated on11/14/2025

With so much information available online these days, it’s our responsibility as researchers to evaluate the validity and credibility of the information presented. Becoming familiar with the SIFT method and CRAAP test is a great start to evaluating resources; considering the accuracy, relevance, trustworthiness, and authority of a resource are necessary steps of the research process. If you’re ready to dig in deeper and level up the intensity of your research, you may want to consider adding the method of following citations to your research toolkit. 

The Method of Follow Citations

Following citations can transform your research in a number of ways. Before we identify the benefits of this strategy, let’s explore how to follow citations. It’s recommended this process is performed once you find a resource, before any information-gathering occurs. Here are the steps to get started:

1. On a website, scroll down to the bottom to find the Bibliography or Works Cited section. In a research or academic article, find the last few pages, which is where the Bibliography or Works Cited information generally is. 
2. Scan the citations, making sure they are complete and are formatted correctly. Haphazard citations can be a sign of incomplete research. If something feels off, double-check the citation format on TypeCite.com.
3. Click on a few citations to visit the original resources. If you’re unable to click on the citations, copy and paste it into a search engine to find the abstract or summary of the resource.
4. Explore the original source by reading some of the information and investigating the corporation or author who produced the resource. 

What Following Citations Can Reveal

First and foremost, tracing citations can reveal bias, incomplete information, and disinformation in original sources. If all of the original sources of an article or a website point to the same viewpoint or bias, chances are the author of the resource you’ve found isn’t approaching the topic with a balanced perspective. Credible research should present balanced viewpoints and should take different perspectives into account. Without a fair approach, writers run the risk of skewing information and producing, or replicating disinformation. If your investigation of the citations reveals bias or disinformation, consider whether or not the author of the resource you’ve found addresses this.

Real Life Scenario

Let’s explore a real-world situation to put this into perspective. You’re conducting research on the safety components built into social media sites and you’ve found a great article that addresses your topic. You want to make sure the information is credible and legitimate and have employed the CAARP test; you need to know where the author of the article has gotten their information, leading you to follow the works cited list. The works cited list is as follows:

Spending a few minutes following the citations reveals that the sources consulted are developed by social media companies whose goal is to persuade people to use their platforms. Is your source credible and legitimate? The short answer is that it’s likely biased, knowing that the facts included are representative of certain viewpoints. To be a responsible researcher, you’ll need to find resources that are inclusive of perspectives, perhaps from psychologists or researchers, to balance out the bias that’s likely present in the article you found. 

This leads to a question that every researcher has encountered at least once: what if a resource you’ve found has zero citations? If the author doesn’t cite where their information is derived from, you’re right to question its legitimacy. Considering that citations help a reader know writing is based on fact rather than opinion, or that information isn’t completely made up, it could be risky to include uncited information in your own work. 

What about AI Tools?

If you choose to use AI tools in your research process, the strategy of link checking becomes even more significant. Many AI Large Language Models (LLMs), including ChatGPT and Gemini, don’t provide citations for their responses. Couple that with the phenomenon known as hallucination, in which AI LLMs produce responses that are coherent and seem correct, and the decision to use AI tools for research can become precarious. Instead, opt for tools like Perplexity that include citations so you as a researcher can investigate the legitimacy and credibility of the information. 

While you’re checking links, you may uncover potential resources for your own research that you can then build on in your own work. And of course, as a responsible researcher, it goes without saying that you’ll need to include your own works cited list. Just as you should expect your resources to have works cited, your own work needs to acknowledge any resources you’ve consulted, giving your research its own layer of credibility and legitimacy. 

You can also use this method to find more resources for your own research! If you find a source that is legitimate and credible, follow the citations and use them in your own note-taking and research process!