AboutDan Smith Expertise I have been a professional writer and editor for more than 30 years, taught speech and English composition at the university level, and have developed speech and English composition courses and seminars for businesses. I am experienced in editing a wide variety of materials, especially business, scientific, and other academic papers. I am familiar with all the major style guides.
Experience I have edited any number of graduate papers and other technical materials in such advanced fields as civil and electrical engineering and semiconductor fabrication. I have extensive experience in working with non-native English speakers.
Expert: Dan Smith Date: 4/19/2008 Subject: APA citation
Question I need to write an essay on a scientific paper that cites several other sources. Do I cite only the author(s) of the paper itself when paraphrasing or quoting ideas originally compiled from that author's cited sources, or do I cite the original source?
Answer You should cite the author of the paper itself. If you think it is appropriate, you can note in your text that the author is drawing on other sources. Simply stealing someone else's footnotes is a kind of cheating, but it is often done. It is risky. What if your guy got it wrong? You may find it appropriate to take a look at the sources your author cited. If you do that, you can legitimately cite them.
If you use the same quotation from some other source, you may put in your bibliography, that source, in the source you are working from.
For example,
Smith, J. (1998). Title. In Jones, D. (2006). Title of article. Journal Title. Publication information.
