Organizing Your Social Sciences Research Paper

Further readings provide references to sources that the author has deemed useful to a reader seeking additional information or context about the research problem. They are items that are not essential to understanding the overall study or were cited as a source the author used or quoted from when writing the paper.

Lester, James D. and James D. Lester, Jr. Writing Research Papers: A Complete Guide. 16th edition. Boston, MA: Pearson, 2021.

A writing assignment may include a requirement to include all sources found about the topic regardless of whether or not you used them to write your paper. This list of further readings helps your professor understand the entire scope of your review of the literature and assess how effectively you made decisions about what to cite in your paper and what you found but excluded as part of your analysis.

Depending on the writing style you are asked to use [e.g., APA, Chicago, MLA, etc.], a list of further readings should be located at the end of your paper after the endnotes or references but before any appendices. The list should begin under the heading "Further Readings." Items can be arranged alphabetically by the author's last name, categorized under sub-headings by material type [e.g., books, articles, websites, etc.], or listed by the type of content [e.g., theory, methods, etc.].

If you choose to include a list of further readings, keep in mind the following:

1. The references to further readings are not critical to understanding the central research problem. In other words, if a list of further readings were not included, the citations to sources used in writing the paper would be sufficient in allowing the reader to evaluate the credibility of your literature review and analysis of prior research on the topic.
2. Although further readings represent additional or suggested sources, they still must be viewed as relevant to the research problem. Don't include further readings simply to show off your skills in searching for materials on your topic. Even though they may not be central to understanding the research problem, every item listed must relate in some way to helping the reader locate additional information or obtain a broader understanding of the topic.
3. Do not include basic survey texts or reference books like encyclopedias and dictionaries. These types of sources are usually too general or basic in helping to understand and contemplate the research problem. If a survey text or basic reference source provides very specific information, its content likely should have been integrated into the text of your paper [e.g., definition from a dictionary] and cited in your list of references.
4. If you have identified non-textual materials related to your topic that may be of interest to the reader but were not used for your paper, they can be included in a list of further readings. This may include references to sources such as archival collections, documentary or popular films, photograph collections, audio files, or large data sets. Note that these materials could also be listed and described in an appendix.

To identify possible titles to include in a list of further readings, examine the sources you found while researching your paper, but that you ended up not citing because it did not directly relate to supporting your analysis and interpretation of the results. Review these items and, playing the role of reader, think about which ones may provide additional insight or background information about the research problem you have investigated.

Soles, Derek. The Essentials of Academic Writing. 2nd edition. Boston, MA: Cengage Learning Houghton Mifflin, 2010; "Further Reading" and "Wikipedia Talk: Further Reading." Wikipedia.