Consistent Use of Academic Writing Conventions among Post Graduate Students: A Case Study of Kisii University, Kenya

Abstract

Citing sources in the body of your paper and providing a list of references as either footnotes or endnotes is a very important aspect of academic writing. It is essential to always acknowledge the source of any ideas, research findings, data, or quoted text that you have used in your paper as a defence against allegations of plagiarism. Equally important, the scholarly convention of citing sources allow readers to identify if students resources you used in writing your paper so they can independently verify and assess the quality of findings and conclusions based on your review of the literature. The study sought to establish if students use the ampersand and et al in relation to joining two or more cited source authors. The study employed a descriptive survey design to analyse how graduate students employ three conventions—and, ampersand sign and et al. Twenty-four Masters theses submitted to Kisii University for the award of degrees were analysed. The selected theses were from the faculties of business studies and education for the period 2015 and 2018. The study observed various incorrect in-text application of the ‘and, or ampersand’ conventions in crediting two source authors by graduate students in Kisii university. The most common incorrect in-text usage of the ampersand was when citing two source authors in the author prominent style and in parenthesis. The study observed that one, most documents analysed employed the et al., convention sparingly.