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Chat GPT - AI Literacy

Best practices for using Chat GPT in your Research

Citing Your Sources With ChatGPT

When you do research you should always cite your information sources and the same goes for ChatGPT!  It should be considered as one of your citable sources whenever you paraphrase or quote any content that was created by it. As with other sources, you will generally need to include an in-text citation as well as a formatted one in your Reference list or Works Cited. 

You should always check and confirm the validity and accuracy of any sources that ChatGPT provides as supplemental sources. 

Keep in mind that your instructors will not consider ChatGPT to be a scholarly research source, but if you do want or need to cite it, the following guidelines and practices may help you.

 

MLA Style Citations

Guidance from the MLA Style Center: How to cite generative AI in MLA Style.

 
Example of citation for a Works Cited page: 

“Describe the symbolism of the green light in the book The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald” prompt. ChatGPT, 13 Feb. version, OpenAI, 8 Mar. 2023, chat.openai.com/chat.

Notes on the Works Cited citation:  

  • ChatGPT is not to be considered as an author within MLA.
  • Start the citation with the prompt you used in quotation marks followed by the word 'prompt.'
  • Include the version used and the date of use.
  • Use the URL for the general site as the inquiry itself is not saved.
 
In-Text MLA Citations

To refer to your citation within your text, use the first few identifying words of the query prompt (in quotation marks) as the reference. 

For example:

While the green light in The Great Gatsby might be said to chiefly symbolize four main things: optimism, the unattainability of the American dream, greed, and covetousness (“Describe the symbolism”), arguably the most important—the one that ties all four themes together—is greed.

 

APA Style Citations

Guidance from APA Style: How to Cite ChatGPT

 
Example of citation for a References page: 

OpenAI. (2023). ChatGPT (Mar 14 version) [Large language model]. https://chat.openai.com/chat

Notes on the Reference citation:  

  • The author of the model is OpenAI
  • The date listed after the author is the year of the version you used (you do not need the exact date)
  • The version of ChatGPT is included after the title, in parentheses
  • Use the phrase Large language model in brackets to indicate that this source is outside of typical peer-reviewed literature.
  • Use the URL for the general site as the inquiry itself is not saved.
  • Do not include the prompt on the Reference page citation. APA encourages including prompts and outputs in an Appendix​.
 
In-Text APA Citations

To refer to your citation within your text, use OpenAI as the author and the version year as the year. If providing AI prompts and outputs within an Appendix (highly recommended by  APA) then also include the Appendix letter.

For example:

When prompted with “Is the left brain right brain divide real or a metaphor?” the ChatGPT-generated text indicated that although the two brain hemispheres are somewhat specialized, “the notation that people can be characterized as ‘left-brained’ or ‘right-brained’ is considered to be an oversimplification and a popular myth” (OpenAI, 2023; see Appendix A for the full transcript).

 

Chicago Style Citations

Guidance from the Chicago Manual of Style: Q&A on Citation, Documentation of Sources

Note: Do not include ChatGPT sources in the Bibliography unless you provide a publicly available link. Although OpenAI assigns unique URLs to conversations generated from your prompts, those can’t be used by others to access the same content (they require your login credentials), making a ChatGPT conversation like an email, phone, or text conversation—or any other type of personal communication.

Example of citation using Footnote format: 

1. Text generated by ChatGPT, OpenAI, March 7, 2023, https://chat.openai.com/chat.

Notes on the Footnotes:  

  • The author of the model is ChatGPT
  • The publisher is OpenAI
  • If you’ve edited the AI-generated text, you should say so in the text or at the end of the note (e.g., “edited for style and content”)
 
Example of citation using Author/Date form: 

(ChatGPT, March 7, 2023)

Notes on the Author/Date format:  

  • Any information not in the text would be placed in a parenthetical text reference