ABSTRACT

Many different styles of referencing have developed over the years. National standards have been agreed in the USA, UK, Europe and China. However, few publishers appear to follow these standards precisely, perhaps because they each allow some degree of choice. Today variation seems rife, and this is made worse by computer-based systems for preparing references, such as EndNote, Procite and Reference Manager. EndNote (2007) proudly boasts that it includes ‘more than 2,300 predefined bibliographic styles for leading journals’, although quite why anyone should want such a number is anybody’s guess.