Complete and Accurate Citation of Sources | Genealogical Proof Standard | Ancestry

Join Crista Cowan for the third in our series on the Genealogical Proof Standard (GPS). The second element is a complete and accurate citation of your sources. You will learn both WHY this is such an important step in your research process and HOW to improve your source citations.
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Complete and Accurate Citation of Sources | Genealogical Proof Standard | Ancestry
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[@jcfh19981]

I’ve been hasty at times and know I have not cited all of my sources properly. I’ll be going back to square one and work on that. And I’ll have fresh eyes on what I haven’t looked at in awhile.

[@patwolfe4261]

Christa, as I am listening to you on citations and watching the pages you are showing in Ancestry, I have never seen these pages in the layout your are using. I have been using Ancestry for 10 yrs plus. I like your layout and would love to be able to use in my trees. How to you get this lay out?

[@AncestryUS]

Hi Pat! This video is several years old so you are looking at some old screen shots. But, the source citation section is mostly the same, just some different colors, etc. When you are viewing the profile page of a person in your family tree, just click the ADD SOURCE button in the middle section. That will walk you through the source/citation creation wizard like I showed on the screen. Hope that helps! (~Crista)

[@JustAGuitarPlayer]

Crista, is it best to use a photo (jpg) of a source citation or a pdf file of one? I have recently purchased some records off the ScotlandPeoplesUK website which contain the National Archives of Scotlands records. I'd like to create citations for my ancestry dot com page but I wasn't sure if there is a preferred document/file type. The Scottish Peoples website allows you to download both a jpg which comes out slightly larger and a bit easier to read or a pdf file which is still usually legible most of the time. Anyway, I was wondering if you suggest using jpg's or pdf's for the citations. These are a mix of census records/birth and death certificates. Also, is it legal to include these copies of these original documents as citations? When I see them asking for who is the publisher, I get a bit confused. Would I be writing myself in as the publisher because I'm publishing my copy of the record? Or is the website Scottish Peoples website considered the publisher? Hope you can let me know as I've got a lot of census records and birth and death certificates that I'd like to add to my tree in the correct way. Thanks in advance for a reply and info.

[@rudged123]

Is there an accepted way to document, i.e. cite DNA results that are used as a source of evidence ? I've searched Genealogy Standards (2nd edition) - it discusses how to use DNA results when reasoning about parentage, it provides no example of how you would document this type of evidence.

[@matthewcondon1985]

Have you ever cited a source that you did not fined info in? Stating that you searched that source and were not able to find info.

[@AncestryUS]

Yes, Matthew. I keep tracking of negative searches as well. (Crista)