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However you use your borrowed information—whether directly quoting, paraphrasing, or summarizing—remember that you must cite your sources. That's called documenting your sources of borrowed information. That is covered in documentation.
Quoting Directly
For various reasons, you may feel compelled to throw in a lot of quotations in your technical documents. It's true: direct quotation can provide authority to your documents, but so can paraphrasing and summarizing (covered below).
Reasons for Direct Quotations
In technical texts, you can reduce your reasons for direct quotations to these:
Authority speaks:
According to Stephen Hawking in an interview with Nature, "There is no escape from a black hole in classical theory, Quantum theory, however, enables energy and information to escape from a black hole."
Dr. Avijit Banerjee, chair of cardiology and operative dentistry at King's College London, said "the potential harmful effects of fluoride cited have not been associated with the very low levels of fluoride used in water fluoridation programs."
Avoid guilt by association: Imagine that some politician makes hopelessly misinformed comments about vaccines. You don't want readers to think that you have that idea about vaccines so you quote the politician, perhaps loading the attribution:
In his presidential campaign, he has put forth the widely discredited notion that fluoridated water is "associated with arthritis, bone fractures, bone cancer, IQ loss, neurodevelopmental disorders, and thyroid disease."
Crazy, quirky expression:
In Into a Black Hole transcribed by https://www.hawking.org.uk/, Hawking stated that "black holes ain't as black as they are painted."
The legendary H. Ross Perot, in his famous criticism on NAFTA (a free-trade agreement), argued that it would create "a giant sucking sound going south," meaning U.S. jobs leaving of the U.S. because lower wage expectations elsewhere.
Methods of Direct Quotation
Block quotation
According to APA style:
Check APA style for the format of narrative citations and parenthetical citations.
Complete-sentence direct quotation
If you need to quote a complete sentence, remember to attach some sort of attribution to it, and use appropriate punctuation:
Colon: Research from the Encyclopedia Britannica states that distance learning was not universally accepted by colleges and universities across the United States: "the introduction of distance learning in traditional institutions raised fears that technology will someday completely eliminate real classrooms and human instructors” based on research from the Encyclopedia Britannica" [3].
Comma: According to the United States Distance Learning Association, "in 2015, an estimated quarter of a million people were participating in some level of undergraduate distance learning in the United States alone" [2].
See the next section on attribution
Run-in direct quotation
In plenty of instances, it's better to run in parts of a direct quotation to the syntax of your own writing, for example:
Dewey stated that "by 1987, for example, the interest in distance learning was sufficient to create the United States Distance Learning Association (USDAL)" [2].
Another advantage of online learning is that it more readily enables "adaptation of training materials that address students' individual needs" [1].
Direct Quotations: Attribution
An attribution for a quotation indicates who made the quoted statement and possibly other related details. The attribution is highlighted in red:
Dewey also argues that “this shift has significant implications and allows distance educators to play an important role in the fulfillment of the promise of the right to universal education” [2].
Now, here is an example containing the unattributed quotations highlighted in red (using bracketed-format for citations):
The bracketed numbers in the above example identify the sources of the quotations. But that is inadequate. In this revision, attributions have been added and are highlighted in teal:
Technology changed the game of distance learning entirely. Just a few of the technologies that are commonly used in distance learning courses include video chat, webinars, chat room digital forums and e-mail based on details from the Essential Guide [1] and are the foundation of virtual classrooms. Dewey states that "by 1987, for example, the interest in distance learning was sufficient to create the United States Distance Learning Association (USDAL)" [2]. And as technology has continued to improve, access to computers and internet in most homes, as well as high speed cellular connections, the growth and interest in distance learning in many forms has skyrocketed. According to the United States Distance Learning Association, "in 2015, an estimated quarter of a million people were participating in some level of undergraduate distance learning in the United States alone" [2]. While this number may seem like distance learning was accepted by colleges and universities across the United States, research presented in the Encyclopedia Britannica states that "the introduction of distance learning in traditional institutions raised fears that technology will someday completely eliminate real classrooms and human instructors" [3]. Because of this unrealistic fear, many colleges and universities still offered limited or no remote or online course options even as recent as five years ago. But the major driver that brought distance learning into the mainstream and helped to solidify this education method as just as valuable as a regular classroom model was the COVID pandemic.
Paraphrasing
In a technical-document, usually the better approach to note-taking is to paraphrase. When you paraphrase, you convey the information fact-by-fact, idea-by-idea, and point-by-point in your own words. The writer of the original passage ought to be able to read your paraphrase and say that it is precisely what she or he had meant.
Reasons for Paraphrasing
Here are some reasons for paraphrasing as opposed to directly quoting:
- There is nothing special or unusual in the direct quote.
- The quotation is too long (True, you could reduce the length with ellipses, but the result would be a hard-to understand collection of fragments.
- You can make the paraphrase fit the context and terminology of your discussion.
- It's much easier to transition into and out of the paraphrase.
As for punctuation, you punctuate the paraphrase as you would your own writing.
Paraphrases: Attribution
Here is an example of original text followed by a paraphrase of it, including an attribution highlighted in red:
Original passage |
Paraphrased version
|
As of fall 2025, these paraphrasing tools were available:
Quillbot Paraphrasing Tool l
Quillbot AI-Detector
Scribbr Paraphrasing Tool
Grammarly may also offer a paraphrasing tool.
Summarizing
Reasons for Summaries
Here are some reasons for summarizing as opposed to quoting or paraphrasing:
- You just want to cite the main idea of the source.
- You want to enable readers to read further, dive deeper.
- You want to state that the source provides further support for the point you're making.
As for punctuation, you punctuate the summary as you would your own writing.
Summaries: Attribution
Here is an example of original text followed by different summaries of it:
Original passage |
Summarized versions
Original-sentence paraphrased: |
As of fall 2024, this summarizing tool was available:
I would appreciate your thoughts, reactions, criticism regarding this chapter: your response.
