When referencing someone else's work in the body of your paper, which citation element appears first?

• A. Title
• B. Page number
• C. Quote
• D. Signal phrase

Answer: (D)

Introducing the source with a signal phrase is the first thing you do when you reference someone else’s work in your writing. A signal phrase names the author and sets up the idea as coming from that source, for example, “According to Smith” or “Smith argues that.” This attribution happens before you present the borrowed material, so the reader immediately knows whose ideas are being discussed and the orientation of the quotation or paraphrase. After this lead-in, you include the actual quote or paraphrase, with a page number added in the citation if you’re quoting directly. The title isn’t the initial element of the in-text reference, and is typically reserved for the works cited or reference list. So the first element you see when referencing a source in the body is the signal phrase.