Skip to Main Content

University Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Cited Reference Searching

This guide shows users how to view how many times a publication has been cited–sometimes called citation analysis–using tools like Web of Science, Scopus, and Google Scholar.

About This Database

Searching in Web of Science

Step 1:

On the Library homepage search for "Web of Science" in Easy Search. A direct link to Web of Science will be at the top of your search results.

This image is a screensot of a direct link to Web of Science in the EasySearch results page of the University Library website.

Step 2:

Click on the arrow next to "Basic Search" and choose "Cited Reference Search" from the dropdown menu.

This image is a screenshot of the drop-down menu where users can access the cited reference search in Web of Science.


Step 3:

Enter information about your article into the search boxes. In the example we will search for an article published in Science in 2005 by author AJ Leggett.

This image is a screenshot of the cited reference search search boxes in Web of Science.

Step 4:
Choose the result that matches your citation information. In this case, we know we are looking for an article by Leggett in volume 307 of Science, published in 2005. Place a check mark next to the correct article, and click "Finish Search."

This image is a screenshot of the Cited Reference Search results page where you can select the cited reference.

Step 5:

The final result is a list of articles that have cited the article:

This image is a screenshot of the Cited Reference Search results page with a list of articles that cite the reference.

For more information see Web of Science's cited reference search tutorial.