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For example, a presentation whose PDF is listed at http://www.astro.ex.ac.uk/exoclimes/2012/pdf/talks/Day02_Ferreira.pdf?

And what if the presentation doesn't have a publicly available URL? How would the citation style differ from that of a poster?

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It's worth checking with the conference... for example, Society for Neuroscience poster abstracts have a citation style listed at the bottom of every page (scroll to bottom of page, under "support" heading). – eykanal♦ Jun 8 '12 at 4:28

3 Answers

up vote 11 down vote

I would try to avoid citing a presentation or poster in the first place. It won't make a very good reference for your readers, since not only may it be hard to find, but it won't have a complete description of what the previous authors did.

Instead, I would contact the authors of the poster, and ask if they have a paper about their project, or at least a preprint, and then cite that.

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up vote 2 down vote

To supplement Nate's comments, what I have usually seen is "personal communication". The poster isn't yet peer-reviewed and if it has yet to be written up as a manuscript and you can't cite it as a paper that is "in press", "personal communication" is a good substitute.

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I find "personal communication" rather poor as a citation. How can one look that up? – Dave Clarke Jun 8 '12 at 5:35
Well if it is personal communication with Dave Clarke, it gives people an idea. At least it is better than trying to cite a url that may not exist in a year. – bobthejoe Jun 8 '12 at 8:14
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I don't even remember the conversation ... – Dave Clarke Jun 8 '12 at 9:39
@Dave Clarke, Touche – bobthejoe Jun 8 '12 at 21:08
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"Personal communication" is what you write when you've given up on citing anything that could actually help the reader, and just want to give credit to your friend. Which is about as much as citing a presentation accomplishes. – Nate Eldredge Jun 9 '12 at 5:14
up vote 2 down vote

The specifics of the citation would depend on the citation style you are using. I am most familiar with Chicago style. To cite the presentation you've linked to in Chicago style, I would put:

David Ferreira, et al., "Climate of an Earth-like Aquaplanet: the high-obliquity case and the tidally-locked case" (presentation, Exoclimes 2012, Aspen, CO, January 16–20, 2012), accessed June 8, 2012, http://www.astro.ex.ac.uk/exoclimes/2012/pdf/talks/Day02_Ferreira.pdf.

Following these guidelines: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/717/08/

For APA style, you would only cite a presentation in a reference list if there is a tangible remnant ("recoverable data") of the presentation (e.g., slides posted on a website). The citation would look like:

Ferreira, D., Marshall, J., O'Gorman, P., Seager, S. & Lau, H. (January 2012). Climate of an Earth-Like Aquaplanet: the high-obliquity case and the tidally-locked case. Paper presented at Exoclimes 2012, Aspen, Co.

For more examples in APA citation, look here: http://citationonline.net/CitationHelp/csg04-manuscripts-apa.htm#53

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