Citations serve several important functions, including maintaining intellectual honesty (or avoiding plagiarism), attributing prior or unoriginal work and ideas to the proper sources, allowing the reader to independently determine whether the referenced material supports the author's argument in the claimed way, and assisting the citer. These functions are not always mutually exclusive; for example, an author might cite another work as support for a claim while also noting that this other work has its own shortcomings. In academic writing, citations are used to identify sources of information and evidence upon which authors rely during their research and writing processes. Academic writers often use bibliographic databases such as PubMed or Web of Science to search for relevant publications, then include these references when submitting papers for publication. The purpose of citing sources is threefold: first, others can evaluate the paper's claims by comparing them with those of other scholars; second, they can verify the accuracy of the information presented; third, others can learn from these sources by reading their works themselves (or having them cited by others). In science journalism and books about science, citations are required to demonstrate that one has properly attributed content. Writers must give credit to previous researchers if they have taken something out of their imagination and put it into practice. They should also cite sources if they have drawn on stories or anecdotes told by scientists themselves. This shows that they have done some original research and written something novel, which will be appreciated by editors and readers.