Self-Citation

Citing one's own previously published work (an article, dataset, preprint, or other output) within a new manuscript. Self-citation is legitimate, and often necessary, when it substantively supports the current work — building on prior results, pointing to a previously validated method instead of repeating it, or situating a study within a sustained research programme. It becomes problematic — citation manipulation rather than ordinary scholarly practice — when self-citations are added primarily to inflate personal or journal-level citation metrics rather than because the cited work is genuinely relevant, including reciprocal citation-stacking arrangements between authors or journals.

ByCASRAI Editorial Board

· Last updated 23 Jul 2026

Worked examples

Is an instance

A researcher citing their own earlier methods paper instead of re-describing a validated protocol in full, so readers can locate the detailed procedure without it being repeated in every subsequent paper.

Is an instance

An author citing their own prior study to properly credit and contextualize how a new paper extends or replicates that earlier work, using the same citation-style conventions (APA, MLA, Chicago, Vancouver) applied to any other reference.

Looks similar, but isn't

Not an instance

An author citing several of their own tangentially related papers in an introduction with no substantive connection to the current argument, primarily to raise their personal citation count — self-serving self-citation rather than a citation that does real argumentative work.

Not an instance

Two authors, or two journals, agreeing to reciprocally cite each other's work at an inflated rate specifically to boost citation-based metrics such as Journal Impact Factor — citation stacking, a form of citation manipulation that Clarivate's JCR monitors and can suppress journals over.

Self-citation is the act of citing one’s own previously published work — a prior article, dataset, preprint, book chapter, or conference paper — within a new manuscript. It is a normal, expected part of scholarly writing: researchers build on their own prior results, methods, and datasets constantly, and the citation record should reflect that continuity the same way it reflects any other researcher’s contribution.

Self-citation is not inherently a problem. It becomes a problem only when citations to one’s own work are added primarily to inflate a metric — personal citation counts, an author’s h-index, or a journal’s Impact Factor — rather than because the cited work is genuinely relevant to the point being made. That distinction, not the mere presence of a self-citation, is what separates ordinary scholarly practice from citation manipulation.

When self-citation is legitimate

Citing your own earlier work is appropriate, and often necessary, when it does real argumentative or methodological work in the new manuscript:

Building on prior results. A paper that extends, replicates, or reanalyzes an earlier study should cite that earlier study — readers need to know what came before and how the new work relates to it.
Referencing established methods. Citing a previous methods paper instead of re-describing a validated protocol in full lets readers locate the detailed procedure without repeating pages of methodological detail in every subsequent paper. This is the standard, encouraged alternative to reproducing that text (see self-plagiarism below).
Situating a research programme. Researchers working on a sustained line of inquiry routinely cite their own earlier papers to show how a study fits into that programme — this is normal disciplinary practice, not misconduct.
Avoiding unnecessary repetition. Rather than restating background, definitions, or a literature review already published, an author can cite the earlier work and summarize its relevant conclusion.

In each case, the self-citation is doing the same job any other citation does: pointing the reader to a specific, relevant source that supports a specific claim.

When self-citation becomes problematic

Self-citation crosses into citation manipulation when it is added for reasons unrelated to the argument being made in the current manuscript:

Self-serving padding. Citing several of one’s own tangentially related papers in an introduction or discussion, with no substantive connection to the current argument, primarily to raise a personal citation count.
Citation stacking. A reciprocal arrangement — between individual authors, or between journals — to cite each other’s work at an inflated rate specifically to boost citation-based metrics such as the Journal Impact Factor. Clarivate’s Journal Citation Reports (JCR) tracks each journal’s self-citation rate separately from its Impact Factor and has suppressed journals from JCR listings when self-citation or reciprocal citation stacking accounts for an outsized share of the citations driving that Impact Factor.
Coercive self-citation. A related but distinct pattern where an editor or reviewer pressures an author to add citations to the editor’s or reviewer’s own work as a condition of publication — see coercive citation.

Publishers and indexing bodies distinguish self-citation as a normal, expected feature of the literature from self-citation rates or patterns that appear designed to game citation-based metrics. See self-citation rate for how that rate is measured and monitored at the journal level.

Self-citation vs. self-plagiarism

These are frequently confused but address different problems:

Self-citation is about whether you disclose and reference your own prior work at all. Failing to cite relevant prior work of your own is a citation gap, not usually treated as misconduct on its own — though it can leave a reader thinking a finding or method is newer than it is.
Self-plagiarism (also called text recycling) is about reusing substantial portions of your own previously published text in a new publication without disclosure or appropriate citation, such that a reader is led to believe the material is new.

The two interact directly: citing your own earlier paper for its methods, rather than pasting the methods section into the new manuscript verbatim, is exactly how proper self-citation avoids self-plagiarism. Citing the source is necessary but not always sufficient on its own to fully resolve a text-recycling concern if large verbatim blocks are still reused — journals and institutions generally expect both accurate citation and original wording (or clearly marked quotation) for anything beyond boilerplate methods language.

How to cite your own work

Mechanically, citing yourself follows the same rules as citing anyone else, in whatever citation style the target venue requires (APA, MLA, Chicago, Vancouver, or a journal’s own house style):

Use the standard in-text citation and full reference-list entry for the work, exactly as you would for any other author’s publication — your own name in the author position is not a special case.
If the earlier work is unpublished (a course paper, thesis chapter, or working draft), cite it as such using the citation style’s convention for unpublished/unpublished-manuscript sources, and check whether the venue or instructor requires disclosure or permission to reuse it.
Where a paper’s copyright has been transferred to a publisher, reusing substantial text from it — even with a citation — can raise a separate copyright question independent of the citation itself; citing the source doesn’t automatically clear reuse of the original wording.
Where a data set, software package, or other non-article output is being reused, cite it as its own object (with a persistent identifier such as a DOI where one exists) rather than only citing the paper that describes it.

Related terms

Self-plagiarism — reusing your own prior text without disclosure or citation.
Self-citation rate — the journal-level bibliometric measure that citation stacking is designed to game.
Coercive citation — a reviewer or editor pressuring an author to add citations to their own work.
Fake citation — a citation to a source that doesn’t exist or doesn’t say what it’s cited for.

Use in your systems

JATS XML <role> element

xml

<role vocab="credit"
      vocab-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/"
      vocab-term="Self-Citation"
      vocab-term-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/self-citation" />

Schema.org DefinedTerm (JSON-LD)

json

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  "url": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/self-citation",
  "sameAs": [],
  "license": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/",
  "publisher": {
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  "dateModified": "2026-07-23T07:06:19",
  "inLanguage": "en"
}