[parsimo2010]

A common approach to research is to do literature review first, and build up a library of citable material. Then when writing your article, you summarize the relevant past research and put in appropriate citations.

To clarify, there is a difference between a bibliography (a list of relevant works but not necessarily cited), and cited work (a direct reference in an article to relevant work). But most people start with a bibliography (the superset of relevant work) to make their citations.

Most academics who have been doing research for a long time maintain an ongoing bibliography of work in their field. Some people do it as a giant .bib file, some use software products like Zotero, Mendeley, etc. A few absolute psychos keep track of their bibliography in MS Word references (tbh people in some fields do this because .docx is the accepted submission format for their journals, not because they are crazy).

[plastic041]

> a bibliography (a list of relevant works but not necessarily cited)

Didn't know that there's difference between bibliography and cited work. thank you.

[suddenlybananas]

Yes but you should read your bibliography.