There is no single settled convention yet for citing AI assistance, and guidance from style bodies and journals is still being revised. But three points are already consistent across most current guidance, and getting them right protects you far more than guessing wrong.
Disclose the tool and its role, not just its existence
The emerging norm — reflected in APA, MLA, and most publisher policies — is to disclose what the AI tool was used for (drafting, editing, translation, idea generation), not merely that one was used at some point. A blanket disclaimer at the end of a manuscript is weaker evidence of good practice than a specific note describing which sections or tasks involved AI assistance.
Never cite an AI tool as a source of fact
An AI system is not a citable authority for a claim, a statistic, or a finding — it is, at best, a drafting or organizing aid. If an AI-assisted draft states a fact, that fact needs its own source citation, exactly as if you had written the sentence yourself without assistance. Treat AI output the way you would treat an unreviewed draft from a research assistant: useful, but not evidence.
Check your specific venue’s policy before submitting
Policies differ meaningfully by publisher and by journal, and they are changing quickly. Some require disclosure only above a materiality threshold; others prohibit AI-generated text outright in certain sections; some require disclosure in the methods section rather than an acknowledgments footnote. Check the actual submission guidelines for your specific target — not general advice, including this article — before you finalize a manuscript.
Keep your own audit trail
Retain a record of your original source selection, and which claims and citations came directly from a source you read versus a synthesis that was later drafted with assistance. This is not just a compliance habit — it is what lets you answer a supervisor’s or reviewer’s question about where a specific claim came from, quickly and with confidence.
Make disclosure easy to reconstruct
Keep the source set, prompts or instructions, and material revisions together while you write. That record lets you distinguish AI assistance used for structure or language from the scholarly sources that support factual claims. Researchers using Craft can retain citations with a draft, but should still check the target journal’s current disclosure policy before submission.