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Data citation is a fundamental part of the research data lifecycle. It enables reuse and verification of the data, gives proper credit to the creater of the dataset, and supports the scholarly record for research.  Just as you cite all of your resources in a scholarly article or book, you should also cite the data that you used to conduct your research.

Citing data is pretty easy. There are  elements that should be included in all citations:

• Creator: Author(s) of the dataset
• Title: Name of the dataset
• Publisher (or Distributor): Repository name
• Publication Year: Date the dataset was released or published
• Version: If you have multiple versions of a specific dataset, or an updated set 
• Identifier: Unique identifier. This is often a DOI, but can also be an URN or Handle System.

DataCite is a global organization that encourages and supports the use of data citations. They provide guidelines and tools. They recommend a general format for a data citation. Disciplines and publishers may have their own standards.

Recommended format for the 5 basic elements: Creator (Publication Year): Title. Publisher. Identifier.

Recommended format for the 2 additional elements: Creator (Publication Year): Title. Version. Publisher. Resource Type. Identifier.

Examples:

• Dataset: OECD (2008), “Social Expenditures aggregates”, OECD Social Expenditure Statistics (database). doi: 10.1787/000530172303 http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/000530172303 (Accessed on 2008-12-02).
• Dataset package: Sidlauskas B (2007) Data from: Testing for unequal rates of morphological diversification in the absence of a detailed phylogeny: a case study From characiform fishes. Dryad Digital Repository. doi:10.5061/dryad.20
• Table from a publication:
  Smith, J. (2008), Figure 1.2. Broadband Penetration in OECD Countries, in OECD Communications Outlook 2008, OECD Publishing doi: 10.1787/000530172303 http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/000530172303.
• Dataset from a publication: Irino, T; Tada, R (2009): Chemical and mineral compositions of sediments from ODP Site 127‐797. Geological Institute, University of Tokyo. http://dx.doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.726855 
• Updated Dataset:
  Cavalieri, D., C. Parkinson, P. Gloersen, and H. J. Zwally. 1996, updated 2006. Sea ice concentrations from Nimbus-7 SMMR and DMSP SSM/I passive microwave data, March 2002–Sept. 2003. Boulder, Colorado USA: National Snow and Ice Data Center. url: http://nsidc.org/data/nsidc-0051.html (Accessed on 2008-05-14).
• Survey Dataset: Barnes, Samuel H. Italian Mass Election Survey, 1968. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 1992-02-16. https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR07953.v1 

​Examples courtesy of DataCite: https://www.datacite.org/services/cite-your-data.html and ICPSR: https://www.icpsr.umich.edu/icpsrweb/content/datamanagement/citations.html