APA Citations:

Everything You Want to Know About What You Don’t Want to Know

APA Checklist:

 First, review your instructor’s formatting directions!

 Your essay should be typed, double-spaced on standard-sized paper (8.5 X 11 inches) with margins of 1 inch on all sides.

 Title page: includes a running head for publication, title, and byline and affiliation.

 Abstract: If your instructor requires an abstract, write a 75-100 word overview of your essay, which should include your main idea and your major points.

In-Text Citations



Direct Quotations:

include the author, year of publication, and the page number for the reference (preceded by "p.").



Example:

According to Mr. Melvin (2005), the purple lilacs did not “bloom in the concrete driveway”(p. 199).



Indirect Quotations:

She declared, “The water tastes of melons” (Monier, 1945, p. 234).



Paraphrase:

If you paraphrase, you only need to cite the author and year, but are encouraged to include the page number (Falgoust, 2002, p. 1918).

Long Quotations

 Salvadore Greco (1998) pronounces: Place direct quotations longer than 40 words in a free-standing block of typewritten lines, and omit quotation marks. Start the quotation on a new line, indented five spaces from the left margin. Type the entire quotation on the new margin, and indent the first line of any subsequent paragraph within the quotation five spaces from the new margin. The parenthetical citation should come after closing punctuation mark. (p.690)

Citing An Author or



Authors

Research by Dupré and Pecanty (2007) asserts that you must name both authors in the signal phrase or in the parentheses each time you cite the work (p. 199).

 Or if you don’t use the author’s name in the sentence, cite like this (Dupré & Pecanty, 2007).



A Work by Three to Five Authors

: List all the authors in the signal phrase or in parentheses the first time you cite the source (Chiasson, Carlos, Justin, & Comeaux, 2003, p. 198).

 In subsequent citations, only use the first author's last name followed by "et al." in the signal phrase or in parentheses (Chiasson et al., 2003, pgs. 9-8).

More on Authors…

 Fellini et al. (1960) state that if you have six or more authors write the first author’s name, followed by “et al.” And for the parentheses: (Fellini et al., 1945, p. 8).

 If the work does not have an author, cite the source by its title in the signal phrase or use the first word or two in the parentheses (“Making it into the Toilet,” 1988, p. 9).

 According to the American Psychological Association (2000), if the author is an organization or a government agency, mention the organization in the signal phrase or in the parenthetical citation the first time you cite the source.

Just a bit more…

 For interviews, letters, e-mails, and other person-to person communication, cite the communicator’s name, the fact that it was personal communication, and the date of the communication. Do not include personal communication in the reference list. (E. Robbins, personal communication, January 4, 2001).

 If you use a source that was cited in another source, name the original source in your signal phrase.  According to Buckwheat, list the secondary source in your reference list and include the secondary source in the parentheses (as cited in Murphy, 2003, p.102).

And Some More…

 When your parenthetical citation includes two or more works, order them the same way they appear in the reference list, separated by a semi-colon (Cornholio, 1993, p. 3; Hill, 2002, p. 5).

 If the authors have the same last name, to prevent confusion, use first initials to distinguish (E. Boo, 2004, p. 7; D. Boo, 2009, p. 9).

 If you have two sources by the same author in the same year (Buber, 2000a), use lower-case letters (a, b, c) with the year to order the entries in the reference list. Use the lower-case letters with the year in the in text citation (Buber, 2004b).

And now for something different (kind of) -- Indirect & Electronic Sources!



If possible, cite an electronic document the same as any other document by using the author-date style.

The Unknown

 If no author or date is given, use the title in your signal phrase or the first word or two of the title in the parentheses and use the abbreviation "n.d.” (“Bubbles and Boo,” n.d., p. 8).

 When an electronic source lacks page numbers, use the ¶ symbol, or the abbreviation "para.”, followed by the paragraph number (Hall, 2001, ¶ 5) or (Hall, 2001, para. 5). If the paragraphs are not numbered and the document includes headings, provide the appropriate heading and specify the paragraph under that heading.

Reference Lists

 All lines after the first line of each entry in your reference list should be indented one-half inch from the left margin.

 Authors' names are inverted (last name first).

 Reference list entries should be alphabetized by the last name of the first author of each work.

 If you have more than one article by the same author, list references in order by the year of publication, starting with the earliest.

And Some More…

 For books, articles, Web pages, etc., capitalize only the first letter of the first word of a title and subtitle, the first word after a colon or a dash in the title, and proper nouns. Do not capitalize the first letter of the second word in a hyphenated compound word.

  Capitalize all major words in

journal titles

.

Italicize titles of longer works such as books and journals.

 Do not italicize, underline, or put quotes around the titles of shorter works such as journal articles or essays in edited collections.

Reference List Part I:



Single author:

Dubious, B. (2009). Friendship is not unlike a ham sandwich.

Current Topics in Psychology

,

11

, 87-90. 

Two authors:

Soprano, T., Corleono, M. (1974). Scientists discover French is actually German.

The Christian Science Monitor, 66

, 1034-1048.



Three to six authors:

List by last names and initials; commas separate author names, while the last author name is preceded again by "&.” For more than six authors, list the first six as above and then "et al.," which stands for "and others."

Part I (Cont.)



Organization as author:

American Plumber Syndicate. (2010).



Unknown author:

Merriam-Webster's collegiate dictionary (10th ed.). (1993). Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster.



Two or more works by the same author in the same year

: Hooker, T. J. (1981a). Hooker, T.J. (1981b).

Reference List Part II:



Basic outline for periodical references

: Author, A. A., Author, B. B., & Author, C. C. (Year). Title of article.

Title of Periodical, volume number(issue number),

pages.



Paginated by volume:

Rudolph, I. B. (1983). Essential psychos for a housewife.

Journal of Psychological Empathy, 55,

899-900.



Paginated by issue:

Ribbig, E.X. (1022). Freudian neuroses for a spring collection.

Journal of Journal

,

44(23),

5-4. 

Article in a magazine

: Millsap, R. Y., IV (1999, April 20). Why is your daughter a girl: hard questions to ask a robot.

People, 145,

0-1.

Part II: (Cont.)



Article in a newspaper:

Schmuck, A.B. (2002, December 23). Jack the Ripple drops a pebble again.

The Eternal Times,

pp. 1A, 2B.



Letter to Editor:

Pimple, E.D. (2000, August). Why does Don Johnson exist [Letter to editor]?

Scientific American, 245(3),

13.



Review:

the book Marx, G. (1888). The ineffable quantifications of a prismatic psyche [Review of

Mommy, I wet my pants

].

The Contemporary Philosopher, 34,

432-100

.

Reference List Part III:



Basic book format:

Author, A. A. (Year of publication).

Title of work: Capital letter also for subtitle

. Location: Publisher.



Edited book, no author:

Marx, G., & Marx, C. (Eds.). (1997).

How to tie your shoes in Senegal

. Beijing: Impudent Press.



Edited book with an author or authors:

Gabilondo, P. (2003).

Wilds Ducks: Tony Soprano and castration

(L. Stall, Ed.). New York: Prometheus. 

Translation:

Celan, P. (1960).

Niemandrose

. (M. Theriot & P. Perkins, Trans.) New York: Hover (Original work published in 900).

Part III (Cont.)



Edition other than first:

Falgoust, K. A. (1985). E

xistential death: stories for a child’s bedtime

(10 ed.). Chicago: Harvard Press.



Article of Chapter in an Edited Book:

Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Year of publication). Title of chapter. In A. Editor & B. Editor (Eds.),

Title of book

(pages and chapter). Location: Publisher.



Multivolume Work:

Schlopp, Z. (Ed.). (1987).

Dictionary of kitchen utensils

York: Scribner’s.

(Vols. 1-4). New

Part III (Cont. some more)

 

Work discussed in secondary source:

List the original source and use primary source in text.



An entry in an encyclopedia:

Bergman, I. (1998). Rabbits. In

The contemporary encyclopedia of birds

23, pp. 509-510). Chicago: Encyclopedia of Birds.

(Vol.

Dissertation abstract:

Monier, C. (2060). A dialogue with clowns (Doctoral dissertation, Nicholls State, 2001).

Dissertations Abstracts International, 62

, 7741A.



Government document:

National Institute of Mental Health (1900).

Clinical studies of girls with cooties

(DHHS Publication No. ADM 90-1000). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.



Private Organization Report:

American Psychiatric Association. (2007).

Practice guidelines for frog puppets

(3rd ed.). New Orleans, LA: Herring Press.

Reference List Part IV



Article from online periodical:

Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Date of publication). Title of article.

Title of Online Periodical, volume number

(issue number if available). Retrieved month day, year, from http://www.address.com/full/url/ 

Online scholarly journal article:

Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Date of publication). Title of article.

Title of Journal, volume number

. Retrieved month day, year, from http://address.com/full/url 

Article from database:

Hilton, P., Richie, N., & Kardashian, K. (2002). A study of the enjoyment of peas.

Journal of Abnormal Eating, 8(3).

Part IV (Cont. {Last One, I’m serious})



Nonperiodical web document, web page, or report:

Author, A. A. (Date of publication).

Title of document

. Retrieved month day, year, from http://webaddress.com - use “n.d.” if there’s no date.

 

Chapter or section of web document:

Author, A. A. (Date of publication). Title of article. In Title of book or larger document (chapter or section number). Retrieved month day, year, from www.webaddress.com/full/url/.

And Lastly…

THE END

The Purdue OWL Family of Sites

. 26 Aug. 2005. The Writing Lab and OWL at Purdue and Purdue University. 23 April 2006 .