Citing sources is an essential part of the writing process for several reasons:
Welcome to APA Style
APA style was developed with the goal of implementing a set of guidelines for scientific writing, and is largely used in psychology, nursing, business and related fields. Very exciting!
We'll take a look at two important aspects of APA style:
In-text citations: The writer includes an abbreviated citation within the text of the paper.
Reference page: A more detailed citation list at the end of the paper that corresponds with the author's in-text citations.
APA uses the Author-date system for in-text citations, below are some examples:
One Author:
The water in Pittsburgh, PA was shown to have dangerously high levels of lead from 2010-2018 (Smith, 2018).
Research by Smith (2018) proved that there was high levels of lead in the Pittsburgh, PA water supply from 2010-2018.
Two Authors:
Luzerne County's juvenile court system incarcerated a much higher percentage of juveniles than the PA statewide average (Gomez & Williams, 2019).
According to Gomez and Williams (2019), Luzerne County's juvenile court system incarcerated a much higher percentage of juveniles the PA statewide average.
Three or more authors:
Global warming will make Phoenix, AZ uninhabitable by 2050 (Johnson et al., 2016).
Johnson et al. (2016) proved that global warming will make Phoenix, AZ uninhabitable by 2050.
Let's take a look at some examples from an APA reference list:
Example book with one author:
Author Last Name, First Initial. (publication year). Title of book. Publisher.
Slotkin, R. (1973). Regeneration through violence: The mythology of the American frontier, 1600-1860. Wesleyn University Press.
Example book with two authors:
Albarelli, D. & Gennari, J. (2018). Halloween: Celtic origins. Carnegie Mellon University Press.
Example Journal article:
Author Last Name, First Initial. (publication year). Title of article. Journal Title, Volume #(Issue #), page #s. DOI
Mckelvey, K. (2019). Silence is golden. Introvert Studies, 8(3), 200-207. https://doi.org./10.1039/is0001234
Some notes:
**If the citation goes onto more than one line, all subsequent lines need a hanging indent.
**Include the DOI if the article has one.**
**If the article does not have a DOI, and has a working URL (not from a library/academic database), then include that.
**If the article is from an academic database (Ebsco, JSTOR etc.) and has a DOI then include it. If it does not have a DOI then end the reference after the page numbers, don't include any database info.
Webpage from a website:
Author's Last Name, First Initial. (date of publication). Webpage title. Website Title. URL
Hedges, C. (2019, December 15). Hope lies in the streets. Truthdig. https://www.truthdig.com/articles/hope-lies-in-the-streets/
Some notes:
**When citing a webpage, use as specific a date as possible. This might just be the year, might be the year and month, or possibly the exact date.
**If the citation goes onto more than one line, all subsequent lines need a hanging indent.
Access the NCC Library's APA handout here: