American School of Valencia Library APA STYLE GUIDE FOR BIBLIOGRAPHICAL CITATIONS Used primarily for: Psychology, business, engineering, social sciences. Some general things to know: To begin with, the APA doesn t call the list of bibliographical citations a bibliography. They refer to it as a Reference List. Also, first and middle names of all authors are reduced to a single initial in the reference list. Bibliographical footnotes or endnotes are not used in APA style. Use footnotes only for extra-commentary within a paper. Instead of bibliographical footnotes, in-text or parenthetical citations are used for APA papers. Personal interviews, emails, conversations, letters etc. are not included in the Reference List as they cannot be accessed by an outside party. Such material is only cited in-text. Page numbers are only used within the in-text citation when you directly quote the source. See some examples below. If you don t see an example that fits the kind of source you have, consult an APA style guide in the Library, or ask in the Librarian. Every line after the first is indented in the full citation. And remember, pay close attention to the examples. Punctuation is very important. For all examples below, the information following is what goes into the Reference List and the end of your paper. The information following is what goes at the end of your sentence that includes a citation. There is more flexibility in how your in-text citations can appear when using APA style, and writers will often put them in the middle of the sentence. This is a little trickier though. Consult an APA style guide or ask the Librarian to find out more. A BOOK WITH ONE AUTHOR: Author s last name, Initials of First/Middle name. (Year). Title of the book. City: Publisher. Smith, J.G. (2007). When citation is almost too much fun. Trenton, NJ: Nice People Publications.
(Smith, 2007) [The way you do an in-text or parenthetical citation for a work with more than one author depends not only on exactly how many authors there are, but also if it s the first time you re citing the source in your paper or not. All of the examples that follow are for one author. Rules for more than one author are the same for all examples, and they can be found at the end of this guide. Consult an APA style guide or ask the Librarian for more.] ELECTRONIC BOOK/ E-BOOK: Author s last name, Initials of First/Middle name. (Year). Title of the book. Electronic retrieval statement Harrington, C. R. (2007). When I am away from the card catalog: Poems, 1831-1837. Retrieved from http://www.gutenberg.org/files/12345/12345-h/12345-h.htm [Note that there is no period after the url in APA citation.] (Harrington, 2007) [For E-books downloaded and read on an E-book reader, include the type of reader/software file after the main citation, as well as the source of your download. See example below.] Smith, J. G. (2002). Road trips with my incunables. [Kindle DX version]. Retrieved from EdifyingEbooks.com. (Smith, 2002) A BOOK, EDITED: Editor s last name, Initials of First/Middle name. (Ed.). (Year). Title of the book. City: Publisher. Smith, J. G. (Ed.). (2009). Editing a book alone. Newark: Lonely Guy Books.
(Smith, 54) CHAPTER IN AN EDITED BOOK: Author s last name, Initials of First/Middle name. (Year). Title of chapter or essay. In Editor s First/Middle initials, Last name (Ed.), Title of book (page range). City: Publisher. Brown, D. M. (2012). Worthwhile and rewarding alternatives to alphabetizing. In J. G. Smith (Ed.), Strategies for sorting things in the 21 st century and beyond (pp. 119-148). Edison: Streamlined Book Group. (Brown, 143) MAGAZINE/NEWSPAPER ARTICLE: Author s last name, Initials of First/Middle name. (Year, Issue Date). Title of article. Title of newspaper/magazine, Issue/Section numeration [if applicable], page range. (Example Magazine) Carluccio, E. T. (2010, May 23). How to laminate the previously unlaminatable: Breaking new ground in plastic coverage. Bibliophile Weekly, 13-21. (Carluccio, 17) (Example Newspaper) Walker, R. F. (2010, September 19). Man runs out of downtown bookstore with a foot and a half of Samuel Beckett in his arms. New York Times, p. A19. (Walker, A19) JOURNAL ARTICLE WITH DOI*: Author s last name, Initials of First/Middle name. (Year). Title of article. Title of journal, Issue numeration, page range. doi:
(Example Print journal) Sterling, H. J. (2011). Why it s not funny to use the Dewey Decimal System in your jokes with librarians. Journal of Contemporary Bibliographic Concerns, 12(7), 46-57. doi: 10.1089/0334-6712.12.7.46 (Sterling, 47) *The 12(7) in the example above refers to Volume 12, Issue 7. Always include this information for scholarly journals if they are ordered this way.] * (A DOI (Digital Object Identifier) is a standard, unique numerical string assigned by the publisher at the time an article is published electronically. They always begin with a 10 and can usually be found near the copyright information or a database s information page for the article. When available, always includes the DOI for both print and electronic sources. JOURNAL ARTICLE WITHOUT DOI*: Author s last name, Initials of First/Middle name. (Year). Title of article. Title of journal, Issue numeration, page range. (Example Retrieved online) Gibbons, H. (2011). Why I dream about bibliographies: Journeys into a most fascinating world of numerals and semicolons. The Journal of Frightening Precision, 49(2), 36-41. Retrieved from http://tjofp.com/features/v4902.dreaming.htm (Gibbons, 39) [If your article does not have a DOI and was retrieved online, you must include the url of the article, as shown above. Note that there is no period (.) at the end of a url citation in APA format, so that it appears just like it would in the address bar of your browser. Finally, it is not necessary in APA format to include the retrieval date of an article.] FILM, DOCUMENTARY: Director s last name, First name (Director). (Year). Name of film/documentary [Motion picture]. Country of origin: Studio. Green, L. (Producer/Director). (2012). Going cardboard: a board game documentary.
[Motion picture]. U.S.: T-Cat Productions. (Going Cardboard, 2012) [When relevant, you can add the name of performers in a film. These are placed after the Director s name, following the abbreviation Perf.. Also, when consulting a reprinted version of a film (for example, a DVD), include information about the distributor of the reprint, as well as the medium. This goes after the initial entry for the film. See example below.] Coen, J. (Director/Writer). (1991). Barton Fink. [Motion picture]. Perf. John Turturro, John Goodman. Circle Films-Working Title Films. U.S.: 20 th Century Fox Home Entertainment, DVD (2003). (Barton Fink, 1991) or (Barton Fink, 2003) ENTIRE WEB SITE: In APA style, it is sufficient to provide the url of the website when citing it in your text. The Internet Movie Database is likely the most used reference for film today (http://www.imbd.com). WEB PAGE, WITH STATED AUTHOR (the non-journal kind of thing you get through normal internet searches): Author s last name, Initials of First/Middle name. (Year). Title of web page. Electronic retrieval statement White, F. (2008). Citing things just for fun: Strategies for getting by when there is no bibliography to actively compile. Retrieved from http:// www.whynotbecitingrightnow.com/articles/strategiesbetweenpapers.htm (White, 2008)
[The following is an example for a web page without a stated author, and where the date is not indicated.] The Citation Palace: An e-environment. (n.d.). Retrieved from http:// www.thecitationpalace.com/environment.html (The Citation Palace) BLOG ENTRY: Author s last name, Initials of First/Middle name. (Year, Date). Title of blog post. [Blog post]. Electronic retrieval statement Gavin, J. (2011, March 11). Hold your nose while you read this. [Blog post]. Retrieved from http://blogs.loc.gov/loc/page/3/ (Gavin, 2011) THE REST (Twitter, YouTube, Wikipedia, images etc.) : Creator s last name, Initials of First/Middle name. (Year). Title of content. [Format description]. Electronic retrieval statement [This is the general format that can be applied to the many forms and formats of media that do not fit into the above categories.] (Example Twitter) TheBeckettStealer. (2012, September 18). I m coming down to a store near you [Twitter post]. Retrieved from http://twitter.com/beckettstealer/status/ 123459788 (TheBeckettStealer, 2012) (Example YouTube) mushk45. (2006, June 20). Japanese way of folding T-shirts! [Video file]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5awq5abjge
(mushk45, 2006) A WORK BY MULTIPLE AUTHORS: Books and articles in the social sciences often have more than one author. The following are general rules for how to deal with that. From 2 to 7 authors Boyle, F. H., Argyle, P., Charrington, E., & Formosa, A. *The & always precedes the final name in the string. From there you follow the examples above for the rest of the citation.] For 8 authors or more Boyle, F. H., Argyle, P., Charrington, E., Elliott, S. A., Dupont, W.R., Formosa, A.,... Morris, W. *You list the first 6 authors as above, followed by... and then the last named author. From there you follow the examples above for the rest of the citation.] 2 authors (Boyle & Argyle, 2009) 3, 4, or 5 authors (Boyle, Argyle, Charrington, & Elliott, 2010) (Boyle et al., 2010) 6 or more authors (Boyle et al., 2011) [For 1 st and subsequent citations] [For 1 st citation] [For subsequent citations] [For 1 st and subsequent citations] [If you elect to do in-text rather than parenthetical citations, even for 1 author, things get a little more complicated. Additional rules are involved. A chart is involved. If you feel would like to see these rules, and this chart, come by the Library and ask for the APA guide!] While the majority of examples provided above are fictitious, the following non-fictitious works were consulted as reference in preparing this guide: American Psychological Association. (2010). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (6 th ed.). Washington, DC. American Psychological Association. (2012). APA style blog [Blog]. Retrieved from
http://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/ Lipson, C. (2006). Cite right: a quick guide to citation styles MLA, APA, Chicago, the Sciences, Professions, and more. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.