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Referencing Guide: APA 7th

Using APA 7th

This section provides guidance on the use of the APA 7th referencing style.  You will find basic guidance and links to the APA website and Cite Them Right for further advice.

In-text citations and reference list

In-text citations and reference list

APA is a in-text citations and reference list referencing system. This means that all sources should be immediately cited with an in-text reference when they are mentioned in your work, and a full reference should appear in the reference list at the end of your work.

In-text Citations

An in-text citation consists of the author or authors’ surname(s), and the year the source was published. If you are quoting, or otherwise referring to a particular part of the source, it should also include the page or paragraph number.

An in-text citation may look like this:

“Confidence in the police has declined sharply in the past few years as the number of unsolved crimes continues to grow.” (Hall, 2019, p.5)
An interesting insight is provided by Hall (2019, p. 5) who claims that…

If the whole of the work by Hall was being cited, not only a specific section, then the in-text citation might look like this:

                In her book, Hall (2019) notes…

 

Reference list

The reference list should contain full details of everything you have cited in your assignment. Each reference should follow the format for its source type, as given below or on the APA Style Website, which allows readers to see the full information needed to trace the item.

All the references should be listed in alphabetical order of author’s name, regardless of format.

Commonly used sources

Book

Author. (year). Title (edition). Publisher.

 

Example

Howitt, D., & Cramer, D. (2017). Understanding statistics in psychology with SPSS (7th ed.). Pearson.

 

Points to note

  • For multiple authors use a comma between each author and an & between the final two (as well as the comma)
  • Book titles are always in Italics
  • Only include the edition number if it is not the 1st edition. A book that doesn't state the edition is usually the 1st edition
  • Put full stops after the date, the title and edition number and the publisher
  • Use sentence case for the book title

 

Chapter of an edited book

Author. (year). Title of chapter. In E. Editor (Ed.), Title (edition, pages). Publisher

 

Example

Fox, M. (2013). Educational and child psychology. In R. Bayne & G. Jinks (Eds.), Applied psychology: Research, training and practice (2nd ed., pp. 68-80). Sage Publications.

 

Points to note

  • For multiple authors use a comma between each author and an & between the final two (as well as the comma)
  • Book titles are always in Italics but chapter titles are not
  • Only include the edition number if it is not the 1st edition. A book that doesn't state the edition is usually the 1st edition
  • Put full stops after the date, the title, the book information and the publisher
  • Use sentence case for the book title and the chapter title
  • For editors names, put their initials first
  • Use pp. to indicate multiple pages
  • Use Ed. for one editor and Eds. for multiple editors

 

Journal article

Author. (year). Title of article. Title of journal, Volume (Issue), Pages. DOI/URL

 

Example

Chu, V., & Krishnan, K. (2022). Quantitative assessment of prewriting skills in children: The development and validation of a tablet assessment tool. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 129(3), 554-569. https://doi.org/10.1177/00315125221087802

 

Points to note

  • For multiple authors use a comma between each author and an & between the final two (as well as the comma)
  • Journal titles are in italics but article titles are not
  • If the journal doesn't have volumes or issues, just leave that section out
  • Put full stops after the date, the article title and the journal information
  • Don't put a full stop after the DOI or URL as it can break the link
  • Use sentence case for the article title and title case for the journal title

 

Newspaper or magazine article

Author. (date). Title of article. Title of newspaper/magazine, Volume(Issue), pages. URL

 

Example

Lieberman, J. (2023, May 2). Mending the schizophrenic mind. Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/articles/202305/mending-the-schizophrenic-mind

 

Points to note

  • For multiple authors use a comma between each author and an & between the final two (as well as the comma)
  • Use the full date of the article including the month and day if available
  • Magazine/newspaper titles are in italics but article titles are not
  • If the volume number, issue number or page numbers are unavailable, just leave that section out
  • Put full stops after the date, the article title and the newspaper/magazine information
  • Use sentence case for the article title and title case for the magazine/newspaper title
  • Leave out the URL if your source is a physical magazine or newspaper
  • Cite news websites as websites not newspaper articles

 

Website

Author. (date). Title of webpage. Website name. URL

 

Example

Wood, G. (2022, December 9). The pressure of taking spot kicks. The British Psychological Society. https://www.bps.org.uk/blog/pressure-taking-spot-kicks

 

Points to note

  • For multiple authors use a comma between each author and an & between the final two (as well as the comma)
  • Use the full date of the webpage including the month and day if available
  • Title of the webpage is in italics
  • Put full stops after the date, the webpage title and the name of the website
  • Use sentence case for the webpage title
  • Cite news websites as websites not newspaper articles
  • If the author and the name of the website are the same, leave out the site name

 

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