Citing Your References: APA Style

FORMAT:`

(Author's_LastName, Author's_FirstName MI. Title of the Article. Title

of the Book/Magazine/Newspaper. Place of Publication: Publisher, Year
of Publication. Medium of Publication.)
Note:

1. The Authors Name must be in the order Last Name, First Name, Middle Initial, then period.
If there are more than one author, separate each authors name with a comma, then after all
names have been written, put a period at the end of the last name.
2. The Title of the Article must be enclosed in quotation marks and beginning of each word must be
capitalized except for prepositions, conjunctions and articles like the, a/an, of, etc. except
if it leads a title. End with a period.
3. The Title of the Book or Magazine or Paper must be italicized and beginning of each major word
must be capitalized.

Punctuations and Capitalizations:

1. Use period for each different pieces of information like the period between the Author of the
Book, the Title of the Book and the publication data. The period is used if you need a complete
stop or a transfer for a new piece of information.

Use comma for each group of same information like the Authors surname and first name (all about the
author). Also, see the comma between the Publisher and the Year of Publication (all about publishing).
Comma is used when a complete stop is not necessary because the same basic piece of information is
presented. We just separate them like in the Authors Name, the surname is presented first before the
firstname.

2. Use colon to separate two pieces of the same information but somehow needs to be separated
somehow, like in the Place of Publication and the Publisher
3. All major words and beginning of the title are capitalized. All prepositions, conjunctions and
articles (e.g., the, of, a, an) should not be capitalized unless they lead the title.

EXAMPLE:

(Singer, Ferdinand L. Engineering Mechanics, 2nd Ed. New York, Evanston and
London: Harper and Row Publishing, 1970. Print.)
Note: In this example, no title of article/chapter is given, thus nothing is enclosed in quotation marks,
only the title of the book is written in italics.
WEB CITATIONS:
Author's_LastName, Author's_FirstName MI. Page Title Cite Title. Publisher of
the Website, Latest Date of Update. Medium. Date of Access.
1. The Authors Name must be in the order of Last Name, First Name, Middle Initial followed by a
period.
2. The Page Title is the specific HTML file title and should be enclosed in quotation marks. All
words must be capitalized except for prepositions, conjunctions and articles. Then period.
3. The Cite Title must be italicized. Beginning of each word must be capitalized except for
prepositions, conjunctions and articles.
4. Information about the Publisher of the Website (i.e., name, address, etc.) may be seen at the
bottom part of the page or just click Contact Us or About Us.

EXAMPLE:

(Kandell, Steve. How the Nevermind Boy Was Almost a Girl. Spin.com. Spin
Meuda LLC, 18 July 2011, Web. 23 July 2011)

IN-TEXT CITATIONS
An in-text citation refers the reader to the References page at the end of a paper. The reader can
then find the resource using this Reference Citation and then find the correct page or section using the
in-text citation.

In the APA style in-text citations are composed of the authors last name, date, and the page
number where the information was found.

EXAMPLE:
The big final rule for the comma is one that you wont find in any books by grammarians. It is quite
easy to remember, however. The rule is dont use commas like a stupid person (Truss, 2004, p. 96).

Note:

1. The p. before 96 stands for page. If you are including a page range, use two ps followed by a
period. (i.e., pp. 96-98)
2. Always put the page number/s inside the parentheses at the end of the sentence.
 3. The period after the sentence should be placed after the parentheses.
4. The authors name may be included within the parentheses or the name may be used anywhere
within the sentence.
5. The publication year within parentheses should stay next to the authors name wherever it goes.

EXAMPLE:
Truss (2004) writes, The big final rule for the comma is one that you wont find in any books by
grammarians. It is quite easy to remember, however. The rule is dont use commas like a stupid
person (p. 96).

6. Additional information about the resource is not necessary but may be included.

EXAMPLE:
According to Chapter 5 of Engineering Mechanics, 2nd Ed. by Ferdinand L. Singer (1970) The big final
rule for the comma is one that you wont find in any books by grammarians. It is quite easy to
remember, however. The rule is dont use commas like a stupid person (p. 96).

7. If there are many authors, write all their names in the first citation. If there are citations again
on their work, write the name of the first author followed by the words et al.
8. If the authors name is not known, you may just include the Article Title or the Book Title in the
parentheses enclosed in quotes.

EXAMPLE:
The big final rule for the comma is one that you wont find in any books by grammarians. It is quite
easy to remember, however. The rule is dont use commas like a stupid person (Engineering
Mechanics, 2nd Edition, 1970, p. 96).

OR

According to Chapter 5 of Engineering Mechanics, 2nd Ed. (1970) The big final rule for the comma is
one that you wont find in any books by grammarians. It is quite easy to remember, however. The rule is
dont use commas like a stupid person (p. 96).

I HOPE YOU READ THIS LECTURE SO THAT YOU WILL BE ABLE TO CORRECTLY WRITE YOUR RESEARCH
DOCUMENTS. THIS WILL BE HELPFUL FOR YOU NOT ONLY IN THIS SUBJECT BUT IN YOUR OTHER
SUBJECTS, AS WELL, THAT REQUIRES WRITING FORMAL RESEARCH DOCUMENTS.