The American Psychological Association style uses in-text citations along with a reference list to document sources. All citations in the text must refer to an entry in the reference list, and conversely, entries in the reference list must be cited in the text. Reference citations are used in the text at the point you use information from another source. The in-text citation gives the reader the last name of the author and year of publication for the source you use. This in-text citation will have the same last name as the complete citation found in the reference list at the end of the paper. An example of an in-text citation is given below. This example is for one work by one author.
Nochlin (1999) analyzes the representation of women in art from the late eighteenth to the early twentieth century.
This analysis of women and art covers the nineteenth century (Nochlin, 1999).
Notice that this can be done different ways depending on how the sentence is written. In the first example above the author's name is given as part of the sentence and only the year is inside the parentheses. In the second sentence the author is not mentioned, and a full in-text citation is given.
When a work has only two authors, you should always cite both names when you reference the work.
When a work has 3-5 authors, cite all authors the first time the reference occurs. For subsequent in-text citations, give only the surname of the first author followed by et al. and the year if it is the first citation in the paragraph.
A reference to a work by two authors
Matthews and Foster (2005)
A first reference to a work by 3-5 authors
Kaufman, Gentile, Baer (2005)
Subsequent references
...(Kaufman et al., 2005) or Kaufman et al. (2005)...- first reference in the paragraph
(Kaufman et al.)... - after the first reference in a paragraph
Groups or Corporations as Authors
in the text citation: (University of Tennessee, 1997)
Entry in reference list: University of Tennessee (1997)
Works with No Author
When a work has no author, cite in the text the first few words of the reference list entry. This will more than likely be the title and year.
When a work is designated as "Anonymous," use the word anonymous as you would an author's name.
Authors With the Same Surname
When citing in the text reference to works by an author with the same surname as another author in your reference list, always include the author's initials to distinguish him/her from the other author with the same last name.
Citing two or more works in the same parentheses
When citing two or more works in the same parentheses, always cite them in the same order as they appeared in the reference list.
Past research (Edenline & Weinberger, 1991, 1993)
Several studies (Balda, 1980; Kamil, 1988; Pepperberg & Funk, 1990)
All entries in the reference list are alphabetized letter by letter. Remember that nothing precedes something. For example:
Wood, S.
Woods, A.
As you can see Wood comes before Woods.
Reference to a magazine article
Gorman, C. (2005, October 17). The avian flu: How scared should we be? Time, 166, 31-34. No author given Creating leaders. (2001, October 7). Economist, 256, 7-11.An example of a reference to an entire book
Beck, C. A. J., & Sales, B. D. (2001). Family mediation: Facts, myths, and future prospects . Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. An edited book with two authors Roe, A., & Simpson, G. G. (Eds.). (1958). Behavior and evolution. New Haven: Yale University Press. Harlow, H. F. (1958). The evolution of learning. In A. Roe & G. G. Simpson (Eds.), Behavior and evolution (pp. 269-290). New Haven: Yale University Press. Parel, A. (2005). Nonviolence. In new dictionary of the history of ideas (Vol. 4, pp. 1643-1646). Detroit: Charles Scribner's Sons.
Electronic copy of a journal article, retrieved from database
Stand-alone Internet document no date given
Price, A. (n.d.). Whitman's Drum Taps and Washington's Civil War hospitals. Retrieved November 7, 2005. from http://xroads.virginia.edu/~CAP/hospital/whitman.htm
Last updated August 2010