Disciplines within the Social Sciences typically use the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (APA) as the preferred style of citation.
AuthorLastName, FirstInitial. (Year). Title of article. Title of Journal, Volume(Issue), Pages. DOI
Crosby, O., & Moncarz, R. (2006). The 2004-14 job outlook for college graduates. Occupational Outlook Quarterly, 50(3), 42-57.
Geller, J. D. (2018). Introduction: The transformative powers of aesthetic experiences in psychotherapy. Journal Of Clinical Psychology, 74(2), 200–207. https://doi.org/10.1002/jclp.22582
Johnson, D. R. (2018). Playing off the beat: Applying the jazz paradigm to psychotherapy. Journal Of Clinical Psychology, 74(2), 249–260. https://doi.org/10.1002/jclp.22579
Morici, G. Gruttad'Auria, C., Baiamonte, P., Mazzuca, E., Castrogiovanni, A., & Bonsignore, M. (2016). Endurance training: Is it bad for you?. Breathe, 12(2), 141-148. https://doi.org/10.1183/20734735.007016
For two authors, include both last names and initials with an ampersand (&) between them:
Crone, D. L. & Levy, N. L. (2019). Are Free Will Believers Nicer People? (Four Studies Suggest Not). Social Psychological & Personality Science, 10(5), 612–619. https://doi.org/10.1177/1948550618780732
For works with three to twenty authors, include all the author's names (last name and initials), with an ampersand before the final author's name:
Kruglanski, A. W., Jasko, K., Milyavsky, M., Chernikova, M., Webber, D., Pierro, A., & di Santo, D. (2018). Cognitive Consistency Theory in Social Psychology: A Paradigm Reconsidered. Psychological Inquiry, 29(2), 45–59. https://doi.org/10.1080/1047840X.2018.1480619
For works with more than twenty authors, APA requires the use of an ellipsis (. . .) between the nineteenth author's name and the final author's name:
Pegion, K., Kirtman, B. P., Becker, E., Collins, D. C., LaJoie, E., Burgman, R., Bell, R., DelSole, R., Min, D., Zhu, Y., Li, W., Sinsky, E., Guan, H., Gottschalck, J., Metzger, E. J., Barton, N. P., Achuthavarier, D., Marshak, J., Koster, R., . . . Kim, H. (2019). The subseasonal experiment (SubX): A multimodel subseasonal prediction experiment. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 100(10), 2043-2061. https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-18-0270.1
AuthorLastName, FirstInitial. (Year, Month Day). Title of article. Title of Magazine, Volume(Issue), Pages. DOI
AuthorLastName, FirstInitial. (Year, Month Day). Title of article. Title of Magazine, URL
Fry, E. (2020, March). The grim business of containing an epidemic. Fortune, 181(3), 17–19.
Harrary, K. (n.d.). The truth about Jonestown. Psychology Today, 25(2), 62.
Har'el, Alma (2020, March 5). Why women's history should be everyone's history. Time. https://time.com/5795675/documenting-100-women-of-the-year/
AuthorLastName, FirstInitial. SecondInitial. (PublicationYear). Book title. Publisher. DOI.
Feist. (2006). The psychology of science and the origins of the scientific mind. Yale University Press. https://doi.org/10.12987/9780300133486
* Omit the DOI when not available.
Levitin, D. J. (2016). A field guide to lies: Critical thinking in the information age. Dutton.
Mathiez, A. (1964). The French revolution (C. Phillips, Trans.). Grosset & Dunlap. (Original work published 1928)
Jones, R. (2008). A handbook of photography (5th ed.). Rogers.
AuthorLastName, FirstInitial. (Year, Month Day). Title of article. Title of Newspaper, p(p).
AuthorLastName, FirstInitial. (Year, Month Day). Title of article. Title of Newspaper, URL
Associated Press. (2020, March 26). What you need to know today about the virus outbreak. Associated Press, https://apnews.com/e07207490753628beb18c21031a406e7
Burkholder, S., Eldred, S., Belz, K. H., Keppler, N., Kreidler, M., Majchrowicz, M., Martin, B., Wang, S., Eilperin, J., Santamarina, D., & Fischer-Baum, R. (2020, March 25). What is an essential business in 10 U.S. cities. The Washington Post, https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/national/coronavirus-esssential-businesses/?itid=hp_hp-visual-stories-desktop_vs2%3Ahomepage%2Fstory-ans
Levitz, J. (2017, September 11). Seeking: Part-time workers in bad jobs. The Wall Street Journal. pp. A1, A10.
Casselman, B., Cohen, P., & Hsu, T. (2020). ‘It’s a wreck’: 3.3 million file unemployment claims as economy comes apart. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/26/business/economy/coronavirus-unemployment-claims.html?action=click&module=Spotlight&pgtype=Homepage
When a website includes a publication date or last date of revision, use this citation template. Only include an access date if the website does not give a date of creation. Note: sometimes the date may be at the bottom of the page. If no individual name(s) are listed as authoring the content, the name of the group or organization that manages or owns the website.
AuthorLastName, FirstInitial. (Year, Month Day). Title of work, Site Name. URL
Name of Group. (Year, Month Day). Title of work, Site Name. URL
Harmeet, K. (2020, April 15). A zoo is struggling so much that it may have to feed some animals to other animals. CNN. https://edition.cnn.com/2020/04/15/europe/german-zoo-crisis-slaughter-animals-pandemic-trnd/index.html
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2020, April 10). COVID-19 guidance for older adults. CDC. https://www.cdc.gov
If a website does not give a creation date, include an "retrieval date" before the URL of the day you accessed the website if the website is likely to change over time. If you expect that the website will be archived or not altered, you can instead include as the date (n.d.), meaning "no date." The first example below is to a source likely to change, and includes a retrieval date. The second source is unlikely to be updated and/or is likely to exist in archived format. N.d. is the appropriate "date marker" for that website.
American Veterinary Medicine Association. COVID-19: What vetrinarians need to know. AVMA. Retrieved April 15, 2020. https://www.avma.org/resources-tools/animal-health-and-welfare/covid-19
National Nurses United. (n.d.) What employers should do to protect nurses from Zika. https://www.nationalnursesunited.org/pages/what-employers-should-do-to-protect-nurses-from-zika
Author, A. A. [User name]. (year, month day). Title of video [Video file]. Retrieved from http://xxxxx
Carmelina Films (Producer). (2011). Open source revolution [Video file]. Retrieved January 12, 2018, from https://fod.infobase.com/PortalPlaylists.aspx?wID=96757&xtid=47367
Producer, A. A. (Producer), & Director, B. B. (Director). (year). Title of motion picture [Medium: DVD, video file, etc.]. Retrieved from http://xxxxx
APA uses an author-date citation style. To correctly use APA, a short in-text citation is used consisting of the author's last name and the year of publication. A full citation is included on the References list.
(AuthorLastName, Year). When a page number is included: (AuthorLastName, Year, p. #).
Parker (2018) argues that colleges should require students to carry computers to class.
According to Parker (2018), "students who own laptops perform better on average in their courses than those who do not own their own computers" (p. 198).
According to Parker (2018) "students have a responsibility to care for their equipment" (p. 121), which she also notes is not always a top priority for every student.
Additionally, she stated, "most students are perfectly responsible" (Jones, 2018, p. 121).
For works by two authors, include both names in alphabetical order, using "and" between them (notice the use of the ampersand, &, in the parenthetical citation):
Parenthetical: (Jones & Smith, 2011).
In a sentence: According to Jones and Smith (2011), . . .
For works by three or more authors, list only the first author (last name and initials) and include "et al."
For example, a work by (Dexter, Hardwick, Jones, McMillan, & Smith, 2018) would be cited in this way:
Parenthetical: (Dexter et al., 2018)
In a sentence: According to Dexter et al. (2018), . . .
et al. (et alia) is Latin for "and others," and is used to avoid printing all the names of the authors of a source. A period does not follow "et," only "al."
Although it is best to avoid long quotations in an APA paper, if you include a quotation of more than 40 words, it must be included in a separate block of text. Indent the entire block quotation by one-half inch (the same as the standard tab indent), maintain double-spacing, and place the citation at the end in parentheses after the period or punctuation from the quotation. Do not include quotation marks. In good APA style, the quoted author should be introduced before the quotation begins.
According to Kim et al. (2017):
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The remainder of the paper continues as normal. . . .
What not to include:
Most student papers include a separate title page, although some instructors allow students to include the title page information on the same page as the first paragraph of the paper.
On a new page, include your reference list, which is your bibliography.
Purdue OWL is an excellent website for locating in-depth APA information and finding APA examples.