Referencing in APA Style: How to Reference

In-text citations

What is an in-text citation?

An in-text citation is a short reference which goes in the body of your assignment. You must give an in-text citation whenever you include information in your work that you have taken from somewhere else. This might be a quote, a paraphrase, summary, data, image etc.

Every in-text citation must have a matching entry in the list of references. This allows your reader to check the full details of the source.

What information should I include?

Normally, an in-text citation contains:

• An author's last name
• The year the source was published
• The page number(s) you have taken the information from, if you have quoted or paraphrased. 
  • ​If your source does not use page numbers (e.g. a website) you don't need to include a page number, even for a quote or paraphrase.
  • If the page you have used has a Roman numeral as a page number (e.g. vii, ix), use the Roman numeral in your in-text citation, e.g. (p. iv).

Some specialist sources may be slightly different. If a source is different, you will be told in this guide or in the APA Publication Manual.

How do I write an in-text citation?

There are two ways to write an in-text citation:

• Parenthetical citations (these are also called information-prominent citations)
• Narrative citations (these are also called integrated or author-prominent citations)

Both types of citation are acceptable to use, and you will probably find that you switch between using both of them throughout your assignment.

Parenthetical citations

In parenthetical citations, include all of the information in brackets. This should normally go at the end of a sentence, before the full stop. However, you may also include it elsewhere within the sentence if this makes your reference clearer.

Formats

Components

• Author's last name, followed by a comma (for more information about authors, see the Types of Authors tab)
• Year the source was published
• If your source has page numbers:
  • A comma after the year
  • p. for one page, or pp. for multiple pages
  • The page number, or page numbers (put a dash between your pages for multiple page numbers)

Example 1 (A summary of the whole book)

Example 2 (A paraphrased section) 

Example 3 (A direct quote) 

Narrative citations

In narrative citations, you include the author's name in the structure of your sentence. The other information then goes in brackets.

Formats

Components

• Author's last name within your sentence (for more information about authors, see the Types of Authors tab)
• Year the source was published in brackets, directly after the author's name
• If your source has page numbers, put this in brackets after the quote or paraphrase, but before the full stop:
  • p. for one page, or pp. for multiple pages
  • The page number, or page numbers (put a dash between your pages for multiple page numbers)

Example 1 (A summary of the whole article)

Example 2 (A paraphrased section)

Example 3 (A direct quote) 

Multiple citations 

You may need to cite more than one source in the same sentence, for example, when multiple authors agree about something.

Narrative citations should be written as normal and in any order. Parenthetical citations should be included in the same set of brackets, in alphabetical order, separated by a semi colon.

If you are citing multiple works by the same author, you only need to list the author's name once, followed by the dates in order, with the earliest first.

Example 1 (Multiple narrative citations)

Example 2 (Multiple narrative citations by the same author)

Example 3 (Multiple parenthetical citations)

Repeating citations 

Sometimes, you may use more than one sentence to paraphrase, summarise, or discuss a source. In this case, it is not necessary to repeat the same citation in every sentence. As long as it is clear from the structure of your sentences that you are still talking about the same source, you only need to include the citation in the first sentence. If you include the author's name in a subsequent sentence, you don't need to include the year again.

If you change topic and then return to talking about the original source later in your assignment, you should include a full in-text citation as normal.

List of References

What is the list of references?

The list of references gives the full details of every source you have included in an in-text citation. It provides the information that a reader needs to check the source themselves.

What information should I include?

The information required for a list of references entry changes based on what type of source it is. Click the tabs at the top of the page to see examples for different types of references.

Generally, most references will start with an author, then have a date in brackets, a title, and then additional information specific to that type of source.

How should I format the list of references?

The list of references should be in alphabetical order by author's last name. There is an option in Word, Google Docs, Pages and other word processors to sort your list automatically. Your references should be in one long list - you do not need to create separate lists for books, articles etc. unless you are told otherwise by your tutor.

Each entry in your list of references should have a hanging indent. This means that the first line of each reference is in line with the margin of the page, and any lines afterwards are indented away from the edge. You can use the paragraph formatting tool in Word, Google Docs, Pages and other word processors to do this automatically.

Example reference list

Gemen, H. (2015). Agricultural finance: From crops to land, water and infrastructure. John Wiley.

              https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118827352

Human Rights Act 1998

Nixon, V. (2013). Professional practice in paramedic, emergency and urgent care. Wiley-Blackwell.

Statista. (2016). Poverty in the United Kingdom. https://www.statista.com/study/25947/poverty-and-economic-hardship-in-the-

              united-kingdom-uk-statista-dossier/

TED. (2009, October 7). The danger of a single story | Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie [Video].

              YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9Ihs241zeg 

Tuccitto, N. (2017). Automated data mining of secondary ion mass spectrometry. Journal of Chemometrics, 32(3),

               Article e2968. https://doi.org/10.1002/cem.2968