Citations

Citations appear in the body of your paper and correspond exactly to the entries in the list of references. However, citations do not contain as much information about the resources as is found in the reference list. They provide just enough information for the reader of your paper to locate more detailed information about your resources in the reference list. Since the reference list is arranged in alphabetical order according to authors’ last names, the the citations must give the authors’ last names. Furthermore, since you are likely to use more than one resource by the same author, the citation also includes the year of publication. 

Some citations may also refer to a specific part of a resource, such as a page or table. The page number is always included when giving a direct quotation from the resource. View information on citations with page numbers.
 

 
Get a Voki now!

Two Basic Citation Methods

There are two basic ways to present a citation in the body of your paper:  

• directly name the author when giving the attribution in the context of a sentence
• simply name the source in parentheses after the idea being cited

Whether the citation is in parentheses or in context, the last names of the authors and the year of publication are given; in APA style, the title of the work is not mentioned. If the attribution is in the context of a sentence, the year of publication should be given in parentheses after the authors’ names.
 

Examples

attribution in context
citation in parentheses
first and subsequent citation, more than two authors
citations with page numbers
abbreviations and symbols
numbers

 

More than two authors

The preceding examples show how to format a citation containing one or two authors. When there are more than two authors, however, the citations can become lengthy and cumbersome. To avoid this, the APA Manual provides a two-step solution (2001, pp. 208-209).  

            1.  The first time a work is cited, name all authors
            2.  In subsequent citations, name the first author followed by the abbreviation et al. 

The abbreviation et al. stands for the Latin phrase et alia, meaning ‘and others.’ Notice that et is an entire word meaning ‘and’, so after et there is no period. [Remembering et al.]

Citations with Page Numbers

Always provide the page number in a citation when giving a direct quotation from a source. A direct quotation is when you use the exact wording of an author. Direct quotations are placed within double quotation marks.

In APA style, symbols and certain abbreviations are used only in parenthetical material (between parentheses) and in tables or diagrams. As mentioned above, the ampersand (&) symbol is only used in parenthetical citations and reference lists, not in the context of a sentence. In the  context of a sentence us the the word and.

Latin abbreviations such as etc., et al. and i.e. also should only appear in parenthetical material (APA, 2001, p. 106).

There are two other types of abbreviations that are mentioned in the APA Manual:

• abbreviations no needing explanation
• abbreviations needing explanations

Abbreviations not needing an explanation are any abbreviations that you can find listed as words in a standard dictionary, such as IQ, and AIDS (APA Manual, 2001, p. 105)

Abbreviations needing explanations

All abbreviations should be used sparingly. Use an abbreviation only when the term it represents is repeated frequently throughout your paper.

According to the APA Manual, terms used fewer than four times in a paper should not be abbreviated because infrequent abbreviations "may be difficult for a reader to remember, and you probably serve the reader best if you write them out each time" (2001, p. 103).

When using abbreviations or initials (acronyms) for frequently-used terms, such as ESL, IDEA, or SOL, three are two steps to follow:

1. 1. Write the term out completely the first time it is used, followed by the acronym in parentheses

2. 2. After the first sue, always use the acronym when referring to the term

In the context of a sentence of your paper, the general rule is that numbers 10 and above should be written numerically, using figures instead of words, while numbers below 10 are spelled out in words. Numbers below one should be written numerically in decimal form. (see pages 122-130 of the APA Manual for detailed information and exceptions).

An exception to this rule relates to grades in school. While APA style requires grades below 10 to be spelled out (as in ninth grade), if the number follows the word grade, it is written in numerals (as in 9 to 12).