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Referencing Help

Referencing Help

APA Style Guide

This APA 7th style guide is based on the citing and referencing sections of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (7th edition) and the APA Style website. 

Referencing is a way of demonstrating the ideas or information from a number of sources you have used in your assignments or written works to avoid plagiarism. Usually, there are two parts:

  • The brief information appears in the text of the paper, normally including the author's surname, the year of publication, and page(s) (if applicable). The format is as follows:
  • Author Year Page(s)

    Use surname(s) of the author(s). For Paul Smith, Smith is the surname.

    Or use full name if the author is a company or organisation. 

    The year the author(s)' work was published or updated.

    Use “n.d.” if the date is unknown.

    The page number(s) of the cited work (necessary if direct quotation or figures/data are used). The format for one page is ‘p. 5’ and for multiple pages, the format is ‘pp. 23-35’.

    Use a heading or section name or a paragraph number if the source does not contain page numbers. For example: use "para. 4" for paragraph 4 from a webpage.

  • In-text citations are usually presented in the following two ways:

    Parenthetical citation Narrative citation
    The author and date appear within parentheses The author appears in the text with the date in parentheses
    ... (Smith, 2024). Smith (2024) point out ...
  • Each in-text citation in your writing must have a corresponding entry in your references.
  • A reference is the bibliographic information of a work cited in the text. In APA, a reference includes four core elements.
  • Author Date Title Source
    Who created it? When was it published? What is it called?  Where can it be found?

    Author/s.

    Editor/s.

    Group author/s.

    (Year).

    (Year, Month DD).

    Title of a book.

    Title of a chapter of an edited book.

    Title of a journal article.

    Publisher. DOI or URL

    Title of the edited book. DOI or URL

    Title of Journal, volume(issue), pp–pp. DOI or URL
  • Author layout
  • 1 author Author, A. A.
    2 authors Author, A. A., & Author, B. B.
    3 to 20 authors Author, A. A., Author, B. B., Author, C. C., Author, D. D., Author, E. E., Author, F. F., Author, G. G., Author, H. H., Author, I. I., Author, J. J., Author, K. K., Author, L. L., Author, M. M., Author, N. N., Author, O. O., Author, P. P., Author, Q. Q., Author, R. R., Author, S. S., & Author, T. T.
    21 or more authors Author, A. A., Author, B. B., Author, C. C., Author, D. D., Author, E. E., Author, F. F., Author, G. G., Author, H. H., Author, I. I., Author, J. J., Author, K. K., Author, L. L., Author, M. M., Author, N. N., Author, O. O., Author, P. P., Author, Q. Q., Author, R. R., Author, S. S., . . . Author, Z. Z.
    Group author

    Spell out the full name
    No author Use the title in place of the author
    Hyphenated name Retain the hyphen. For example, use Zhang, Y.-C. for Zhang Yi-Chen
  • DOI (digital object identifier)
  • A DOI is a unique alphanumeric string that identifies content and provides a persistent link to its location on the internet.  It must always be presented in the format https://doi.org/xxxxxx, for example: https://doi.org/10.5951/teacchilmath.21.1.0026
    Include a DOI for all works that have a DOI, regardless of whether you used the online version or the print version of a book, journal, report or other publications.
    For periodical articles and books without DOI from most academic research databases, format the references as the print version of the sources. For online sources without DOI from websites, provide a URL in the reference.
    You can find out more about DOI from APA Style website.

 

  • The list of references is to be placed at the end of the assignment on a new page with specific formats to follow:
  • Order of the reference list
  • In APA style for alphabetising names, "nothing precedes something": Loft, V. H. precedes Loftus, E. F.

    For multiple works by the same author, the references should be arranged by the year of publication, the earliest first. References with no date precede references with dates, and in-press references are listed last.

    Peter, S. (n.d.-a).
    Peter, S. (n.d.-b).
    Peter, S. (2016).
    Peter, S. (2020a).
    Peter, S. (2020b, April).
    Peter, S. (2020c, April 20).
    Peter, S. (in press).
    If an item has no author, treat the title exactly the same as the author and alphabetise it accordingly. However, if the title starts with “A”, “An” or “The”, refer to the word after it.
    When the title starts with numerals, alphabetise it by spelling them out. Thus, "Top 100 business schools" precedes "Top 10 nursing specialties" because when spelled out, "one hundred" appears alphabetically before "ten".