Guide to APA References
Return to Lake Land's Guides to Citing Sources
This page is based on the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, 6th ed. (2009)
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APA In-Text Citations
How to Cite a Source in the Body of Your Paper
- APA goes by the author-date method of in-text citation. This means that citations consist of the author's name (if available) and year of publication. These generally go in parentheses after the sentence you're citing (see examples below.)
- Each in-text citation must correspond to a citation from your References list.
- For direct quotes, include page number(s) when available. If page # is not available, use section titles or paragraph #s.
- If the work has no author, cite the first few words of the reference list entry (usually the title) and the year.
- If the author's name appears within a sentence, then just cite the year in parentheses.
- When providing page numbers, use p. for a single page, and pp. for multiple pages. Use para. for paragraph numbers.
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| Examples |
One Work by One Author
Kessler (2003) found that among epidemiological samples...
Early onset results in a more persistent and severe course (Kessler, 2003).
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One Work by Multiple Authors
The first time you mention a source with multiple authors, write all of them out. After that, you can use the "et al." construction:
First mention:
Kisangau, Lyaruu, Hosea, and Joseph (2007) found that...
After that:
Kisangau, et al. (2007) found that...
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Work with no author
The in-text reference should refer to the citation as it appears in your reference list. Use the first few words of the entry.
Bacillus Thuringiensis is used in corn, potatoes, and cotton. ("New child vaccine", 2001).
This refers to a reference that looks like this:
New child vaccine gets funding boost. (2001). Retrieved March 21,
2001 from http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/archive/00000162/
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Direct Quotations, print sources
Anything quoted word for word from a source should be in quotes. Include the page number or paragraph number in the citation.
Confusing the issue is the overlapping nature of roles in palliative care, whereby "medical needs are met by those in the medical disciplines; nonmedical needs may be addressed by anyone on the team." (Csikai & Chaitin, 2006, p. 112).
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Interpreting these results, Robbins et al. (2003) suggested that the "therapists in dropout cases may have inadvertently validated parental negativity about the adolescent without adequately responding to the adolescent's needs or concerns." (p. 541), contributing to an overall climate of negativity.
If the quote is more than 40 words, put it into a "block quote" without quotation marks.
Others have contradicted this view:
In these instances, participants are able to see the visible manifestation of the group, the physical gathering, yet their ability to make direct, intimate connections with those around them is limited by the sheer magnitude of the assembly. (Purcell, 1997, pp. 111-112)
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Direct Quotations-- online sources with no page numbers
If no page numbers are listed, use section headings and paragraph numbers.
In their study, Verbunt, Pernot, and Smeets (2008) found that "the level of perceived disability in patients with fibromyalgia seemed best explained by their mental health condition and less by their physical condition" (Discussion section, para. 1).
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If the section heading has a long title, just use the first few words of it:
"Empirical studies have found mixed results of the efficacy of labels in educating consumers and changing consumption behavior" (Gloat, Kuchler, & Krissof, 2007, "Mandatory Labeling Has Targeted," para. 4).
(The full section title was, "Mandatory Labeling Has Targeted Information Gaps and Social Objectives.")
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