Citing your Sources
You will most likely be using APA (American Psychological Association) Style. Use the examples below as a helpful guide.
How to cite an article from a library database (such as Academic Search Complete or Criminal Justice Abstracts)
Here's how you can use the database generated citation:
Step 1: Once you've accessed the full article, click the circled icon. (It will say "Cite").
Step 2: A box will pop up that has an alphabetized list of all citation styles, complete with the full, ready-made citation; scroll down a bit and you'll see APA. Feel free to copy and paste that into your source list.
Step 3: Double check your citations to make sure they are correct and follow the current editions standard for APA
However, you may have used a database that does not have a citation generator tool. If this is the case, you can follow this example:
Format
Author, A. (Year). Title of article. Title of Publication, Vol.#(Issue #), page range, DOI
Example
Rataj, T. (2014). Video gets personal with body-worn cameras. Blue Line Magazine, 26(8), 38-39,
https://doi.org/10.fhgr109863.12.234
Some other common sources you may have to cite:
Format
Example
Barak, A., & Sutherland, A. (2014, December 23). First scientific report shows police body-worn-cameras
can
Format
Name of Agency/Organization. (Year). Title of document [Data file]. Retrieved from
http://www.someaddress.com/full/url/
Example
Federal Bureau of Investigation. (2012). Crime in the United States [Data file]. Retrieved from
https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2012/crime-in-the-u.s.-2012
Format
Author, A. A. (Year, Month Day). Title of article. Title of Newspaper. http://www.someaddress.com/full/url/
Example
Melendez, G. (2016, June 23). State officials to distribute money for police body cameras. The State.
http://www.thestate.com/latest-news/article85575622.html
Format
A.A. Lastname. (Year, Month Day). Title of document [Web log comment].
http://www.someaddress.com/full/url/
Example
J.D. Williamson. (2016, July 11). What to do if you get pulled over by a cop and you’re legally armed [Web
log comment]. https://www.aclu.org/blog/speak-freely/what-do-if-you-get-pulled-over-cop-and-youre-legally-armed
General APA rules to keep in mind
1. All of your sources should have a hanging indentation.
Example:
Author, A. (2022). Some long article name. Journal of Citations 1(2),
1-5. Doi: 10.123456.78
2. All authors' names should be inverted (i.e., last names should be provided first).
3. Give the last name and first/middle initials for all authors of a particular work up to and including 20 authors . Separate each author’s initials from the next author in the list with a comma. Use an ampersand (&) before the last author’s name.
Example: Less than 20 authors
Nguyen, T., Carnevale, J. J., Scholer, A. A., Miele, D. B., & Fujita, K. (2019). Metamotivational knowledge
of the role of high-level and low-level construal in goal-relevant task performance. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 117(5), 879-899. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/pspa0000166
Example: More than 20 authors
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
4. Reference list entries should be alphabetized by the last name of the first author of each work.
5. For multiple articles by the same author, or authors listed in the same order, list the entries in chronological order, from earliest to most recent.
6. When referring to the titles of books, chapters, articles, reports, webpages, or other sources, capitalize ONLY the FIRST LETTER of the FIRST WORD of the title and subtitle, the first word after a colon or a dash in the title, and proper nouns.
7. Italicize titles of longer works (e.g., books, edited collections, names of newspapers, and so on).
8. Do not italicize, underline, or put quotes around the titles of shorter works such as chapters in books or essays in edited collections.
9. Include retrieval date when the information from the electronic source is likely to change.
Example:
Spaghetti and Meatballs. (2018, February 25). Budgetbytes. Retrieved November 20, 2023 from
https://www.budgetbytes.com/spaghettimeatballs
10. If an online scholarly journal does NOT have a DOI then you do not have to include a link or database.
(From OWL Purdue)
In-Text Citation Guidelines
1. You only have to include the page number if you are directly quoting or borrowing specific
information from another work.
2. If you introduce the author is the body of your sentence you write the year in parenthesis after the
name and the page number at the end of the sentence in parenthesis.
Example:
3. If you do not mention the author's name in the body of your sentence include the author last name,
year, and page number at the end of the sentence in parenthesis.
Example:
4. Use p. for one page or pp. for multiple pages
Example:
5. If there are no page numbers use the paragraph number (para.) or refer to the table the information
is in.
Example:
6. If you are summarizing or paraphrasing you don't have to include page numbers or ranges.
Example:
7. If you there are 3 of more authors only include the first author followed by et al. [There is only a
period after al. NOT after et]
Example:
8. The punctuation should always come AFTER the parenthesis.
General APA Formatting
1. Papers should be Double Spaced, 8.5/11 in pages with 1 inch margins
2. You should use accessible fonts like:
Sans serif fonts:
Serif fonts:
3. Papers should include your name, date, and title of the paper:
4. References on the reference page should be organized alphabetically.
They have simplified explanations and examples of the most commonly used source types for APA, MLA, Chicago, IEEE, AMA, and ASA citation styles. The information provided will be based on the most recent version of those style guides.
Has the most recent APA citation style guide, tips for formatting your papers, and grammar examples.
Tips for formatting your paper, and a citation generator**
**The citation generator can be helpful in getting started BUT should always be checked against an official citation style guide.
This is a tutorial for formatting your papers and citations using APA Style. By the end of the tutorial you should feel more prepared to prepare your citations for your research projects.
Example papers for you to follow and ensure yours look the way they should!
