APA Citation requires two elements—
1. List of References: An alphabetized list at the end of your paper which gives comprehensive author and publication information about each source. Enough information must be provided for your readers to find the sources for themselves.
2. In-Text Citations: In your paper, a short note in parentheses after each quote or rephrased point directing the reader to the corresponding alphabetical entry in your Works Cited list.
APA In-Text Citations: The Basics
Include an in-text citation every time you mention information from your sources.
- Citations are indicated in parentheses at the end of the sentence before the period.
- The information in parentheses must match the beginning of the source’s entry in the Works Cited.
- The author's last name should be the first thing listed, followed by a comma and the year of publication.
Periodic breaks in a study routine are helpful for retention (Sears, 2019).
- If you don’t know the author’s name, the title should be the first thing listed, followed by a comma and the year of publication.
This is distressful for the patient ("Dissociative Identity Disorder," 2013).
- If you are using more than one source by the same author, indicate which one you are referring to by listing the author’s last name and the date of publication of the source.
Studies indicate that there may be biological reasons why some people prefer to listen to rock music at high volume levels (Owen, 2017).
- If your source has two authors, list both last names separated by “&.”
The health impacts of these practices are significant (Smith & Tully, 2018).
- If your source has three or more authors, list the first author by last name followed by “et al.”
Studies of mobile phone data suggest a connection between gender, poverty and mobility in urban areas. (Carlyle et al., 2015).
- When quoting a source word-for-word, indicate this with quotation marks. Include a page number for the quote after the year and a comma.
One researcher stated "the results cannot be generalized between studies" (Holt, 2017, p.171).
- For quotations of 40 words or longer:
- present the quote as a block of text indented ½ inch from the left margin.
- include a citation after the final punctuation.
- do not use quotation marks for block quotes.
At the close of chapter 96, Ishmael comments:
Give not thyself, then, up to fire, lest it invert thee, deaden thee; as for the time it did me. There is a wisdom that is woe; but there is a woe that is madness. And there is a Catskill eagle in some souls that can alike dive down into the blackest gorges, and soar out of them again and become invisible in the sunny spaces. And even if he for ever flies within the gorge, that gorge is in the mountains; so that even in his lowest swoop the mountain eagle is still higher than other birds upon the plain, even though they soar. (Melville, 2017, p. 531)