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Writing a Bibliography: APA Format-standard formats and examples

Listed here are standard formats and examples for basic information that is bibliographic by the American Psychological Association (APA). To learn more about the APA format, see http://www.apastyle.org.

Your directory of works cited should begin at the end of the paper on a new page with the centered title, References. Alphabetize the entries in your list by the author’s last name, using the letter-by-letter system (ignore spaces and other punctuation.) Just the initials associated with the first and middle names are given. If the author’s name is unknown, alphabetize by the title, ignoring any A, An, or The.

For dates, spell out of the names of months into the text of one’s paper, but abbreviate them when you look at the range of works cited, except for May, June, and July. Use either the day-month-year style (22 July 1999) or the month-day-year style (July 22, 1999) and stay consistent. Because of the style that is month-day-year make sure to add a comma after the year unless another punctuation mark goes there.

Underlining or Italics?

When reports were written on typewriters, the true names of publications were underlined since most typewriters had not a way to print italics. You should still underline the names of publications if you write a bibliography by hand. But, then publication names should be in italics as they are below if you use a computer. Always check along with your instructor regarding their preference of utilizing italics or underlining. Our examples use italics.

Hanging Indentation

All APA citations should use hanging indents, that is, the initial line of an entry should always be flush left, and the second and subsequent lines must certanly be indented 1/2″.

Capitalization, Abbreviation, and Punctuation

The APA guidelines specify using capitalization that is sentence-style the titles of books or articles, therefore you should capitalize just the first word of a title and subtitle. The exceptions for this rule could be periodical titles and proper names in a title that ought to nevertheless be capitalized. The periodical title is run in title case, and it is accompanied by the amount number which, with the title, is also italicized.

When there is more than one author, use an ampersand (&) before the name associated with the last author. If there are many than six authors, list just the first one and use et al. for the rest.

Put the date of publication in parentheses immediately after the true name associated with author. Place a period of time following the closing parenthesis. Try not to italicize, underline, or put quotes all over titles of shorter works within longer works.

Format Examples

Allen, T. (1974). Vanishing wildlife of United States. Washington, D.C.: National Geographic Society.

Boorstin, D. (1992). The creators: a reputation for the heroes associated with the imagination. New York: Random psychology research paper topics House.

Nicol, A. M., & Pexman, P. M. (1999). Presenting your findings: A practical guide for creating tables. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Searles, B., & Last, M. (1979). A reader’s guide to science fiction. New York: Facts on File, Inc.

Toomer, J. (1988). Cane. Ed. Darwin T. Turner. New York: Norton.

Encyclopedia & Dictionary

Bergmann, P. G. (1993). Relativity. In the encyclopedia that is new (Vol. 26, pp. 501-508). Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica.

Merriam-Webster’s collegiate dictionary (10th ed.). (1993). Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster.

Pettingill, O. S., Jr. (1980). Falcon and Falconry. World book encyclopedia. (pp. 150-155). Chicago: World Book.

Tobias, R. (1991). Thurber, James. Encyclopedia americana. (p. 600). New York: Scholastic Library Publishing.

Magazine & Newspaper Articles

Format: Author’s last name, first initial. (Publication date). Article title. Periodical title, volume number(issue number if available), inclusive pages.

Note: usually do not enclose the title in quotation marks. Put a period following the title. If a periodical includes a volume number, italicize it and then provide the page range (in regular type) without “pp.” If the periodical will not use volume numbers, as in newspapers, use p. or pp. for page numbers. Note: Unlike other periodicals, p. or pp. precedes page numbers for a newspaper reference in APA style.

Harlow, H. F. (1983). Fundamentals for preparing psychology journal articles. Journal of Comparative and Physiological Psychology, 55, 893-896.

Henry, W. A., III. (1990, 9) april. Making the grade in today’s schools. Time, 135, 28-31.

Kalette, D. (1986, July 21). California town counts town to quake that is big. USA Today, 9, p. A1.

Kanfer, S. (1986, July 21). Heard any books that are good? Time, 113, 71-72.

Trillin, C. (1993, February 15). Culture shopping. New Yorker, pp. 48-51.

Website or Webpage

Online document: Author’s name. (Date of publication). Title of work. Retrieved day, year, from full URL month

Note: When citing Internet sources, relate to the precise website document. If a document is undated, use “n.d.” (for no date) right after the document title. Break a URL that is lengthy would go to another line after a slash or before a period of time. Continually check your references to online documents. There is no period following a URL. Note: If you cannot find several of this given information, cite what is available.

Devitt, T. (2001, August 2). Lightning injures four at music festival. The Why? Files. Retrieved 23, 2002, from http://whyfiles.org/137lightning/index.html january

Dove, R. (1998). Lady freedom in our midst. The Electronic Text Center. Retrieved June 19, 1998, from Alderman Library, University of Virginia website: http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/subjects/afam.html

Note: If a document is contained within a sizable and complex website (such as for instance that for a university or a government agency), identify the host organization additionally the relevant program or department before giving the URL for the document itself. Precede the URL with a colon.