Journals

Script of Video:

One of the most common resources you will be citing is journal articles. In this tutorial, we’ll go through the important things to remember when citing journals in APA format including:

  • Single author
  • Two authors
  • Three to seven authors
  • Over seven authors
  • Electronic source
  • With DOI
  • Without DOI

Please note, all information mentioned is based on the 6th edition of the APA style guide

Regardless of the number of authors, your reference section entry should follow this basic format:

Authors are written as last name followed by initials.

[Type on screen: Author, A. A. ]

The author is followed by publication year, which goes in brackets, followed by a period.

[Author, A. A. (Year). ]

The title of the article is in sentence-case, meaning only the first word and proper nouns in the title are capitalized. So you can capitalize Canada in a title but you wouldn’t capitalize the word country.

[Author, A. A. (Year). Title of article.]

The journal or magazine title is in title case ending with a comma and italicized. Title case means principle words are capitalized but articles, conjunctions, and prepositions are not. So you would capitalize Country but not And.

[Author, A. A. (Year). Title of article. Title of Periodical,]

This is followed by the volume number which is also italicized and the issue number, if present. The issue number is in brackets and is NOT in italics.

[ Author, A. A. (Year). Title of article. Title of Periodical, volume number(issue number)]

This is followed by a comma and the page range for the article, with a period

[ Author, A. A. (Year). Title of article. Title of Periodical, volume number(issue number), pages.]

 

 

For two authors, follow the basic style for one author but separate the author names using a comma and an ampersand, not the word ‘and’.

[Wegener, D. T., & Petty, R. E. (1994). Mood management across affective states: The hedonic contingency hypothesis. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 66, 1034-1048.]

In the body of your paper, do the same with the last names,

If your article has between three and seven authors, list by last names and initials; commas separate author names, with the last author’s name preceded again by ampersand.

 

[Shinde, S., Sebastian, J. K., Jain, J. R., Hanamanthagouda, M. S., & Murthy, H. N. (2016). Efficient in vitro propagation of artemisia nilagirica var. nilagirica (indian wormwood) and assessment of genetic fidelity of micropropagated plants. Physiology and Molecular Biology of Plants, 22(4), 595-603. http://doi.org/10.1007/s12298-016-0379-6]

  

Your article has over seven authors? Start by listing by last names and initials; commas separate author names until after the sixth author's name. After the sixth author use an ellipses (three periods) and then the final author name. There should be no more than seven names in your reference entry.

 

[Miller, F. H., Choi, M. J., Angeli, L. L., Harland, A. A., Stamos, J. A., Thomas, S. T., . . . Rubin, L. H. (2009). Web site usability for the blind and low-vision user. Technical Communication, 57, 323-335.]

 

If you retrieved your article from an online source, you need to include a link to it. There are two ways to include links. The preferred method is to include the DOI, if one has been assigned. DOI stands for digital object identifier, and functions as a persistent link.

The DOI is typically located on the first page of the electronic journal article, near the copyright notice or can be found on the database landing page for the article. What you find may look like this: [doi:0000000/000000000000]

or

[http://dx.doi.org/10.0000/0000 ]

Either format can be used in your references.

The DOI should be included after the page numbers for the article.

[Author, A. A. (Year). Title of article. Title of Periodical, volume number(issue number), pages. doi:0000000/000000000000]

If no DOI has been assigned, use the URL of the website from which you are retrieving the periodical. If you’re working off-campus, make sure the link you provide does not have “proxy” in it. The link should look similar to this:

Most databases have an option to click and get a permanent link, use this for your reference list and always check your links before you finalize your paper.

For links, you include retrieved from and then the article link.

[Author, A. A. (Year). Title of article. Title of Periodical, volume number(issue number), pages. Retrieved from http://www.database.com/articles/article.html]

Now your reference section entry is complete. Using a real article as an example, the finished reference would look like this:

[Scanlan, S. J. (2009). New direction and discovery on the hunger front: Toward a sociology of food Security/Insecurity. Humanity & Society, 33(4), 292-316. http://doi.org/10.1177/016059760903300403]

Or, if you couldn’t find the DOI, like this:

[Scanlan, S. J. (2009). New direction and discovery on the hunger front: Toward a sociology of food security/insecurity. Humanity & Society, 33(4), 292-316. Retrieved from http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/016059760903300403]

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