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Citation Styles: APA

This guide contains information & resources on the commonly used citation styles in NUS such as ACS, AMA, APA, ASA, Chicago/Turabian, Harvard, IEEE, Legal style and MLA.

APA Style Guide

Number of Authors to Include in In-Text Citation

Note the change in format of the author element, depending on the number of authors (see table below for examples of the basic in-text citation styles)

basic intext

 

Parenthetical versus Narrative In-Text Citation#

Avoiding Ambiguity in In-Text Citation

Multiple works with three or more authors and the same publication year may cause some confusion when we apply the APA guideline for in-text citation.

If the in-text citation of multiple works shorten to the same form, enter as many names needed to distinguish the references, and abbreviate the rest of the names to "et al." in every citation.

For example: two works have the following authors:

Tan, Goh and Kumar (2020)

Tan, Goh, Kumar, Reilly and Jaecklin (2020)

Both these citations shorten to Tan et al. (2020). To distinguish these when citing them both in your paper, cite them as follows:

Tan, Goh, Kumar, et al. (2020)

Tan, Goh, Kumar, Reilly et al. (2017)

The following are handouts and guides for the seventh edition of APA's Publication Manual.

These online resources are accessible on APA's site: https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/handouts-guides

1 APA Style References Formatting Activity
2 Avoiding Plagiarism Guide
3 Creating an APA Style Reference List Guide
4 In-Text Citation Checklist
5 Journal Article Reference Checklist
6 Number and Statistics Guide
7 Paraphrasing and Citation Activities
8 Reference Examples
9 Reference Quick for Journal Articles, Books and Edited Book Chapters

 

When Author is Unknown or Identified as "Anonymous"

For in-text citation: include the title and year of publication

If the title of the work is italicised in the reference, the title in the in-text citation should be in italics as well. If the title of the work is not italicised in the reference, use double quotation marks around the title in the in-text citation.

  • Book with no author: (Happiness, 2020)
  • Magazine article with no author: ("Inclusive Society Mindset," 2020)

If an author is specifically listed as anonymous, "Anonymous" takes the place of the author name in the in-text citation, followed by a comma and the date.

  •  (Anonymous, 1998)

Secondary Sources

In reference list, cite the secondary source used.

In the text, include the primary and secondary sources. List them as follows: 

 

  • In Atkins and Reeve's study (as cited in Barthos, Jones & Reynolds, 1995), ...

In the Reference List (include Secondary Source):

  • Barthos, W., Jones, C., & Reynolds, M. (1995). Positive Psychology: Integrated Study. Today's Mind Review, 95, 13-27.

Citing Specific Parts of a Work

To cite a specific part of a work, indicate details of the page, chapter, figure, etc. Always give page numbers for direct quotations.

  • (Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, 2009, p. 13)
  • (Kilmarten, 2000, Chapter 5)

Note: "Page" is abbreviated but not "Chapter".

Multiple Works

  • List citations in alphabetical order
  • Separate them with semicolons

Two or more works by same authors: arrange by year of publication

In-press citations will be listed last. Give the author's last name once and for each subsequent work, give only the date.