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Citing Others' Work

Examples -- Referencing Books

Basic Format for Books
 
Author, A. A. (Year of Publication). Title of work: Capitalize first letter of subtitle and Proper Nouns. Publisher. DOI (if it has one)

 

Basic Format for an Authored Entry or Chapter in Books
 
Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Year of publication). Title of chapter/entry. In E. E. Editor & F. F. Editor (Eds.), Title of work: Subtitle of work (pp. page range). Publisher. DOI (if available)
Books and Ebooks
 
One Author
 
Wellock, D. (2015). Health and nutrition for dogs and cats: A guide for pet parents. Rowman & Littlefield.
 
Two Authors 
 
Terhune, T. R., & Hays, B. A. (2015). Land your dream career in college: The complete guide to success. Rowman & Littlefield.
 
More Than Two Authors
 
Liebman, J. S., Crowley, S., Markquart, A., Rosenberg, L., White, L. G., & Zharkovsky, D. (2014). The wrong Carlos: Anatomy of a wrongful execution. Columbia University Press.
 
Corporate Author
 
Solar Energy International. (2014). Photovoltaics design and installation manual: Renewable energy education for a sustainable future. New Society Press.
 
No Author 
 
Lippincott nursing procedures (8th ed.). (2019). Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.
 
Editor
 
Zott, L. M. (Ed.). (2015). Women's health: Opposing viewpoints. Greenhaven Press.
  
A Later Edition of a Book
 
Carpenito, L. J. (2017). Nursing care plans: Transitional patient & family centered care (7th ed.). Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.
  

 

Chapter or Entry within a Book or Ebook
 
An Un-Authored Entry in an Edited Book
 
Defibrillator. (2021). In D. Venes (Ed.), Taber's cyclopedic medical dictionary (24th ed.). F. A. Davis.
 
Entry in an E-book without Page Numbers (Author is the Publisher)
 
American Academy of Family Physicians (2023). Rheumatoid arthritis. In AAFP conditions A-Z.
 
Authored Chapter in a Edited Book
 
Buchanan, A. (2014). Protective factors in family relationships. In M. M. Merviö (Ed.), Contemporary social issues in East Asian societies: Examining the spectrum of public and private spheres (pp. 76-85). Information Science Reference.
 
Chapter in an Authored Book
  Use a narrative description (in addition to the in-text citation) in your paper's text to point your reader to the chapter. Then reference the whole book: 
Blumberg, M., & Kust, R. T. (2020). Research skills in language and literature. Wiley.
 

 

Introduction, Preface, Foreword or Afterword
   
Mast, T. (2007). Introduction. In R. A. Kelly, Energy supply and renewable resources (pp. i-ix). Facts on File.
 
  • Chapter in a Book:  see the APA website for explanation
  • When a book is from a library database, for example STATRef
    • If the book has a DOI: include the DOI (https://doi.org/....) after the publisher. No period after a DOI
    • If the book doesn't have a DOI: end the reference after the publisher
  • What is the book has an imprint as well as a publisher: use the imprint instead of the publisher (p. 295-6)

Examples -- Referencing Articles

Basic Format for Periodicals (APA)
 
Author, A. A., Author, B. B., & Author, C. C. (Publication Date). Title of article: Subtitle of article. Title of Periodical, volume number(issue number), pages. https://doi.org/xx.xxx/yyyy

 
Magazine Article (In Print or From an NMC Article Database)
 
Fisher, D. (2008, November 24). A brief history of energy boondoggles. Forbes, 82.
 
   
Magazine Article from the Web

 

Schulman, M. (2019, September 9). Superfans: A love story. The New Yorker. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/09/16/superfans-a-love-story

 
   

Scholarly Journal Article (w/ DOI)
 
O'Connor, D., & Hou, D. (2019). More haste, less speed in replenishing China's groundwater. Nature, 569(7757), 487. https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-019-01617-5
Scholarly Journal Article - Print or From Library Database
 
Schimmoller, B. K. (2004). Renewable energy enters commercial era. Power Engineering, 108(4), 28-41.
 

 

Review 
   
Haggas, C. (2009, February 15). [Review of the book Clean Energy Nation: Freeing America from the Tyranny of Fossil Fuels by J. McNerney & M. Creek].  Booklist, 22.
 

 

Newspaper Article
 
Wald, M. L. (2009, July 13). Debate on clean energy leads to regional divide. New York Times, pp. 13A.
 
 

 

Referencing an Article from an Article Database: Don't include database information unless the database is the only way to access the article. Most articles from NMC databases will be referenced without the database information. For more information, use this explanation from the APA.

If the journal article without a DOI but a usable URL for any reader (e.g., it is from an online journal that is not part of a database), include the URL of the article at the end of the reference.

Website Examples

Basic Format
 

Author, A. A. & Author B. B. (Date of publication). Title of page [Format description when necessary].  https://www.domain.com/fullURL

If no author is listed, begin with the page Title, followed by date and the rest of the citation:

Title of page [Format description when necessary]. (Date of publication). https://www.domain.com/fullURL

If no publication date is listed, use the abbreviation (n.d.) in place of the date:

Author, A. A. & Author B. B. (n.d.). Title of page [Format description when necessary]. Retrieved from https://www.domain.com/fullURL

If you expect the page's content to change with some frequency, add date accessed:

Author, A. A. & Author B. B. (Date of publication). Title of page [Format description when necessary]. Retrieved Month DD, YYYY from https://www.domain.com/fullURL

 
Website Examples
 
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. (2016). Pulses: Nutritious Seeds for a Sustainable Future [PDF file]. http://www.fao.org/3/a-i5528e.pdf
 
National Institute of Health. (2024, January). Asthma. MedlinePlus. https://medlineplus.gov/asthma.html
 
National Institute of Mental Health. (2023, April). Anxiety disorders. National Institutes of Health. https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/topics/anxiety-disorders/index.shtml
 
U.S. Census Bureau. (n.d.). U.S. and world population clock. U.S. Department of Commerce. Retrieved January 9, 2020, from https://www.census.gov/popclock/
 

 

Referencing a Source Your Reader Can Access (Student Paper)
 
Arnett, P. (2020). Course outcomes [Lecture notes]. NMC Moodle. https://elearn.nmc.edu/
 
 

 

  • Updated versus Reviewed Date for Online Works (9.15 in Manual)
    • If the page has a "last updated" date, and you're sure the material you're citing was updated, then use that date.
    • If the page has a "last reviewed" date, don't use it in your reference; the content probably wasn't updated. Use n.d.
  • "If you cite multiple webpages from a website, create a reference for each." (10.16 in manual)

Referencing Images

As a student writing an academic paper you aren't expected to get the creator's permission to use the image, but do give credit to the creator for their work.  To give credit and to make it simple for your instructor to read, use the same reference to the work under the image and on the references page.

When you refer to the image in the text of your paper, use the standard author and date citation style. APA considers an image a type of figure.  Here's an example of how to insert the image in a paper.

Reference Format - Underneath Image and on References Page

Creator. (Date). Title of the work [Format]. Title of Website. URL

Example of a Reference

Perry, M. (2018, May 11).  Everything that’s blue is considered sterile! [Photograph]. The Circulating Life. https://thecirculatinglife.com/2018/05/11/orientation-in-surgery/ 

What To Do When You Image is Created by Someone Other than the Creator of the Source You Found It

When the author or creator of the source you’re using quotes or uses content (like an image) from some other author or creator, you’re using a secondary source

  • First, try to find the original to use
  • If you can’t find the original:
    • In the reference list, provide an entry for where you found the image
    • Reference the source where you found the image. When you insert that reference under the image, add a copyright statement identifying the original creator

Example of Reference Under Image

Odong, A. (2015, December 7). [Girls playing soccer in Australia]. The Women's Game. https://thewomensgame.com/news/girls-football-participation-hits-all-time-high-483634 Copyright Adam Butler.

In-Text Citations

In-text citations point the reader to more complete information in the reference list at the end of the paper.

Basic format: use the last name of the author followed by a comma and the publication year enclosed in parentheses: (Smith, 2007).

When doing a direct quote: include the page number should be included, or a pointer to the paragraph or section. If you are paraphrasing the page number is not required.

Signal Phrase: If you refer to the author's name in a sentence you do not have to include the name again as part of your in-text citation, instead include the date after the name and the page number (if there is one) at the end of the quotation or paraphrased section. For example:

Hunt (2011) explains that mother-infant attachment has been a leading topic of developmental research since John Bowlby found that "children raised in institutions were deficient in emotional and personality development" (p. 358).

A Work by Two Authors

Name both authors in the signal phrase or in parentheses each time you cite the work. Use the word "and" between the authors' names within the text and use the ampersand in parentheses. Examples:

In their research on therapy options, Key and Peel (2015) demonstrated...

(Key & Peele, 2015)

A Work by Three tor More Authors

(Pavia et al., 1993)

Unknown Author

If the work does not have an author, cite the source by its title in the signal phrase or use the first word or two in the parentheses. Titles of books and reports are italicized; titles of articles, chapters, and web pages are in quotation marks. APA style calls for capitalizing important words in titles when they are written in the text (but not when they are written in reference lists). Example:

A similar study was done of students learning to format research papers ("Using Citations," 2001).

Organization as an Author

If the author is an organization or a government agency, mention the organization in the signal phrase or in the parenthetical citation the first time you cite the source.

According to the American Psychological Association (2000),...

If the organization has a well-known abbreviation, include the abbreviation in brackets the first time the source is cited and then use only the abbreviation in later citations.

First citation: (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2017)
Second citation: (CDC, 2017)