Western Piedmont Community College
Western Piedmont Community College

Pathfinder: APA Citation Guide

RETURN TO STUDENT LEARNING RESOURCES

APA Style

The APA style is established by the American Psychological Association. It is used in Social Science disciplines including political science, business and education. It requires a name and year in the text and requires a page number only with a direct quote. Full bibliographic entries are entered alphabetically by author on a “References” page.

Book

Gabor, A. ( 1955). Einstein s wife: work and marriage in the lives of five great

     twentieth-century women. New York: Viking.

Magazine Article – Weekly

  • Magazine with a volume number
    Block, T. G. (1995, September II). Riding the waves.  

            Forbes, 46, 182.

  • Magazine without a volume number
    Mills, L. (1997, December 22/29). Snap, crackle, pop. Marketing Magazine, 6-7.
  • Magazine Article – Monthly
    Moran, S. P. (1983, June). A deviant star. Natural History, 24-29.
  • Newspaper Article
    Matthew, J. (1995, August 28). More public schools using private dollars.

The Washington Post, p. A1.

  • Magazine Article from Online Database
    Auster, B. B. (1998, March 23). Restarting the race dialogue.

       U.S. News & World Report, I 24, 9 paragraphs. Retrieved August 13, 1998

from Bell & Howell ProQuest: http://www.nclive.org

Lerner, B. (1996, January 29). Black future. National Review, 48.  Retrieved August 7, 1998

from EBSCOhost: http://www.nclive.org

Citing Internet Resources Using APA Style

When citing sources from the Internet include the following information as appropriate to the source:

  1. Author/editor last name, followed by a comma, then the initials.
  2. Year of Publication, followed by a comma, then month and day for magazines and newspapers, within parenthesis.
  3. Title of the article, not within quotations and with only major words capitalized, followed by the total number of paragraphs within brackets only if that information is provided. Note: You need not count paragraphs yourself.
  4. Name of the book, journal, or complete work italicized. Note: If you cannot italicize then underline.
  5. Volume number if listed italicized. Note: if you cannot italicize then underline.
  6. Page numbers only if you have that data from a printed version of the journal of magazine. If the periodical has no volume number, use “p” or “pp.” before the numbers; if the journal has a volume number, omit “p” or “pp.”
  7. The word “Retrieved,” followed by the date of access, followed by the source and a colon.
  8. the complete URL (Uniform Resource Locator).

Online Journal Article

Little, Miles & Feamside, M. (1977). On trust. Online Journal of Ethics. 2.

Retrieved February 1, 1999 from the  World Wide Web: http://www.depaul.or&html

Miscellaneous Internet Sources

  • No author noted
    Schools and gun violence ( 1999, June 13). Retrieved February 12, 2000

from the World Wide Web: http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcgvscho.html

  • Group or organization as authors
    Minnesota Coalition for Battered Women. Rural battered women.

Retrieved February 16, 2000 from the World Wide Web:

http://www.letswrap.com/yellowMed/rural.

For Complete APA Style rules, please consult the following resources:

  • Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (call number: BF 76.7 .P83)
  • The Worlds Easiest Guide to Using the APA (call number: Ref. BF 76.7 .A43 1995)

REMEMBER: Instructors serve as the FINAL authority in matters of citation for class-based assignments!