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APA Citation Guide

Butler's guide to APA citations

Reference List - General Information

CITING RESOURCES ON YOUR REFERENCES PAGE

GENERAL INFO ABOUT YOUR REFERENCES PAGE

Your References list should start on a new page.

Alphabetize your reference list by the first word of the citation (usually the author's last name).

  • If you are citing more than one work by the same author, the work with the earliest date goes first.
  • If you have more than one work published in the same year by the same author, alphabetize by title.
  • If some of your references' authors share a last name, alphabetize by first initials.

Double space all of the citations on your reference page.

Indent the second & following lines of the citation 0.5 inches.  

2 -20 authors: Provide the name of all authors. For example Wingert, P., Smith, J., & Brown, P.

Over 21 authors: Provide the name of the first nineteen authors followed by an ellipsis (...) and the last author's name. For example: 

Pegion, K., Kirtman, B. P., Becker, E., Collins, D. C., LaJoie, E., Burgman, R., Bell, R., DelSole, R., Min, D., Zhu, Y., Li, W., Sinsky, E., Guan, H., Gottschalck, J., Metzger, E. J., Barton, N. P., Achuthavarier, D., Marshak, J., Koster, R., . . .  Kim, H. (2019). The subseasonal experiment (SubX): A multimodel subseasonal prediction experiment. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 100(10), 2043-2061. https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-18-0270.1

Only capitalize the first word of the document title. If there is a colon in the title, capitalize the first word after the colon.

Italicize the title of the magazine or journal.  Also, italicize the volume number - but do not italicize the issue number.

Vol., issue, and pages may not always be available on Internet sources. If they are not used, the name of the journal is all that can be provided in the reference list.

No Date: Use n.d. (no date) when a publication date is not available.

URL: Break a URL that goes to another line after a slash or before a period.

Student Sample Paper and Example Reference List

Partial Reference List Example

References

Achterberg, J. (1985). Imagery in healing. Shambhala Publications.

American Psychological Association. (2017). Stress in America: The state of our nation. https://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/stress/2017/state-nation.pdf

Baider, L., Uziely, B., & Kaplan De-Nour, A. (1994). Progressive muscle relaxation and guided imagery in cancer patients. General Hospital Psychiatry, 16(5), 340–347. https://doi.org/10.1016/0163-8343(94)90021-3

Ball, T. M., Shapiro, D. E., Monheim, C. J., & Weydert, J. A. (2003). A pilot study of the use of guided imagery for the treatment of recurrent abdominal pain in children. Clinical Pediatrics, 42(6), 527–532. https://doi.org/10.1177/000992280304200607

Bernstein, D. A., & Borkovec, T. D. (1973). Progressive relaxation training: A manual for the helping professions. Research Press.

Bottomley, A. (1996). Group cognitive behavioural therapy interventions with cancer patients: A review of the literature. European Journal of Cancer Cure, 5(3), 143–146. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2354.1996.tb00225.x

Cohen, M., & Fried, G. (2007). Comparing relaxation training and cognitive-behavioral group therapy for women with breast cancer. Research on Social Work Practice, 17(3), 313–323. https://doi.org/10.1177/1049731506293741

Cunningham, A. J., & Tocco, E. K. (1989). A randomized trial of group psychoeducational therapy for cancer patients. Patient Education and Counseling, 14(2), 101–114. https://doi.org/10.1016/0738-3991(89)90046-3

Freebird Meditations. (2012, June 17). Progressive muscle relaxation guided meditation [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDZI-4udE_o