Examples & Explanations of the APA (5th edition) Style

The following are only very basic explanations and examples of APA style. This style encompasses
much more than simply how to format the reference list and write citations. All referencing styles
are complex (they all must deal with how to display numbers, punctuation, headings, abbreviations,
etc.), so if you are publishing a real article for an academic journal, you should get a copy of the
APA Manual (Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, 5th edition) for more detailed
examples1. There are also some online sites giving tips on the APA style:
http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/research/r_apa.html
http://www.wooster.edu/psychology/apa-crib.html
http://www.docstyles.com/archive/apacrib.pdf

The latest official information about how to refer to web sites/on-line articles can be found here:
http://www.apastyle.org/elecref.html

REFERENCES
Take careful note of spacing, ordering, use of italics, capitalization, identation, and punctuation.

BOOKS
Dörnyei, Z. (2001). Teaching and researching motivation. Harlow, England: Pearson Education
Limited.
Gardner, R. C., & Lambert, W. E. (1972). Attitudes and motivation in second language learning (5th ed.).
Rowley, MA: Newbury House.
Ushioda, E. (1996). Learner autonomy 5: The role of motivation. Dublin: Authentik.

BOOK SECTIONS, CHAPTERS BY SPECIFIC AUTHORS, OR ARTICLES

COMPILED IN A BOOK
Adamopolous, J. (1999). The emergence of cultural patterns of interpersonal behavior. In J.
Adamopolous & Y. Kashima (Eds.), Social psychology and cultural context (pp. 63-76).
Thousand Oaks, California: Sage Publications.
Abrams, D. (1999). Social identity, social cognition, and the self: The flexibility and stability of
self-categorization. In D. Abrams & M. A. Hogg (Eds.), Social identity and social cognition
(pp. 197-229). Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.
Befu, H. (1986). The social and cultural background of child development in Japan and the
United States. In H. Stevenson, H. Azuma & K. Hakuta (Eds.), Child development and
education in Japan (pp. 13-27). New York: W. H. Freeman.

JOURNAL ARTICLES
Lee, D. Y. W., & Swales, J. M. (2006). A corpus-based EAP course for NNS doctoral students:
Moving from available specialized corpora to self-compiled corpora. English for Specific
Purposes, 25(1), 56-75.
Lukmani, Y. (1972). Motivation to learn and language proficiency. Language Learning, 22, 261-273.

1 The APA web site has some tips at http://apastyle.apa.org/previoustips.html

Schmidt-Rinehart, B. C. (1994). The effects of topic familiarity on second language listening
comprehension. The Modern Language Journal, 78, 179-189.

INTERNET SOURCES
Below are some basic examples. More examples of how to refer various types of Internet
documents can be found at <http://www.apastyle.org/elecsource.html>. Make sure that there
are no active links to the web addresses you type (i.e., do not allow Micosoft Word to
automatically change the links to active links (shown by underlining)).

Online periodical
Frederickson, B. L. (2000, March 7). Cultivating positive emotions to optimize health and
well-being. Prevention & Treatment, 3, Article 0001a. Retrieved November 20, 2001,
from http://journals.apa.org/prevention/volume3/pre0030001a.html.

Nonperiodical Web Document, Web Page, or Report

Smith, A. B. (2003, April 7). The future of English: The perspective from Asia. Retrieved
November 20, 2004, from http://www.somesite.com/somepage.htm.

Stand-alone document, no author identified, no date

GVU's 8th WWW user survey. (n.d.). Retrieved August 8, 2000, from
http://www.cc.gatech.edu/gvu/usersurveys/survey1997-10/.
If the author of a document is not identified, begin the reference with the title of the document.
The "n.d." stands for "not dated".

General Points

All citations or quotes in the text should have a reference source listed. Do not include any
publication or web site unless you have cited it in your text.

All page numbers are written in full (example: 553-558, NOT 553-58)

If the same author has two works in the same year, refer to them as (Author, 1994a) and
(Author, 1994b) by their order in the references. Type references accordingly.

References should be alphabetical by author(s) and by date, as in the following example from a
reference list:

Gardner, R. C. (1988a). Attitudes and motivation. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 9, 135-148.
Gardner, R. C. (1988b). The socio-educational model of second-language learning: Assumptions,
findings, and issues. Language Learning, 38, 101-126.
Gardner, R. C. (2001). Integrative motivation and second language acquisition. In Z. Dörnyei & R.
Schmidt (Eds.), Motivation and second language acquisition (pp. 1-19). Honolulu, HI: University
of Hawai'i Press.
Gardner, R. C., Day, J. B., & MacIntyre, P. D. (1992). Integrative motivation, induced anxiety, and
language learning in a controlled environment. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 14,
197-214.
Gardner, R. C., Lalonde, R. N., & Moorcroft, R. (1985). The role of attitudes and motivation in
second language learning: correlation and experimental considerations. Language Learning, 35,
207-227.
Gardner, R. C., & Lambert, W. E. (1959). Motivational variables in second-language acquisition.
Canadian Journal of Psychology, 13, 266-272.
Gardner, R. C., & Lambert, W. E. (1972). Attitudes and motivation in second language learning. Rowley,
MA: Newbury House.
Gardner, R. C., & Lysynchuk, L. M. (1990). The role of aptitude, attitudes, motivation, and language
use on second-language acquisition and retention. Canadian Journal of Behavioral Science, 22,
254-270.

As you can see, if there is more than one work by the same author, the earliest work comes
first. Thus, Gardner (1988a, 1998b) are listed before Gardner (2001).

Reference lists are always alphabetical, and if an author has both single-authored works and
multiple-authored works (e.g., Gardner in the above example), the single-authored works
should come first.

References that have the same first author and different second and/or third authors are
arranged alphabetically by the last name of the second author, or the last name of the
third if the first and second authors are the same.

For foreign language texts, an English language translation in brackets should come
immediately after the title.

Matsubara, T. (1991). Bunsho dokkai no strategy [Reading comprehension strategies]. In Y. Ito (Ed.),
Recent studies of English language teaching (pp. 125-136). Tokyo: Yumi Shobo.

IN-TEXT CITATIONS
The following are typical in-text citations (references to sources within the body of your paper).
Note that citations are NOT references; that is, they do not include things like titles, webpage
addresses or specific page references in the text unless they are pertinent to your discussion. Also,
remember that citations (and references) are meant to support your discussion. If someone else
came up with an idea, you must cite him or her. If it is your idea, citations are unnecessary.

………Walker (2000) compared reaction times………

………In a recent study of reaction times (Walker, 2000)………
………by many researchers (Ackman, 1989; Hanes, 1983; Penny, 1962)………
………past research (Edeline & Weinberger, 1991, 1993)………
………via several studies (Johnson, 1991a, 1991b, 1991c)………

When citing a reference with more than one author, include all names when you first cite it
(unless there are more than five authors) and use et al. the second time onwards. (If there are
more than five authors, use et al. for each citation, including the first.)

………(Altine, Franklin, Menson, & Yobbs, 1998)………

………(Altine et al., 1998)………

Join the names in a multiple-author citation in running text by the word and. In parenthetical
material, in tables and captions, and in the reference list, join the names by an ampersand (&),
as in the following examples:

………as Nightlinger and Littlewood (1993) demonstrated………

………as has been shown (Joreskog & Sorbom, 1989)………

For references and citations of groups or organizations:

Entry in reference list:

National Institute of Mental Health. (1999).
First text citation:
………(National Institute of Mental Health [NIMH], 1999)………
Subsequent citations:
………(NIMH, 1999)………

For electronic sources that do not provide page numbers, use the paragraph number, if
available, preceded by the ¶ symbol or the abbreviation para. If neither paragraph nor page
numbers are visible, cite the heading and the number of the paragraph following it to direct the
reader to the location of the material.

………(Myers, 2000, ¶ 5)………

………(Beutler, 2000, Conclusion section, para. 1)

When an article uses direct quotes, the page number must appear in the citation:

………"Things as certain as death and taxes, can be more firmly believed" (Defoe, 1726,
p. 25)………
……… Twine (2001) defines essentialism as the belief that "people and/or phenomenon
have an underlying and unchanging 'essence'" (p. 121).
………Essentialism has been defined as the belief that "people and/or phenomenon have
an underlying and unchanging 'essence'" (Twine, 2001, p. 121).

When the quote is indirect, do not include the page number (Author, 2004).

Citing Indirect Sources

If you use a source that was cited in another source, name the original source in your signal
phrase (e.g., "Johnson argued" in the example below). List the secondary source (e.g., "Smith,
2003" in the example below) in your reference list and include the secondary source in the
parentheses:
Johnson argued that ABC is XYZ (as cited in Smith, 2003, p.102).

Note: When citing material in parentheses, set off the citation with a comma, as above.

MISCELLANEOUS

Use figures to express all numbers 10 and above (e.g., 12 cm wide) and to express numbers
above and below 10 for comparisons (e.g., 5 and 13 lines)

Use figures if the numbers represent time, dates, ages, population size, etc. (e.g., in about 3
years, 2 weeks ago, 9 rats, etc.)

Choose heading levels appropriately (check the APA manual if necessary)

Use a comma between elements in series of three or more items (e.g., the height, width, and
depth)

Place periods and commas within closing single or double quotation marks. Place other
punctuation marks inside quotation marks only when they are part of the quoted material.

Use standard Latin abbreviations only in parenthetical material (within brackets); in
non-parenthetical material, use the English translation of the Latin terms:

When parenthetical ( ), When in-text, use:

use:
(e.g., ) for example
( , etc.) , and so forth
(i.e.,) that is,

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