APA In-Text Citations

Parenthetical in-text citations should not distract the reader, but they must be complete enough to allow the reader to easily locate the corresponding entry in the reference list. If a specific passage is being quoted or referred to, include the page number (or numbers) in the citation; if the whole work is being referred to, page numbers are not necessary. The following examples illustrate the APA style of in-text citation.

Author named in text

Include the year and the page number (or numbers) of the citation (preceded by “p.” or “pp.”). Separate the elements with a comma. If a work is cited more than once in a paragraph, only the first mention needs to include the year.

According to Inose and Pierce (1984, p. 157), the term artificial intelligence may be a misnomer.

If the reference list contains two authors with the same last name, include the first initials of each one in the in-text citations.

Author not named in text

Separate the author’s name, date of publication, and page numbers with commas.

The scarcity of day care is an obstacle to employment for many women with young children (Sidel, 1986, p. 344).

More than one author

For a work with two authors, cite both names every time. When the names are in parentheses, use an ampersand (&) instead of writing out and.

Edward A. Feigenbaum, an artificial intelligence researcher, has produced a program that "analyzes mass spectra and produces highly probable molecular structures" (Inose & Pierce, 1984, p. 142).

For a work with three to five authors, cite all the names the first time a reference to the work appears; in subsequent references, give only the first author’s name followed by “et al.” (Latin abbreviation for “and others”).

The inherited aspects of intelligence cannot be considered separately from environmental influences (Conley, Bennett, Ailing, Sherwin, & Reid, 1992).

For a work with six or more authors, give only the first author’s name followed by “et al.” in the first as well as all subsequent citations.

E. Jones et al. (1985) summarize a 37-nation study of adolescent pregnancy.

Author of two or more works in one year

If an author has two books or articles published in the same year, the reference list should show the date of the first followed by an “a” and the date of the second followed by a “b.” The order is determined by the alphabetical order of the titles. The in-text citations should also show “a” and “b.”

More women--224,000 of them--serve in the United States armed forces than in any other military forces in the world ( Moore , 1989a).

Group author or government agency

If the name of the agency or institution is long, write it out in full for the first reference and abbreviate it (if the abbreviation is familiar) in second and subsequent citations.

Over ten thousand respondents to a survey of Pacific Telephone customers (Field Research Corporation, 1985, p. 42) estimated that 74 percent of their calls were "personal or social."

Unknown author

If the source is not signed (a brief article in a newspaper or magazine, for example), use the first few words of the title in the citation. Enclose the title of an article or chapter in quotation marks; underline the title of a periodical, book, brochure, or report. (The full title for the article cited in the example is “Can Your Mind Heal Your Body?”)

Both physicians and entrepreneurs have recently become interested in how the mind can affect physical health ("Can Your Mind Heal?" 1993, p. 107).

Indirect source

To cite material that appears as a quotation in your source, identify the original source and then precede the name ol your source with the phrase “as cited in.” The reference list should include only your source.

Kenneth Bruffee observed, "While students often forget much of the subject matter shortly after class is over, they do not easily forget the values implicit in the conventions by which it was taught" (as cited in Trimbur, 1992, p. 95).

More than one source

If a statement has more than one source by the same author (or authors), list the years of publication after the author’s name.

This conclusion is repeated in the more recent issues of her work (Vanderbilt, 1967, 1972).

If a statement has more than one source by different authors, list the sources in alphabetical order and separate them with a semicolon.

Most advanced industrial countries in the West--except the United States --have a universal program of national health insurance or a national health service (Leichter, 1979; Roemer, 1977; Simanis & Coleman, 1980).

Personal communications

Letters, e-mail, telephone conversations, and other personal communications that are not publicly available are cited in the text but not included in the reference list. Give the initials and the last name of the person who made the communication, and follow it with the phrase “personal communication” and the date.

The study was originally commissioned by the State of North Carolina (T. R. Purefoy, personal communication, November 11, 1991).