OWLPurdue YouTube Channel - Writing Lab
Close-up of a reference:
Here is a typical reference for a book:
Zacharakis, A. (2011). Business plans that work: A guide for small business. McGraw-Hill.
Author
LastName, A.A. Folsom, R.H.
Multiple authors Hwang, J., Manganini, S., & Eglinton, T.
Group/corporate author National Institute on White Collar Crime
Authors' names are written last name - COMMA - first name initials (and middle name initial, if known).
More than one author. List the names in the order that they are listed on the publication, separated by COMMAS, with "&" before the last author's name.
An author can be a company, organization, and government agency. Use the name of the group as the author.
If there is no author and no group/corporate author, begin the reference with the title in the author-place. Use a shortened version of the title in when using in-text citations.
Date
(Publication year) (2016).
(Publication year) (2010, January 12).
no date (n.d.).
Publication year in parentheses, followed by a period.
If there is no publication date (look carefully to determine this!), use (n.d.). That stands for "no date."
Title
Book title Marketing 4.0: Moving from traditional to digital.
Report title 2012 annual report of the American Psychological Association.
Article title Managing our hub economy: Interaction.
Periodical title Harvard Business Review, 96 (1), 17.
Include the full title and subtitle.
Capitalization: Books, ebooks, reports, webpages. Capitalize the first letter of the title and the subtitle.
Capitalization: Article titles: Capitalize the first letter of the title and the subtitle. Article titles are not in italics.
Capitalization: For periodical titles (journals, magazines, newspapers). Capitalize ALL major words, and put the periodical title in italics. After the title, add a comma and the volume number in italics.
Book, ebook, report, and web page titles have only the first word of the title and subtitle capitalized and are written in italics.
Publication information
The rest of the reference provides the information needed to find the source you used. These details may include: the editor, edition number, publisher's name, volume number, issue number, page numbers, digital object identifier (https://doi.org/), or URL.
Books
Author. (Publication Date). Title of book. Publisher.
Other book examples:
Edition other than the first
Atkinson, A. A. (2001). Management accounting (3rd ed.). Prentice Hall.
Chapter from a book
Eisenstein, E.M., & Lodish, L.M. (2002). Marketing decision support and
intelligent systems: Precisely worthwhile or vaguely worthless? In B.A.
Weitz & R. Wensley (Eds.), Handbook of marketing (pp.436-456).
SAGE.
Ebooks
Author. (Publication Date). Title of Book. Publisher. URL
Ebook from Ebook Central (via Proquest) (include the URL leading to information on how to obtain the material for ebooks accessed through subscription database)
Other ebook examples:
Ebook available via direct link
Martin, B. (1998). Information liberation. Freedom Press. http://www.uow.edu.au/arts/sts/bmartin/pubs/98il/ilall.html
Ebook from Ebook readers
Gladwell, M. (2008). Outliers: The story of success. Little, Brown and Company. https://www.amazon.com/
- For in-text citation, when page number is not available, use chapter/section/paragraph number instead. For example:
One of the author’s main points is that “people don’t rise from nothing” (Gladwell, 2008, Chapter 1, Section 2, para. 5).
Articles from Print Journals
Journal Paginated by Issue:
Author. (Publication Date). Title of article. Journal title, Volume(issue), page range.
Journal Paginated by Volume:
Author. (Publication Date). Title of article. Journal title, Volume, page range.
Articles with DOI (Digital Object Identifier)
Author. (Publication Date). Title of article. Journal title, Volume(issue), page numbers.
https://doi.org/########
Note: A DOI may be found on the document itself, in a database record, or in a database-generated citation.
Articles with no DOI
Author. (Publication Date). Title of article. Journal title, Volume(issue), page numbers.
URL/Document URL
Examples:
Portions adapted from APA 7 Citation on Purdue OWL's website.
Purdue Online Writing Lab (2020). APA Style (7th Edition). The OWL at Purdue. Retrieved April 24, 2020 from https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_style_introduction.html
Report or Profile
Author. (Publication Date). Title of report. Name of source.
URL
Examples:
Annual Report or SEC Filing
Name of company. (Publication Date). Form or filing title.
URL
Examples:
Film, Video, or DVD
Director's last name, first initial (Director), & director's last name, first initial
(Director). (Year of the film's release). Film Title. [Film]. Name of the movie studio.
Examples:
1. Hitchcock, A. (Director). (1941). Suspicion. [Film]. Turner.
2. Coppola, F (Director). (1972). The Godfather. [Motion picture].
Television Series
Executive Producer’s last name, first initial (Executive Producer). (Date rate of release). Title of
broadcast. [TV series]. Production Company(s).
Example:
Crane, D & Kauffman, M (Executive Producers). (1994). Friends [TV series].
Single Episode of a Television Series
Writer’s last name, first initial (Writer), & Director’s last name, first initial (Director).
(Original air date). Title of episode (Season number, Episode number) [TV series episode]. In
Producer(s) first initial, last name (Executive Producer), Series title. Production Company(s).
Example:
Carlock, R. (Writer), & Halvorson, G (Director). (2003). The one with the cake
(Season 10, Episode 4) [TV series episode]. In D. Crane & M. Kauffman (Executive Producers), Friends. National Broadcasting Company.
Music Recording
Recording artists's last name, first initial. (Year of release). Title of song [Album]. Title of album [Album]. Label.
Example:
John, Elton (1975). Someone saved my life tonight. Captain fantastic and the brown dirt cowboy [Album]. MCA.
Image
Photographer's last name, first initial. (Year of Publication). Title of photograph [Photograph]. Source. URL (if retrieved electronically)
Example:
Kulbis, M. (2006). Men pray [Photograph], Retrieved April 12, 2006. Source. http://accuweather.ap.org/cgi-bin/aplaunch.pl
Presentation slides
Author. (Publication date). Title of presentation [Type of material]. URL
Example:
Kapterev, Alexei. (2007). Death by PowerPoint [PowerPoint slides]. http://www.slideshare.net/thecroaker/death-by-powerpoint