Reference Entries/ List

This guide summarizes the APA 7th edition guidelines of the APA Publication Manual.

APA reference entry/ list can be auto generated by referencing tool (e.g., Mendeley Zotero, endnote, etc) as from the in-text citations from the document.

Even though the reference structure varies depending on the source (e.g., a book, a website, or a video), they all share the same four components as outlined below:

1. Author: who is responsible for creating the work?
2. Date: when was the work published?
3. Title: what is the work called?
4. Source: where can the work be retrieved?

 

Author Entry

The author is in charge of creating the work. This can be an individual, a set of people, a corporation, a government entity, or a professional group. The author can be the author of a writing, the host of a conversation, or the director of a motion picture.

Begin with the last/sur-name, followed by a comma (,) and the initials, separated by a period (.) and space ( ).

N/B     Infixes like “Van” as well as “De” are treated as part of the surname. Individual titles, like Ph.D. or Dr., should be avoided, but suffixes should be included.

Where there are several authors:

• Use commas to separate the names of multiple authors. I nclude an ampersand (&) preceding the final author’s name.
• Up to 20 authors can be listed in a reference entry. If there are over 20, list the first 19 authors, followed by an ellipsis (…) and the name of the last author.

 

 

Author	Basic format
One author	Juma, P. W. (2020) Van der Edwin, R. (2022)
Two authors	Juma, P. W., & Nkirote, S. (2020)
Three or more authors	Juma, P. W., Wekesa, J., & Maina, J. (2020)
Twenty (20) authors	Juma, P. W., Wekesa, J., Maina, J., Gibendi, R., Diki, M. P., Mutuma, M., Kinoti, S., Ntuchiu, L., Barasa, J., Muthamia, J., Musungu, M., Ngiga, E., Muriithi, F., Mutua, F., Kibos, J., Moraa, D., Kiogora, A., Makena, S., Nkirote, J., & Otieno, L. (2022)
More than Twenty (20+) authors	Njorege, G., Odunga, M., Juma, P. W., Wekesa, J., Maina, J., Gibendi, R., Diki, M. P., Mutuma, M., Kinoti, S., Ntuchiu, L., Barasa, J., Muthamia, J., Musungu, M., Ngiga, E., Muriithi, F., Mutua, F., Kibos, J., Moraa, D., Kiogora, A., Makena, S., Nkirote, J., … Otieno, L. (2022)
Organization	Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2020) Safaricom (2020) Microsoft & Apple (2022)
Unknown Author	King James Bible. (2017)

N/B: legal citations (e.g., court cases, laws) generally don’t have an author element.

 

Role recognition

If a contributor has a role apart from “author,” a description of that role is sometimes (sometimes not) included within parentheses. See the table below.

Source	Role	Reference entry
Book	Author Editor*	Ngiga, E. Gibendi, R. N. (Ed.)
Film	Director	Ngina, W. M. (Director)
TV Series	Executive producer	Hassan, S. (Executive producer)
Podcast	Host	Ngugi, L. (Host)
Webinar	Instructor	Too, S.
Artwork	Artist	Hassan, S.
Photograph	Photographer	Barasa, E.

 

Date

The “author” is followed by the “date.”

To determine the date of publication, use the guidelines below:

·         Books – use the copyright date.

·         Journal articles – use the year in which the volume was published.

·         Web pages – use the “Last updated” date if it applies to the content you’re citing. Don’t take the copyright date from the footer of a website.

 

 

Example

 

 N/B

Only provide the retrieval date (i.e., the date you consulted the information) if a work is designed to change over time. Examples include:

·         Online dictionary entries

·         Social media profiles (not posts)

·         Dashboards with statistics (like this world population counter)

The retrieval date appears after the source title and before the URL. Write the word “Retrieved” followed by the month, day, and year.

Example:         Worldometer. (n.d.). World population clock. Retrieved October 20, 2020, from https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/

 

Title

Book

Book (stand-alone work)

Voss, C., & Raz, T. (2017). Never split the difference: Negotiating as if your life depended on it. Harper Business.

 

Journal

Journal article (part of a larger whole)

Lou, C., & Yuan, S. (2019). Influencer marketing: How message value and credibility affect consumer trust of branded content on social media. Journal of Interactive Advertising, 

19(1), 58–73. https://doi.org/10.1080/15252019.2018.1533501

 

Website

Webpage (changing over time)

Worldometer. (n.d.). World population clock. 

Retrieved October 20, 2020, from https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/

 

Video

YouTube videoBloomberg QuickTake. (2020, July 1). How to build a city around bikes, fast [Video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/h-I6HFQXquU

 

Unknown title

PaintingVan Gogh, V. (1878–1882). [Portrait of a woman] [Painting]. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

 

Source

Book

Books can have different editions, while periodicals (such as journals and magazines) usually have volume and issue numbers. This information appears after the title.

Put edition information in parentheses, but unlike the title, don’t italicize it.

Example:

Coghlan, D. (2019). Doing action research in your own organization (5th ed.). SAGE Publications.

 

Chapter in an edited book

Belsey, C. (2006). Poststructuralism. In S. Malpas & P. Wake (Reds.), The Routledge companion to critical theory (3rd ed., pp. 51–61). Routledge.

Gaffney, D., & Puschmann, C. (2014). Data collection on Twitter. In K. Weller, A. Bruns, J. Burgess, M. Mahrt, & C. Puschmann (Eds.), Twitter and society (pp. 55–67). Peter Lang Publishing.

 

Journal article

Italicize the volume number and place it after the periodical title. The issue number appears after the volume number in parentheses (not italicized). Do not add a space between the volume and issue number.

Example

Evans, N. J., Phua, J., Lim, J., & Jun, H. (2017). Disclosing Instagram influencer advertising: The effects of disclosure language on advertising recognition, attitudes, and behavioral intent. Journal of Interactive Advertising, 17(2), 138–149. https://doi.org/10.1080/15252019.2017.1366885

Blog post (website)

McCombes, S. (2020, June 19). How to write a problem statement. Scribbr. https://www.scribbr.com/research-process/problem-statement/

 

YouTube video (platform)

Vox. (2018, October 17). How IKEA gets you to impulsively buy more [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYKUJgMRQ7A

 

DOI or URL

Works that can be accessed online usually have a URL or DOI (digital object identifier). A DOI is often used for scientific publications and books, while a URL is more common for other online publications.

Online newspaper article

Wakabayashi, D. (2020, October 21). Google antitrust fight thrusts low-key C.E.O. into the line of fire. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/21/technology/google-antitrust-sundar-pichai.html.

 

Journal article

Cheung, C. M. K., & Thadani, D. R. (2012). The impact of electronic word-of-mouth communication: A literature analysis and integrative model. Decision Support Systems, 54(1), 461–470. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dss.2012.06.008

Streefkerk, R. (2022, December 5). Creating APA reference entries. Scribbr. https://www.scribbr.com/apa-style/reference-entry/