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How to cite and reference your sources (Monash University) : APA

Thank you to Monash University for generously allowing us to copy their resources

Author layout guidance

Where a publication has: List authors in the reference list as:
one author Author, A. A.
two authors Author, A. A., & Author B. B.
three to seven authors

Author, A. A., Author, B. B., Author, C. C., Author, D. D., Author, E. E., Author, F. F., & Author, G. G.
eight or more authors - list first six authors, add three elipses and the last author Author, A. A., Author, B. B., Author, C. C., Author, D. D., Author, E. E., Author, F. F.,...Author, Z. Z.
no author Transfer the title to the author space
a group author Spell the name out

Reference list: General notes

  • Begin your reference list on a new page and title it 'References.' Centre the title on the page.
  • Double-space your reference list and have a hanging indent
    • > a hanging indent is where the first line of each reference is fully left justified while subsequent lines are indented to the right. The width of the hanging indent should be 5-7 spaces or 1.25 cm. Hanging indents and double spacing are set by the word processors
  • All of the references in the reference list must also be cited in the text.
  • All references cited in text must also be included in the reference list (exceptions are unpublished items such as correspondence).
  • List the references in alphabetical order by author surname/family name.
  • Where there are two articles with the same authors and date, order the references alphabetically by article title and add a letter suffix to the year of publication (e.g. 2003a, 2003b...).
  • Provide organisation names in full, unless they are obviously recognisable as abbreviations (e.g. APA for American Psychological Association).
  • Do not add full stops to URLs (e.g. http://www.lib.monash.edu.au/)
  • Capitalize only the first word of the title and of the subtitle, if any, and any proper nouns.
  • APA requires use of an en dash between pagination numbers. An en dash is longer and thinner than a hyphen. Type in an en dash, or if an en dash is unavailable on the keyboard, use a single hyphen. In either case there is no space before or after. We recommend consulting your faculty staff to determine their requirements.
  • Check the reference details against the actual source - you are indicating that you have read a source when you cite it.
  • Be consistent with your referencing style across the document.

Other relevant documents

Business and Economics Students should also consult Chapter 10 of the Q Manual

American Psychological Association (APA) style examples

APA style is an author-date citation style. It was developed mainly for use in psychology, but has also been adopted by other disciplines.

There are two major components to the APA author-date style - the in-text author-date citation at the appropriate place within the text of the document, e.g. (Smith, 2010), and the detailed reference list at the end of the document. All in-text citations must have a corresponding reference list entry, and the converse applies for reference list entries.

Use the following instructions and examples as guide for your own referencing using the APA style. This guide is based on more detailed information in:

Printing this guide: Please note printing directly from pages in this guide may alter the citation formatting display. To preserve the formatting of citations use the print friendly version:

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