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Referencing (TAFE)

American Psychological Association (APA) - Basic Information

Using the APA referencing style

APA is an "author-date" style. All information used in your work either as a direct quote, paraphrase or summary, obtained from another author or source needs to be correctly referenced in APA style.

There are two parts to referencing: the citations within the text of your paper (in-text citation) and the reference list at the end of your paper.

The in-text citation briefly tells the reader where the reference comes from using the author and date within the text of the document.

The reference list placed alphabetically at the end of the essay, provides the reader with the full details of all sources cited in-text.

 

This guide is based on more detailed information in:

 

In general, a reference should contain four elements, which you can remember as the four W's:

Who - author (who is responsible for the work?)

When - date the work was published

What - title of the work

Where - source (where can I retrieve this work?)

Example of Where to Find Reference Information  

Where to find reference information

Figure 1. Example of where to find reference information for a journal article [Image], From Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (p. 283), by American Psychological Association, 2020, American Psychological Association, Copyright 2020 American Psychological Association.

 

 

 

 

Description                           Abbreviation

Edition                                           ed.

Revised edition                             Rev. ed.

Second edition                              2nd ed.

Editors(s)                                      Ed. or Eds.

'and others' (Latin)                        et al.

Translator(s)                                 Trans. 

Narrator(s)                                    Narr. or Narrs.

No date                                         n.d.

Page(s)                                         p. or pp.

Paragraph(s)                                para. or paras.

Volume(s)                                     Vol. or Vols.

Number                                         No.

Part                                               Pt.

Technical Report                          Tech. Rep.

Supplement                                  Suppl.

 

Reference:

American Psychological Association. (2020). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (7th ed.).

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