APA Citation Guide

In-text citations are important for a few reasons.

• An in-text citation is used within your paper to demonstrate to the reader that you are using someone else's work whether that is an idea, an argument, a piece of data, etc.
• It allows the reader to make connections between the in-text citations within your paper and your references page at the end of your paper.
• In-text citations are used to give credit for any work that you write about or refer to within your paper. 

Use an in-text citation when you:

• directly quote a source
• paraphrase, putting a source into your own words
• use dates, statistics, or any other kind of factual information found in a source

IMPORTANT TO REMEMBER: you cannot borrow anyone's words, phrases, ideas, arguments, images, or any other kind of information without giving them credit.

What are Signal phrases? 

A signal phrase is a way of letting your reader know that you are going to write about ideas that are not your own. You are "signaling" the reader that what they are about to read or have just read were another person's ideas. 

For example:

Garcia argued that...

Nelson reasoned that...

According to the Brookings Institute...

Basic formatting

APA uses the format of author/date for in-text citations. Parenthetical citations are used to quickly give sources of information. Page numbers are only required for a direct quotation. Paraphrasing is preferred. Each item cited within your paper must have a corresponding entry on the reference page including the full publication information for the sources.

A parenthetical citation means that you are making connections for the reader at the end of the sentence by inserting the relevant information inside parentheses. In APA style, in-text citations must include the author's last name and year of publication. If no author, or date, is found on the source then use the title in your "signal phrase" or use the first word or two of the title in the parentheses and use the abbrevation "n.d." ("n.d." means "no date"). At the end of the sentence add your citation with a period outside of the parentheses. See below: 

A narrative citation means that you are making connections for your reader within a sentence. This is best done by using a signal phrase or a using a lead-in phrase to alert your reader. Signal phrases can be used at the beginning, middle, or end of a sentence. 

Here are some examples of signal phrases:

• according to
• argued
• explained
• claimed
• observed

See below:

The following should be included in a ALL In-Text citations:

• Author's name*
• Year
• Page number, if a direct quote

* If there is no author attcahed to the work use the title in place of the Author's name.

Author

List the author's last name.

Two Authors

List the last name of both authors. Separate them with "&".

Three or More Authors

• List only the first author's last name. This is the lead author.
• Insert a space followed by the phrase et al. Notice that al. is an abbreviation so it needs a period after it.

Note: The abbreviation et al. is short for the Latin phrase et alia, which means and others. When we use it, we are telling our reader this source was written by the lead author and others, or by the lead author et al.

No Listed Author

Replace the author's last name with the title of the work.

Page Numbers

If using a direct quote, include the specific page number. *** Paraphrasing is preferred when citing in APA style.***

• Include the page number following the year, separated with a comma
• Include p. before a single page number or pp. before a page range
• If 2 pages or more need to be cited in the essay, place a hyphen between them. There is no space on either side of the hyphen.