Author variations
- Order of authors within a reference: List authors in the order that they appear on the source.
- Surnames: Write the author鈥檚 surname exactly as it appears on the source. For example:
滨濒膷别惫
Velasco Caballero
Kabat-Zinn.- If uncertain about the proper format for a name, look at the source itself for any guidance or if that does not clarify the name, consult how the author is cited in other sources鈥 citations, bibliographic database records, the author鈥檚 website and so on. For example:
van der Schaft 鈥 catalogue indexes author as 鈥渧an der Schaft, Arjan鈥
Van der Westhuizen 鈥 catalogue indexes author as 鈥淰an der Westhuizen, Christi鈥
Horst, van der 鈥 author鈥檚 own website has citations as 鈥淗orst, van der H.鈥 This is usually the type of format for authors based in continental Europe, as this author is.
- If uncertain about the proper format for a name, look at the source itself for any guidance or if that does not clarify the name, consult how the author is cited in other sources鈥 citations, bibliographic database records, the author鈥檚 website and so on. For example:
- Format of names within a reference: Invert the names of personal authors to put the surname first. Use the initials for forenames. For example:
Veseth, M. 鈥 on the source as 鈥淢ichael Veseth鈥
Zirpoli, T. J. 鈥 on the source as 鈥淭homas J. Zirpoli鈥.- Forenames with hyphens or parentheses: Include these elements with a full stop after each initial. For example:
Tsui, L.-C. 鈥 on the source as 鈥淟ap-Chee Tsui鈥
Andrews, W. (J.) 鈥 on the source as 鈥淲aimirirangi (Jean) Andrews鈥.- When the second element of a hyphenated name is lowercase, treat it as a single name. For example:
Tsui, M. 鈥 on the source as 鈥淢ing-sum Tsui鈥.
- When the second element of a hyphenated name is lowercase, treat it as a single name. For example:
- Forenames with hyphens or parentheses: Include these elements with a full stop after each initial. For example:
Ministry of Health. (2008). Future directions for eating disorders services in New Zealand
Te T膩huhu o Te M膩tauranga鈥揗inistry of Education & New Zealand Teachers Council鈥揟e Pouherenga Kaiako o Aotearoa. (2011). T膩taiako: Cultural competencies for teachers of M膩ori learners. Ministry of Education. https://teachingcouncil.nz/required/Tataiako.pdf
听
- Parenthetical citations: (Ministry of Health, 2008; Te T膩huhu o Te M膩tauranga鈥揗inistry of Education & New Zealand Teachers Council鈥揟e Pouherenga Kaiako o Aotearoa, 2011)
- Narrative citations: Ministry of Health (2008) and Te T膩huhu o Te M膩tauranga鈥揗inistry of Education and New Zealand Teachers Council鈥揟e Pouherenga Kaiako o Aotearoa (2011)
- Group authors:
- Write the group author鈥檚 name exactly as it appears on the source. For example, World Health Organization (not World Health Organisation).
- List multiple group authors in the order that they appear on the source.
- See also (APA Style website). It explains how to identify the authors of a report and how to handle organisation names that have layers of hierarchy.
- Publisher: When the publisher and the author are identical, omit the publisher element in the reference.
- English and M膩ori: For organisation names that include both English and M膩ori names:
- Include both names separated by an en dash (鈥).
- The order of the names follows that appearing on the source document.
- This guidance is provided by the APA Style Experts (personal communication, February 25, 2020).
Abbreviation in text of group names
You are not required to abbreviate group author names. But you may choose to abbreviate a group author name to avoid cumbersome repetition, provided the abbreviation will appear at least three times in the paper.
- Group name first appears in a parenthetical citation: (Ministry of Health [MOH], 2006)
- Group name first appears in a narrative citation: Ministry of Health (MOH, 2006)
- Subsequent parenthetical citations: (MOH, 2006)
- Subsequent narrative citations: MOH (2006)
- Indicate the abbreviation in the first in-text citation.
- After you define an abbreviation, use only the abbreviation within your text narrative. Do not alternate between spelling out the term and abbreviating it. Use the abbreviation every time after that, including at the beginning of a sentence, at the beginning of a paragraph and within headings.
- The entry in the reference list remains unchanged, however. The group name is spelt out in full name as presented in the source document.
- See also (APA Style website).
Abbreviation in text of group names that include both English and M膩ori names
If you choose to abbreviate a group author names that include both English and M膩ori names, the way you defined the abbreviations depends on whether they appear later in your paper in partial form.
- The en dash (鈥) is changed to a hyphen (-) in the abbreviated form.
- Note: In the examples below, abbreviations are shown as first defined in in-text citations. It is also possible to define abbreviations first in running text and to use those abbreviations in later in-text citations.
- The guidance in this section is based on that provided by the APA Style Experts (personal communication, December 21, 2022, July 22, 2024).
- If the abbreviations will be used throughout your paper in the same combination, you can define the abbreviations together.
- Group name first appears in a parenthetical citation: (Ministry of Education鈥揟e T膩huhu o te M膩tauranga [MOE-TTOTM], 2021)
- Group name first appears in a narrative citation: Ministry of Education鈥揟e T膩huhu o te M膩tauranga (MOE-TTOTM, 2021)
- Note: If individual abbreviations have already been defined in the running text or in in-text citations, they can be used directly in in-text citations as in the citations below. They do not need to be redefined when used in combination as shown in the citations above.
- Subsequent parenthetical citations: (MOE-TTOTM, 2021)
- Subsequent narrative citations: MOE-TTOTM (2021)
- Subsequent parenthetical citations for a different source: (MOE-TTOTM, n.d.)
- Subsequent narrative citations for a different source:: MOE-TTOTM (n.d.)
- If the abbreviations will be used individually throughout your paper, define the abbreviations separately.
- Group name first appears in a parenthetical citation: (Ministry of Education [MOE]鈥揟e T膩huhu o te M膩tauranga [TTOTM], 2021)
- Group name first appears in a narrative citation: Ministry of Education (MOE)鈥揟e T膩huhu o te M膩tauranga (TTOTM, 2021)
- Note: If the abbreviations have already been defined in the running text or in other in-text citations, they can be used directly in in-text citations as in the citations below. They do not need to be redefined when used in combination as shown in the citations above.
- Subsequent parenthetical citations: (MOE-TTOTM, 2021)
- Subsequent narrative citations: MOE-TTOTM (2021)
- Parenthetical citations for other sources with the same group author but different naming: (MOE, 2002; TTOTM, 2009; TTOTM-MOE, n.d.)
- Narrative citations for other sources with the same group author but different naming: MOE (2002), TTOTM (2009), and TTOTM-MOE (n.d.)
- Two group authors: Abbreviations are only used for this specific source or any other sources with identical group authors in the same order.
- Group names first appear in a parenthetical citation: (Te T膩huhu o Te M膩tauranga鈥揗inistry of Education & New Zealand Teachers Council鈥揟e Pouherenga Kaiako o Aotearoa [TTOTM-MOE & NZTC-TPKOA], 2011)
- Group names first appear in a narrative citation: Te T膩huhu o Te M膩tauranga鈥揗inistry of Education & New Zealand Teachers Council鈥揟e Pouherenga Kaiako o Aotearoa (TTOTM-MOE & NZTC-TPKOA, 2011)
- Note: If individual abbreviations have already been defined in the running text or in in-text citations, they can be used directly in in-text citations as in the citations below. They do not need to be redefined when used in combination as shown in the citations above.
- Subsequent parenthetical citations: (TTOTM-MOE & NZTC-TPKOA, 2011)
- Subsequent narrative citations: TTOTM-MOE & NZTC-TPKOA (2011)
- Two group authors: One of the group authors is an author or co-author of another work, or one of the group authors is discussed separately in the text narrative.
- Group names first appear in a parenthetical citation: (Te T膩huhu o Te M膩tauranga鈥揗inistry of Education [TTOTM-MOE] & New Zealand Teachers Council鈥揟e Pouherenga Kaiako o Aotearoa [NZTC-TPKOA], 2011)
- Group names first appear in a narrative citation: Te T膩huhu o Te M膩tauranga鈥揗inistry of Education (TTOTM-MOE) and New Zealand Teachers Council鈥揟e Pouherenga Kaiako o Aotearoa (NZTC-TPKOA, 2011)
- Note: If individual abbreviations have already been defined in the running text or in in-text citations, they can be used directly in in-text citations as in the citations below. They do not need to be redefined when used in combination as shown in the citations above.
- Subsequent parenthetical citations: (TTOTM-MOE & NZTC-TPKOA, 2011)
- Subsequent narrative citations: TTOTM-MOE and NZTC-TPKOA (2011)
- Subsequent parenthetical citations for a different source: (NZTC-TPKOA, 2023)
- Subsequent narrative citations for a different source:: TTOTM-MOE (2022)
- Two group authors: One or more of the group authors is an author or co-author of another work, but with only the English or M膩ori name.
- Group names first appear in a parenthetical citation: (Te T膩huhu o Te M膩tauranga [TTOTM]鈥揗inistry of Education [MOE] & New Zealand Teachers Council [NZTC]鈥揟e Pouherenga Kaiako o Aotearoa [TPKOA], 2011)
- Group names first appear in a narrative citation: Te T膩huhu o Te M膩tauranga (TTOTM)鈥揗inistry of Education (MOE) and New Zealand Teachers Council (NZTC)鈥揟e Pouherenga Kaiako o Aotearoa (TPKOA, 2011)
- Note: If individual abbreviations have already been defined in the running text or in in-text citations, they can be used directly in in-text citations as in the citations below. They do not need to be redefined when used in combination as shown in the citations above.
- Subsequent parenthetical citations: (TTOTM-MOE & NZTC-TPKOA, 2011)
- Subsequent narrative citations: TTOTM-MOE and NZTC-TPKOA (2011)
Ainger, C., & Fenner, R. (2014). Sustainable infrastructure: Principles into practice. ICE Publishing.
Su, C. F., & Picker, M. (Directors). (2001). Mickey Mouse monopoly: Disney, childhood & corporate power [Film]. Media Education Foundation.
听
- Parenthetical citations: (Ainger & Fenner, 2014, p. 251; Su & Picker, 2001, 20:50)
- Narrative citations: Ainger and Fenner (2014, p. 251) and Su and Picker (2001, 20:50)
- In the reference list entry, give both author names in the order they appear in the source document.
- In parenthetical citations, separate the author surnames with an ampersand (&). In narrative citations, separate author surnames with the word 鈥渁nd鈥.
Huber, M., Knottnerus, J. A., Green, L., van der Horst, H., Jadad, A. R., Kromhout, D., Leonard, B., Lorig, K., Loureiro, M. I., van der Meer, J. W. M., Schnabel, P., Smith, R., van Weel, C., & Smid, H. (2011). How should we define health? BMJ, 343(7817), Article d4163. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.d4163
Witten, I. H., Frank, E., & Hall, M. A. (2011). Data mining: Practical machine learning tools and techniques (3rd ed.). Morgan Kaufmann.
听
- Parenthetical citations: (Huber et al., 2011; Witten et al., 2011, pp. 90鈥94)
- Narrative citations: Huber et al. (2011) and Witten et al. (2011, pp. 90鈥94)
- Include all author names in the reference list entry in the order they appear in the source document.
- Separate the last author name from the rest with a comma and an ampersand (&).
- In text, cite only the surname of the first author followed by 鈥渆t al.鈥
- Occasionally ambiguity arises if there are multiple works published in the same year. See (APA Style website) for how to avoid this ambiguity.
Session, A. M., Uno, Y., Kwon, T., Chapman, J. A., Toyoda, A., Takahashi, S., Fukui, A., Hikosaka, A., Suzuki, A., Kondo, M., Heeringen, S. J. van., Quigley, I., Heinz, S., Ogino, H., Ochi, H., Hellsten, U., Lyons, J. B., Simakov, O., Putnam, N., . . . Rokhsar, D. S. (2016). Genome evolution in the allotetraploid frog Xenopus laevis. Nature, 538(7625), 336鈥343. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature19840
听
- Parenthetical citation: (Session et al., 2016)
- Narrative citation: Session et al. (2016)
- In the reference list entry, include the first 19 authors鈥 names, insert an ellipsis (鈥) but no ampersand (&) and then last author鈥檚 name. List the author names in the order they appear in the source document.
- Occasionally ambiguity arises if there are multiple works published in the same year. See (APA Style website) for how to avoid this ambiguity.
Gardner, H. (1999). Intelligence reframed: Multiple intelligences for the 21st century. Basic Books.
Gardner, H. (2004). Changing minds: The art and science of changing our own and other people鈥檚 minds. Harvard Business School Press.
听
- Parenthetical citations: Gardner (1999, 2004)
- Narrative citations: Gardner (1999, 2004)
- Order chronologically in听the reference list.
Graham, S. (2006a). Strategy instruction and the teaching of writing: A meta-analysis. In C. A. MacArthur, S. Graham, & J. Fitzgerald (Eds.), Handbook of writing research (pp. 187鈥207). Guilford Press.
Graham, S. (2006b). Writing. In P. Alexander & P. Winne (Eds.), Handbook of educational psychology (2nd ed., pp. 457鈥478). Erlbaum.
听
- Parenthetical citations: (Graham, 2006a, 2006b)
- Narrative citations: Graham (2006a, 2006b)
- See also (APA Style website) for how to avoid this ambiguity.
Bolstad, R., & Gilbert, J. (with McDowall, S., Bull, A., Boyd, S., & Hipkins, R.). (2012). Supporting future-oriented learning and teaching: A New Zealand perspective: Report prepared for the Ministry of Education. Ministry of Education. https://www.educationcounts.govt.nz/publications/schooling/109306
Morgan, G. (with McCrystal, J.). (2009). After the panic: Surviving bad investments and bad advice. Random House New Zealand.
Plummeridge, C. (with Adams, P.). (2001). Beyond the classroom. In C. Philpott (Ed.), Learning to teach music in the secondary school: A companion to school experience (pp. 222鈥237). RoutledgeFalmer.
听
- Parenthetical citations: (Bolstad & Gilbert, 2012, Chapter 4; Morgan, 2009, pp. 213鈥219; Plummeridge, 2001)
- Narrative citations: Bolstad and Gilbert (2012, Chapter 4), Morgan (2009, pp. 213鈥219), and Plummeridge (2001)
- This format is also used when a person other than the original author has added a new part to the work, such as a foreword or introduction. See (APA Style website).
听
Reference list
Anonymous. (2017).听Stories from my time as a spy. Bond Publishers.
The epic of Gilgamesh听(M. G. Kovaks, Trans.). (1998). Academy of Ancient Texts. http://www.ancienttexts.org/library/mesopotamian/gilgamesh/ (Original work published ca. 2500鈥2750 B.C.E.)
Overuse of benzodiazepines: Still an issue? (2015, February).听Best Practice Journal, (66), 30鈥35. https://bpac.org.nz/BPJ/2015/February/docs/BPJ66.pdf
听
- Use sentence case capitalisation for most titles (e.g., the titles of articles and books). Use title case capitalisation for the titles of journals.
- For a missing author, do not use 鈥淎nonymous鈥 as the author unless the work is actually signed 鈥淎nonymous鈥. If the work is signed 鈥淎nonymous鈥, use 鈥淎nonymous鈥 in the reference and in-text citation.
- When there is no author nor an 鈥淎nonymous鈥 author, place the title in the author position.
In-text citations
Anonymous (2017) ...听OR听... (Anonymous, 2017)
The Epic of Gilgamesh听(ca. 2750鈥2500 B.C.E./1998) ...听OR听... (The Epic of Gilgamesh, ca. 2750鈥2500 B.C.E./1998).
(鈥淥veruse of Benzodiazepines,鈥 2015)
听
- For a missing author, do not use 鈥淎nonymous鈥 as the author unless the work is actually signed 鈥淎nonymous鈥. If the work is signed 鈥淎nonymous鈥, use 鈥淎nonymous鈥 in the reference and in-text citation.
- When there is no author nor an 鈥淎nonymous鈥 author:
- Use a few words of the title (or the whole title if it is short).
- If the title is in italics in the reference (e.g., a book title), write the title in italics. If the title is not in italics in the reference (e.g., an article title), enclose the title in quotation marks.
- Use title case capitalisation (capitals for every major word) in the body of the paper, including in all in-text citations.
For more information on title case and sentence case capitalisation see the听.
Scott, C. R., & Lewis, L. (Eds.). (2017). The international encyclopedia of organizational communication. John Wiley & Sons. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118955567
听
- Parenthetical citation in narrative text: Research indicates 鈥 (Scott & Lewis, 2017)
- Narrative citation in narrative text: Many articles in Scott and Lewis (2017) 鈥
- Reference and cite a whole edited book in this way to direct readers to a relevant reference work.
- The more common situation, however, is to cite encyclopedia and dictionary entries and edited book chapters individually.
