EDF 362: Foundations of Education I

This UAB Libraries research guide provides basic information about formatting student papers, in-text citations, and citing common source types.

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The APA Style website provides guidance on style and grammar. Join their free monthly newsletter to receive tips, resources, and updates in your inbox. The APA Style Blog routinely answers questions common questions or addresses pertinent issues regarding their publication manual. See sample student and professional papers the APA Style website. The sample papers come in both PDF and DOCX versions with as well as without annotations.

If your APA Style questions are still unanswered after consulting the sources above, email StyleExpert@apa.org.

Finding a balance between undercitation and overcitation is imperative for publishing an article that is useful and accessible to your readers yet pays credit where due to others' ideas and research. Not providing a citation can lead to plagiarism, even self-plagiarism. Providing too many citations can disrupt the flow of your prose and cause challenges for readers using accessibility tools.

Below are some general guidelines when using sources in your paper:

• As a general rule, you should cite more primary than secondary sources. Acknowledge secondary sources when used in the text and/or citation ("as cited in").
• Be careful when reprinting or adapting tables, figures, or images; reprinting long quotations; or including copyrighted test items. You do not want to use tools out of their proper context or run into copyright issues.
• Double check that your in-text citations match your reference list exactly. However, there are some exceptions:
  • Personal communications do not need reference list entries, only in-text citations.
  • General mentions of whole websites or periodicals, common software, or apps need no in-text citation or reference list entry.
• Follow special guidelines for citing the following special sources:
  • interviews
  • personal communication
  • classroom or Canvas resources
  • traditional knowledge/oral traditions of Indigenous Peoples

APA in-text citations follow the author-date system. Be sure to include a mix of parenthetical and narrative citations.

See the APA guide for examples and special cases when dealing with in-text citations. Use the In-Text Citation Checklist before submitting your paper to ensure you've followed all APA guidelines.

Below are general guidelines for in-text citations:

• Include the author's surname but not suffixes, such as Jr.
• Use only the year for the date, even if you know the month and day of publication.
• If the source does not have a date, use n.d.
• If the source is not yet published, use in press.
• If your source is a draft of a manuscript, use the date for when the draft was written, not the date it was or will be published.
• When citing multiple works in a parenthetical citation, put them in alphabetical order and separate them with a semicolon.
• When citing multiple works in a narrative citation, they can come in any order.
• If you are citing specific parts of a source, add information about that specific part after the date.
• If your source has been translated, reprinted, republished, or reissued, it may have more than one date. In that case, separate the years with a slash (/) and include the earlier one first.
• Follow APA's guidelines for paraphrasing and direct quotations.

When compiling your list of references, be accurate and consistent, following guidelines on the APA guide and below:

• Alphabetize your list by first author's last name. There should be a direct link between your in-text citation and its reference list entry.
• Double space your list, using no extra spaces between entries.
• Use a 0.5" hanging indentation. Your word processor's settings can be set up to do this for you automatically.
• Be precise when using punctuation within the entries. Punctuation groups information together.
  • Separate the 4 elements of a reference entry (author, date, title, and source) by including a period after each element.
  • Do NOT include a period after DOI or URL, as it could prevent access of the source.
  • Within elements of the reference, use commas or parentheses to separate items.
  • Include parentheses around dates.
• See information on the use of italics and quotation marks on the APA Style website.

APA Style tailors entries based on the type of source you are citing.

• See the APA Guide for examples of citations for books, book chapters, ebooks, the DSM manual, articles, web content, test instruments, data, guidelines, reports, and gray literature.
• See the APA Style website for guidance on missing reference information, database information in references, DOIs/URLs, archival sources, meta-analysis references, and other types of sources.
• See Ch. 11 of the APA manual  or The Bluebook for guidance on citing legal references.  

Chapter 4: Writing Style & Grammar

This chapter provides reminders and guidelines of good writing, including continuity & flow, conciseness & clarity, verbs, pronouns, sentence construction, and improvement strategies.

Chapter 5: Bias-Free Language Guidelines

Use this chapter if you have questions on any of the following topics, as they pertain to writing your article: age, disability, gender, participation in research, racial and ethnic identity, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, and intersectionality.

Chapter 6: Mechanics of Style

Need a refresher from 7th grade English class? Don't know how to present statistics or equations or format a list in your manuscript? Should you spell out a number or use the numeral? This chapter has guidance on punctuation, spelling & hyphenation, capitalization, italics & quotation marks, abbreviations, numbers, statistical and mathematical copy, presentation of equations, and lists.

Chapter 7: Tables and Figures

If you are using any tables or figures in your article, use these chapters as guidelines for formatting.