APA Citation Guide

APA In-Text the Basics

In APA Style, when including a source you must include the following elements in your research paper:

• Author's Last Name
• The source is written in quotes or the source is paraphrased
• The year the source was written

Please note that there are always exceptions to the rule, for example, if the source does not include an author, then cite the source by its title in the signal phrase or use the first word or two in the parentheses.

Examples of In-Text Citations

In-Text Citations have two formats: parenthetical and narrative. The following examples will represent the differences between the two formats. Please note that although the examples are different they are still correct because they include the author's last name, quotation or paraphrase, and year.

Parenthetical Citation:

Falsely balanced news coverage can distort the public's perception of expert consensus on an issue (Koehler, 2016).

Narrative Citation:

Koehler (2016) noted the dangers of falsely balanced news coverage.

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

Page Numbers

In APA, directly quoting a source will require a page number for the in-text citation in either parenthetical or narrative format. It is best to paraphrase but if you need to provide a direct quote, the guideline below will provide some examples of when to use direct quotes.

• To provide the exact definition.
• The author stated something memorable or succinctly.
• Responding to the exact wording (e.g., something someone said).

Example of Direct Quotation:

Effective teams can be difficult to describe because "high performance along one domain does not translate to high performance along another" (Ervin et al., 2018, p. 470).

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