Subject Guides: CRJ 324: Serial & Mass Homicide: Cite Your Sources

Citation Styles

Citations provide the information necessary for readers to identify and retrieve each source you use. When you use someone else's words or ideas in your papers, you should create In-text citations within your paper and References Page (ASA) or References List (APA) citations at the end of the paper. Each In-text citation should lead to a References Page/List citation, and each References Page/List citation should come from an In-text citation.

Help for Writing and Citing in American Psychological Association (APA) Style (7th ed.)

Citations provide the information necessary for readers to identify and retrieve each source you use. When you use someone else's words or ideas in your papers, you should create an In-text citation within your paper and a References List citation at the end of the paper. Each In-text citation should lead to a References List citation, and each References List citation should come from an In-text citation.

Use the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (7th ed.) (print format) and/or the Concise APA Handbook: 7th Edition (ebook format) to correctly cite your sources and format your research papers.

Help from the American Psychological Association

Use the American Psychological Association's APA Style website for help with formatting your citations and your paper:

Quick Reference Guide (for journal articles, books, and book chapters)
Basic Principles of Citation
In-Text Citations: explanations and examples of in-text citations and how to handle in-text citations for various numbers of authors

Student Papers

Student Paper Setup Guide (pdf)
Sample Student Paper (includes example References list)
Guide to Putting Together Title Pages
Guide to Different Levels of Headings

References List

Create an APA Style References List: pdf handout with the basics of putting together your References list
Basic Principles of Reference List Entries
Elements of References List Entries describes the four elements of citations in detail:
- Author: how to format individual/group author names and handle various numbers of authors
- Date: how to format the date and include retrieval dates
- Title: how to format the title and include bracketed descriptions
- Source: how to format the source and include database/DOI information
DOIs (Digital Object Identifiers) and URLs - what they are and how to find and cite them
- Use the Free DOI Lookup tool to find the DOIs of journal articles
How to deal with missing information

References List - Examples:

Textual Works: periodicals, books and reference works, reports, dissertations and theses, conference presentations, etc.
Online Media: websites and webpages, social media, etc.
- Webpage on a website
- Whole website
Audiovisual Media: films, TV, podcasts, course lectures or slides, etc.
Datasets
Assessments, tests, and measures (refers to APA 6th ed., but the rules are the same as for 7th ed.)

MLA Style Citation

Use Purdue OWL's Modern Language Association (MLA) Style (9th edition) guidelines and templates to help you format you papers and bibliographies:

Here is a quick reference guide, an MLA Handout, with citation examples for the works cited page and in-text citations. For additional information on MLA Citations, consult the 2021 9th edition of the MLA Handbook.