How to: APA Citations in Outlines

Perfecting APA citations helps your outline achieve publication-readiness.

The American Psychological Association's APA's) style guideline sets forth standards for writing and formatting content, organizing text and -- possibly most difficult to conquer -- citing a document's references. Just like a research paper or essay in the same format, an outline that adheres to the structure of APA guidelines allows readers to follow ideas with greater ease as opposed to cluttering the reading experience with foreign writing and formatting styles. Earn integrity in your field by proving your mastery with APA citations, particularly within the social science fields in which APA formatting is most common.

Things You'll Need

• APA style guide

Instructions

1. Identify which of your pieces of information are necessary to cite. Cite references when you use direct quotations, paraphrased or summarized information, statistics or supplementary details. Cite the necessary pieces of information both within the text of the outline, in parentheses, and after the conclusion of your outline in a reference list format.

2. Format in-text citations for an outline according to APA guidelines. List the author's last name first followed by the year of publication; separate the two with a comma and a space. Add the page number at the end of the citation after an additional comma and space ("Lewis, 1999, p. 39"), if using a direct quote from a source.

3. Make alterations to these rules as APA guidelines allow. Omit the author's last name if previously mentioned in the sentence that the citation follows: "Johnson has found little data to support this claim (2007)." Include multiple last names if necessary. Use an ampersand to separate two authors' names. Separate three to five authors with commas and a final ampersand in the first citation ("Douglas, Andrews, Nelson & Jones") and use "et al." in subsequent ones ("Douglas et al."). Use "et al." for all citations using six or more authors.

4. Consult an APA style guide to format each of your outline's reference list citations, as one-of-a-kind formatting is required depending on the type of source and number of authors. Include every source that is referenced in your in-text citations. Center the word "References" at the top of the list. Double-space your reference list and use a hanging indent for each entry. Invert author names and alphabetize the list by author's last name; use the first author in a multiauthor work for alphabetizing.

Tips & Warnings

• Always place direct quotes, no matter how short, in quotation marks. Use past or present perfect tense when referring to authors via signal phrases in outline text, such as "Peters believed" or "Austen has found." Consult an APA style guide regarding formatting of names, book and article titles and other such items within the body of your outline as the rules for such occasionally differ from those for citations.

References

• Princeton University: When to Cite Sources
• Purdue Online Writing Lab; In-Text Citations: The Basics; Elizabeth Angeli, et al.; December 2010
• Purdue Online Writing Lab; In-Text Citations: Author/Authors; Elizabeth Angeli, et al.; May 2011
• Purdue Online Writing Lab; Reference List: Basic Rules; Elizabeth Angeli, et al; February 2011
• Purdue Online Writing Lab; APA Style Workshop; Kristen Seas, et al.; April 2010
• Purdue Online Writing Lab: APA Style