How to Document Electronic References in APA Format

The American Psychological Association (APA) format is used to cite sources in the social sciences. With the various types of electronic source material available, several formatting models have been developed for citing sources in APA style. One common source is the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, with the sixth edition's second printing being current as of October 2010. Make sure to refer to the most current edition of this book for accurate citation format.

• 1

  Find the Digital Object Identifier (DOI) for an online scholarly journal article. This is to be used in place of citing the URL. DOIs give longer-lasting links for online articles. Some publishers provide the DOI of an article on the first page. According to the Purdue Online Writing Lab, "[S]ome online bibliographies provide an article's DOI but may "hide" the code under a button which may read "Article" or may be an abbreviation of a vendors name like 'CrossRef' or 'PubMed'. . ." Find DOI's from print publications or ones that go to dead links with CrossRef.org's "DOI Resolver," which is displayed in a central location on the home page." (See Resources.)

  If the DOI is assigned to an online periodical article you are citing, the following format should be used, according to the Purdue Online Writing Lab:

  Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Date of publication). Title of article. Title of Journal, volume number. doi:0000000/000000000000

  If the DOI is not assigned for an online periodical article, include the URL of the journal's homepage:

  Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Date of publication). Title of article. Title of Journal, volume number. Retrieved from http://www.journalhomepage.com/full/url/

• 2

  Follow the same citation guidelines for online periodical articles as you would for printed articles. The following format should be used, according to the Purdue Online Writing Lab:

  Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Date of publication). Title of article. Title of Online Periodical, volume number (issue number if available). Retrieved from http://www.someaddress.com/full/url/

  Note that if a printed version of the article exists, write "Electronic version" after the article's title in brackets. For example,

  Jefferson, S.P. (1998). History of Spanish Galleons [Electronic version]. Ship Periodical, 42, 334-337.

• 3

  Cite an article in print you retrieve from an electronic database just as you would a print article. You may add the accession or item number in parentheses at the end of the citation, but it is not necessary. Include database information only if the article is hard to find. If the source location or information could change, include the retrieval date. For example:

  Moore, D. L. (1989). A study of videocassettes. Media Journal, 5(2), 87-98.

  The following format should be used if you are citing an electronic book only available in an electronic format, according to the Purdue Online Writing Lab:

  De Huff, E. W. (n.d.). Taytay's tales: Traditional Pueblo Indian tales. Retrieved from http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/dehuff/taytay/

  taytay.html

  Use "Available from" if the book must be bought or is not directly available online. Provide the site where it can be found. Include the publish date in parentheses after the author's name for electronic books that are available both in electronic and print form.

• 4

  Use the following format for newspaper articles found online, according to the Purdue Online Writing Lab:

  Author, A. A. (Year, Month Day). Title of article. Title of Newspaper. Retrieved from http://www.someaddress.com/full/url/

• 5

  Use the entry name if there is no author's name available as the first part of an online dictionary or encyclopedia citation. If no date is present, write "(n.d.)" For example:

  Marxism. (n.d.). In Encyclopædia Britannica online. Retrieved from http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/724633/marxism

• 6

  Include as much citation information as you can find if you are citing a web page, report, or web document that is not a periodical. Go back to the homepage or next web page up in the URL in order to find more publication information. For example, shorten the URL in http://hereitis.com/hereitis.htm and go back to http://hereitis.com to find the information you need.

  The following format should be used, according to the Purdue Online Writing Lab:

  Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Date of publication). Title of document. Retrieved from http://Web address

  Give the URL that goes to the homepage for the document if it is longer than one.