A brief summary of a longer written work giving an overview of its purpose and content. An abstract is usually found at the start of scholarly papers or research.
In A to Z order. In APA, the Reference List places all works cited in the paper in one continuous alphabetical listing by the author's surname, and where no author is given, by the first main word of the title (skip over insignificant words in the title like "a" or "the").
A symbol (&) representing the word "and". In APA the ampersand is used between two or three authors' names in an in text citation if they are cited within closed parentheses. For example: (Curtis & Menzies, 2010) or (Duncan, Curtis & Menzies, 2010).
If not enclosed in parentheses then use the full "and". For example: Curtis and Menzies (2005).
The American Psychological Association, a United States professional organisation for psychologists. APA publishes the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, which sets out APA Style, rules and conventions of a wide range of aspects of scholarly publishing, including how to cite sources.
A structured list of relevant sources for background or for further reading on a topic. Unlike a Reference List, a Bibliography is not limited to resouces you have cited in your paper.
A long (40 words or more) quotation which is not enclosed in quotation marks. Instead, the text is indented from the normal marginline by 1.25 cm. from start to finish to form a block. It should start on a new line and be double spaced, as is all the text in your paper. It should end with an appropriate in-text citation following the quotation's finishing punctuation.
A line in a newspaper or magazine article stating the writer's name and possibly their position/role. The byline usually is placed after the title and before the main body of the article.
The statement of a specific source (published or unpublished) used in research. In APA the citation is more commonly called and in-text citation and gives a brief or shorthand indication of the source, following certain rules. The full details of the source used are given in a reference at the end of the paper.
Citation management software is used to help construct reference lists and citations in various styles. There are simple tools which require data to be entered into various fields (author, title, etc.) along with the format and citation style name (APA, Harvard etc) and the software will generate a fomatted reference list (and sometmes in-text) citation. More sophisticated tools will allow you to maintain an account where you can gather, store, edit, retrieve, share and use citations as needed. Others allow addition of footnotes and note-taking features; some have free iphone apps where you scan the ISBN barcode of a book or type the source's name and a citation is created.
Some software is commercial and made available to students by their academic institution (Refworks and Endnote are common examples).
There are also many open source (freely available) tools.
You should always take care that the citations produced by these tools exactly match the rules required by your teachers.
This refers to information that does not have be cited because it is well known and undisputed.
Definitions for this term can vary but generally include include:
- undisputed facts that can be found in a number of different authoritative references (like a dictionary or encyclopedia), such as historical or geographical facts. You do not have to cite these even if you did not know the fact without first looking it up.
- proverbs, sayings, folklore (myths, fairytales)
- commonsense observations
- well established, widely accepted facts within a specific profession, discipline or subject area.
When in doubt, cite it.
Recognising common knowledge (University of Technology, Sydney)
A journal with continuous pagination is one in print (hard copy) that has page numbers continuing unbroken through each issue of a complete volume, as if they were all one publication. For example if issue 1 was paged 1-55, issue 2 might be paged 56-123 and so on. The issue number of a journal is not recorded in a reference list citation if the journal is continuously paged.
A storage facility containing large amounts of information, organised for quick retrieval, usually refering to an online storage system.
The exact wording as used by the author in a source. Direct quotations must always be cited and be incorporated fluently into your own expression. The way they are formatted depends on how many words are quoted (see block quotation and double quotation marks).
Direct quotations should be used less than indirect quotations or paraphrasing. It is better to use a direct quote where the author's own wording is particularly powerful or effective.
Paraphrase or quotation? - Language and Learning Online. Monash University
Version 6 of APA Style requires that electronic items, including articles retrieved via a library database, must cite the article DOI in the reference. The database name is no longer required in the citation. A URL should only be given when no DOI is provided.The Digital Object Identifier is a unique string of numbers (and sometime letters) for identifying content, such an a journal article, in a digital environment.
Sample DOI : 10.1375/brim.11.2.197
Information about an article, including its URL, may change over time but its DOI name remains the same.
The article is registered with a DOI at the time it is published.
An article can be found by entering the DOI number into a DOI resolver, not by pasting it into the address bar of your browser as you would a URL.
DOI resolvers
DOI.org
crossref.org
The DOI may be found in the database citation of an article, or at the start or end of the article itself.
Part of a URL (Uniform Resource Locator) or web address.
http://libguides.gippstafe.vic.edu.au is a URL.
libguides.gippstafe.vic.edu.au is the domain name (sometimes called the host name) and indicates what entity hosts the site
.edu.au the domain name extension or top level domain.
Domain extensions can be used to help decide if your resource passes the CRAP test. They can give a broad indication of the purpose and authority of the site.
Common examples are:
.com commercial
.org non-profit organisation
.net network
.edu education
.gov government
Punctuation symbols " " most commonly used to indicate text that has been written exactly as it was by the author in the source you are citing. Double quotation marks fully enclose quotes of under 40 words. Once you open your quotation marks, you must close them, even if you do not quote a complete sentence.
Also used to indicate a title name mentioned in-text where there is no author.
example: ("Raising standards", 2009)
Do not use double quotation marks for block quotes (over 40 words) except to indicate another quote within the block quote.
Do not use for titles in your reference list.
When do you use double quotation marks? ( APA style FAQs)
The same title (usually book) may be printed in different versions or forms. For example there may be a revised edition, an annotated edition, or a series of numbered editions. The Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association is currently in its sixth edition. The edition statement helps identify the exact version of the title you are citing
Edition information is given only in the reference list citation, in abbreviated form. For example
The Blackwell dictionary of cognitive psychology. (1961). (3rd ed.). Oxford, England: Blackwell.
Spradley, B.W. (Ed.) (2006). Contemporary community nursing. Boston: Little, Brown.
Klaassen, C. D., & Rozman, K. (1991). Absorption, distribution and excretion of toxicants. In M. O.Amdur, J. Doull
& C. D. Klaassen (Eds.), Casarett and Doull’s toxicology: The basic science of poisons (pp. 50-87). New
York: Pergamon Press.
Three spaced dots . . . used to indicate that there has been an omission (plural elipses). Used in a Reference List entry for 8 or more authors. Also used when using only a fragment of a sentence in a direct quotation.
A citation appearing in the reference list, at the end of a paper or essay.
An abbreviation of et alia, a Latin phrase meaning “and others.” In APA style et al.is used to indicate that there are more authors without having to list them all each time.
For works with 3-5 authors, list all names the first time, then use the first author only and et al. in all subsequent citations of that work. For six or more authors, use the first author only followed by et al in all citations, including the first one. It should be written in lower case, not italicised and have a full stop after the al. For an in-text citation, where a publication date is available, it should follow et al. (Curtis et al., 2010) unless you are incorporating author's names into your own text. For example: Curtis et al. (2010) discovered a strong correlation between...
A specified way of organising information. In APA Style, the citations and reference lists must be formatted in a prescribed way. There are also rules for setting out the actual paper (essay or assignment), such as width of margin, size and type of font and pagination.
Text formatting for a reference list in APA has the first line of each individual reference postioned on the left margin but all following lines are indented by 1.25 cm. creating a "hanging indent".
See paraphrasing
Whether you are paraphrasing or directly quoting a source, you must indicate this at the point directly following the quotation or paraphrase in the text of your assignment. In-text citations will typically comprise the author's surname and date of publishing, e.g. (Smith, 2007). Page number(s) will also be provided if it is a direct quotation, e.g. (Jones, 2010, p. 189). Unlike Reference List citations, the format of in-text citations does not vary according to the type of material quoted or paraphrased, so in-text citations for a book, journal or online source will all have the same look.
A typeface where characters slant to the right such as these words. Italicised text helps to distinguish certain words from others within the text. It may also be used within a quotation you are using to add your own emphasis. Note that you must indicate that you have done this by including [emphsis added] after the italicised words. In APA citations, italics are always used for titles of works in a reference list and for perodical volume number infomation.
A critical evaluation of published material. Literature reviews typically document "the progress of research toward clarifying a problem" (Publication manual of the American Psychological Association, 2009).
This is defined by Macmillandictionary.com as "a formal piece of writing, or a short book on a particular subject" (2010).
An online storage facility containing large amounts of information which is organised for quick retrieval.
Rounded brackets or punctuation marks, always used in a pair () to enclose information in citations.
A book or other published source which has been read and checked by authorities other than the author for the accuracy and reliability of the information it contains.
Publications which may also be called serials or journals. Serials are works published across regular time intervals such as newspapers, magazines or journals. Usually, periodicals consist of a collection of articles from various authors. They may be scholarly or popular. Because of their regular publication intervals, periodicals can be a good source of up current/recent information compared to books.
Refers to material that comes directly from the originator, that is, the person who first presents the idea, theory, model, or definition in question, as distinct from those who later comment on the material. It is preferable to quote from primary sources wherever possible.
This is the comprehensive list of sources you will have quoted or paraphrased in your assignment, appearing on a separate final page. It lists all works alphabetically by author's surname, or where there is no author, by the first proper word in the title. Works you have consulted but not quoted or paraphrased are not included in the Reference List; a Reference List entry will always have at least one corresponding in-text citation. APA prescribes strict conventions for Reference List citations with regard to format, spacing, capitalisation, punctuation, font, the elements to be included in the citation for each type of source used and the order in which to present those elements. The type of source used is identified by these distinguishing features.
A book or other published source which has been read and checked by authorities other than the author for accuracy and reliability of the information it contains.
A journal with articles written by scholars or those with specialist knowledge in the field being written about. A scholarly journal is usually, but not necessarily peer-reviewed.
If you are using a quotation that already has another quotation within it, you will be citing a source within a source. This is known as a secondary citation and it will sit inside the primary, or overall citation. It must be quoted exactly as shown in the primary citation. Cite only the primary citation in your Reference List.
Material which comments on a primary source rather than producing its own material, for example a report on findings of a study would be regarded as a secondary source, whereas the study itself would be the primary source. It is preferable to use primary sources when quoting where possible.
The practice of resubmitting one's own previously-used work for publication or in the case of a student, handing in work in part or in full, that has been submitted previously for another separate assessment task, as if it were new. Self-plagiarism is regarded in the same way as plagiarism of another's work.
Also called inverted commas. Single quotation marks are used to identify a quotation within a quotation.
A "work" either published or unpublished which can be quoted / paraphrased by people other than the author or originator.
For clarity in your writing, explain abbreviated technical terms the first time you use them rather than assume the reader knows the term.
For example:
Aortic Valve Incompetence (AVI)
Electronic Performance Support System (EPSS)
Commonly used abbreviations which are listed in the dictionary as if they were a word can be used with out explanation.
For example:
AIDS
HIV
IQ
APA Abbreviations - A helpful explanation of the use of standard abbreviations in APA. Purdue Online Writing Lab, Purdue University.
| APA Citation Abbreviations | |
|
and others (when more than six authors) (from Latin et alii, et aliae) |
et al. |
| editor/edited by | (Ed.) |
| editors | (Eds.) |
| edition | ed. |
| revised edition | Rev. ed. |
| Second Edition | 2nd ed. |
| Supplement | Suppl. |
| Technical Report | Tech.Rep. |
| Translator(s) | Trans. |
| No date | n.d. |
| Number | No. |
| Page | p. |
| Paragraph (for unpaged sources cited in-text) | para. |
| Part | Pt. |
| Pages | pp. |
| Volume | Vol. |
| Volumes | Vols. |