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Citing Electronic Sources in APA Format

LAC Guide (updated 9/25/2007)

APA reference formats for electronic sources can be confusing, particularly since electronic mediums and APA guidelines continue to evolve. Listed here you’ll find samples of the most frequently used electronic sources followed by explanatory and advisory notes. (Please Note: The browser with which you view the following citations may slightly alter format. All APA citations should appear double-spaced in hanging indent.)

Databases

This is an example of the type of electronic source that you will (and should) use most frequently: a peer reviewed journal article retrieved from an aggregated electronic database. Notice that the information contained in the first part of the reference is identical to the information that you would list if you had actually pulled the journal from library shelves. The “retrieval statement” that follows indicates that you didn’t. Most articles that you use at LAC will be retrieved through the Academic Search Premier database unless you choose a specialty database like Biosis, Medline, Maine Newstand, or ERIC. Don’t list a web address for this type of citation unless you access the database through its own website rather than through EBSCOhost, LAC’s subscription service.

In this example, no author is listed so the article title is moved into the author’s position. Typically, a journal article that lists no author isn’t really an “article” at all--it is frequently an editorial, a book review, or part of a regular column within the journal. In this case, the Kansas City Business Journal produced “Dealing with it” by summarizing a section of R. Brayton Bower’s documentary Anger in the Workplace. Rather than using this short piece, try to locate an article written by Bower himself, or view the documentary and list that as a source.

This is an example of a book accessed through our eBook collection. Cite the source as you would the printed version of the book, then indicate [Electronic version] after the book’s title. As the 5th edition APA Publication Manual does not specify a form for electronic books, the format for this type of citation may change in future.

Websites

In this example, Denise Casey (a researcher for Oak Ridge National Laboratory) is identified as the author of the material on the site. “Sequencing Technologies” is the title of the page we accessed; Primer on Molecular Genetics from the U. S. Department of Energy is the title of the entire document/website. List both titles, much like you would list an article from a journal.

In this example, although no individual author is listed, the American Heart Association serves as a “corporate” or “organization” author. Only one title is listed here, italicized to indicate that it is an independent document rather than part of a larger document. No copyright or publication date is available for this source so (n.d.) replaces the typical citation element.

In this example, we have neither an individual nor a corporate author. In fact, if you access this website, although the information seems good, you won’t find any indication of the credentials of the site’s composer. WARNING: As a general rule, avoid referencing websites that don’t list an author/author’s credentials--the information you’re reading may not be accurate.

E-mail

Because e-mail is a personal communication, not easily retrieved by the general public, no entry should appear in your reference list. When you cite an e-mail message in the body of your paper, acknowledge it in your parenthetical citation: Clair Bissel, Human Resources Director at Fairchild Semiconductor, confirms the importance of this management technique (e-mail to author, May 1, 2001).

In-text Citations

To cite your electronic sources in text, use the APA guidelines for print sources. For direct quotation, cite author, date, page (Anakwe, Igbaria, & Anandarajan, 2000, p. 2) or According to Anakwe, Igbaria, and Anandarajan (2000), “Most management research is privately funded” (p. 2). Unless you have viewed the article as a full image copy in a database, the page numbers you use for an electronic source in-text citation may NOT correspond directly to a published version of that source. For instance, although the Anakwe article begins on “p. 653” in the original journal, you would use “p. 1” as the starting point for the database version. For paraphrase, you can drop all page numbers (Casey, 1997).

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