Skip to Main Content

Human Development and Spiritual Experience: APA Basics

APA Citations

APA Style, the official citation style of the American Psychological Association, is used for research in pastoral counseling. Papers for pastoral counseling classes follow the style as defined in Concise Rules of APA Style, 2005. The full style manual is the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, 5th ed. 2001. Both manuals may be found in the reference area of the library.

APA Citation Guide

The Athenaeum uses the APA Style format for all research papers in the pastoral counseling program.

Helpful Online Resources

APA Basics

  • Entries are not numbered
  • Parenthetical Citation includes: (Author Last Name, Year of Publication, page #).
  • Enter author's last name followed by first and middle initials
  • List up to six (6) authors; seven (7) or more authors, use only the first six and then et al.
  • If no author is listed, begin with title
  • Italics must be used for book and periodical titles
  • Capitalize titles in sentence style, only capitalizing the first word
  • Date is in parenthesis after the author's name (or title if no author is listed)
  • Dates are in Year, Month Day format (e.g. 1999, December 20)
  • Use (n.d.) if no date is given
  • List the city of publication, and only include the state or country as needed for clarity (use two-letter abbreviations for states when needed)
  • Alphabetize by the first word of the entry
  • Use p. for one page articles, pp. for multiple page articles
  • Use the abbreviations p. or pp. only for multi-page newspaper articles, encyclopedia entries, and chapters or articles in edited books
  • Do not use the abbreviation p. or pp. (or any other abbreviation) for magazine and journal articles
  • When including the name of the database where you located the full-text, do not just write EBSCOhost. EBSCOhost is NOT a database. Academic Search Premier, Business Source Premier, etc., are databases
  • For items found in full text online, access information in APA requires one of the following (in order of preference):
    • Use DOI (digital object identifier) if available (no period at end of citation) 
    • If no DOI, and from database, use database name (with period) (example: Academic Search Premier database.) (period at end of citation)
    • If no DOI and from open web site - not from a database, use access date and complete URL (no period at end of citation)
  • Indent after the first line of each entry and double space all citations
  • If an element is not present, omit it

Authors are formatted the same way in all material formats.

One Author

Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial.

Example:

Smith, J. D.

 

Two or More Authors

Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., & Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial.

Example:

Smith, J. D., & Jones, R. L.

 

Six or More Authors

List up to six authors, then et al.

Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., & Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., & Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., & Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., & Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., & Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., et al.

Example:

Smith, J. D., & Jones, R. L., & Harper, S. G., & Harris, K., & Thompson, L. C., & Nelson, G. A., et al.

Organizations as Authors

Authors that are organizations, corporations, government entities, etc. should not be inverted or abbreviated.

Example:

United States Department of Commerce

General Motors Corporation

One Editor 

Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial. (Ed.).

Example:

Smith, J.D. (Ed.).

 

Two or More Editors

Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., & Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial. (Eds.).

Example:

Smith, J.D., & Thomas, A.J. (Eds.).

 

Six or More Editors

List up to six editors, then use et al.

Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., & Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., & Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., & Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., & Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., & Author Last Name, First Initial. Middle Initial., et al. (Eds.).

Example:

Jones, K.F., & Lewis, B.C., & Miller, D.M., & Smith, J.D., & Thomas, A.J., & Williams, M.T., et al. (Eds.).

APA Reference in the Library