Writing Center
Youngstown State University

Guidelines for Parenthetical Citations (APA)

Parenthetical references must be provided for all quotes, paraphrases, and summaries in your paper. A parenthetical reference should take the reader to the References list at the end of your paper where complete bibliographic information is supplied. According to APA guidelines, when you are quoting, you must provide the name(s) of the author(s), the year, and the page number(s) on which the information is located within the text. The best way to do this is to introduce the quotation with a signal phrase that includes the author's name followed by the date of publication in parentheses; then put the page number (preceded by "p.") in parentheses at the end of the quotation:

According to Mary Davies (1992), the animals at East Mountain Reservation
"were unlike any known to previous civilizations, strange and exotic
to the human explorers" (p. 176).

When the author's name does not appear in the signal phrase, place the author's name, the year, and the page number in the parenthetical reference at the end of the quotation:

The animals at East Mountain Reservation "were unlike any known
to previous civilizations, strange and exotic to the human explorers"
(Davies, 1992, p. 176).

Hints

1. When paraphrasing or summarizing, you must cite author and year; you need not provide page numbers, but you are encouraged to do so if it would help the reader locate the relevant passage in a long text.
2. Depending on where the quotation falls within a sentence or text, punctuation differs:
• At the end of a sentence. Quotation marks close the quoted passage, the source is cited in parentheses immediately after the quotation marks, and a period comes last.
• In mid-sentence. End the passage with quotation marks, cite the source in parentheses immediately after the quotation marks, and continue the sentence, punctuating as usual.
• At the end of a block quote. Cite the quoted source in parentheses after the final punctuation mark. (A block quote is a quotation of 40 or more words in a free-standing block of typewritten lines: omit quotation marks; start quote on a new line; indent whole quotation 5 spaces from left margin; double-space entire quotation.)
3. The first time you use a parenthetical reference for a work written by more than two but fewer than six authors, all the authors' last names must be used. For subsequent references, only the last name of the first author is used followed by et al. If a work has six or more authors, always document in-text references using the first author's last name followed by et al.: (Jackson et al., 1995).
4. If you use more than one source written in the same year by the same author(s), assign letters (a, b, c, etc.) to the works in the References list, and do this for the parenthetical reference: (Jones, 1983a, p. 130).
5. If you refer to a work more than once, give the author's name and year only the first time; then use only the name for subsequent references.
6. If you cite several sources in one place, put them in alphabetical order according to authors' last names, and separate the sources with a semicolon: (Bassuk, 1984, p. 20; Fustero, 1984, p. 72).

For more information, see

• Guidelines for References List (APA)
• Sample Entries for References List (APA)

E-mail your comments and suggestions to the YSU Grant Team (cardcat@bgnet.bgsu.edu).