Swansea University

REFERENCING ACCORDING TO THE APA 7th STYLE: A BRIEF

GUIDE
When you work on an assignment you will read widely and “borrow” the ideas and
words of experts on the subject. It is essential that you always give complete and
accurate references whenever you refer to the work of others from books, journals,
web pages, reports etc. Examiners will deduct marks for incomplete or inaccurate
referencing.

Why is referencing important?

To enable the reader to follow up the references and find the book or journal article
in a library.
To enable the examiner or supervisor to check the accuracy of the information.
To demonstrate to the examiner that you have read widely a range of opinions.
To avoid plagiarism (using someone else’s ideas as your own.)

What should I reference?

Anything you refer to in your work, whether in quotation marks or not. If you have
used an idea from someone else, you need to acknowledge it.
No need to reference “common knowledge”, i.e. knowledge which is found in many
sources and is undisputed.
Try to avoid secondary quoting. Use the original if you can find it.

Styles

There are four different styles in use for undergraduates at Swansea University. APA
7th is an example of an Author-Date style and is used by many but not all of the
Faculties. Check to see which style you should use.

Important things to remember

 Give full details of each item you use in an alphabetical reference list at the
end of your assignment
 In the reference list, all lines of each reference are double spaced and after
the first are indented (to do this: position your cursor at the beginning of the
second line and press CTRL and the Tab key simultaneously).
 Link the two authors’ names with and when cited outside parentheses. Link
with an ampersand (&) inside parentheses.
 Look at the full APA guide if you can’t find the answer in this short guide.

1
August 2022
PUBLICATION IN-TEXT FULL REFERENCE NOTES
TYPE CITATION
Book (one or Healy and Last name, Initial(s)., & Last Last name + initials
two authors) Mulholland name, initial(s). (Year). Title. for author’s name.
(2019)… Publisher. DOI or URL Use & (not and) to
link authors.
OR Healy, K., & Mulholland, J. Italicise title.
(2019). Writing skills for
…(Healy & social workers (3rd ed.). Sage.
Mulholland,
2019).
Book with 3 or Stewart et al. Last name, Initial(s)., & Last NB: For 21 or more
more authors (2011)… name, initial(s). (Year). Title. authors see the full
Publisher. DOI or URL APA guide.
OR
Stewart, S. D., Piros, C. D., &
…(Stewart et Heisler, J. (2011). Running
al., 2011). money: Professional portfolio
management. McGraw-Hill
Irwin.

Edited book Cash and Last name, Initial(s). (Ed.). Abbreviate editor(s)
Smolak (Year). Title (edition.). as Ed. or Eds.
(2011)… Publisher. DOI or URL

OR Cash, T. F., & Smolak, L.

(Eds.). (2011). Body image:
…(Cash & A handbook of science,
Smolak, practice, and prevention (2nd
2011). ed.). Guilford Press.

Chapter in an Bowden Last name, Initial(s). (Year). Author and title of

edited book (2017)… Chapter title. In Initial. Last chapter precede
name (Eds.), Book title editors and title of
OR (edition, pages of chapter). book.
Publisher. DOI or URL Note use of In.
…(Bowden, Pagination required.
2017). Bowden, J. (2017). Health
promotion models and
approaches. In J. Bowden &
V. Manning (Eds.), Health
promotion in midwifery:
Principles and practice (3rd
ed., pp. 47-60). CRC Press.

Journal article Palmer and Last name, Initial(s)., & last No italics for article
Koenig-Lewis name, initial(s). (Year). Article title, but italicise the
(2011)… title. Journal title in italics, journal title and
Volume number in volume number.
OR italics(issue or part number), Include volume
page numbers. DOI or URL number (27 in this
…(Palmer & case).
2
August 2022
 Koenig- Palmer, A., & Koenig-Lewis,
Lewis, 2011). N. (2011). The effects of pre-
enrolment emotions and peer
group interaction on students’
satisfaction. Journal of
Marketing Management,
27(11), 1208-1231.
https://doi.org/10.1080/02672
57X.2011.614955
PUBLICATION IN-TEXT FULL REFERENCE
TYPE CITATION
Book review in Nagorski Last name of reviewer,
a journal (2013)… Initial(s). (Year). Title of
review [Review of the
OR book Title of book, by name
of book's author]. Journal
...(Nagorski, Title, Volume number in
2013). italics(issue or part number),
page numbers. DOI or URL  brackets.
Nagorski, A. (2013). The
totalitarian temptation
[Review of the book The devil
in history: communism,
fascism and some lessons of
the 20th century, by
V.Tismaneanu]. Foreign
Affairs, 92(1), 172-176.
Web site Gallagher Last name, Initial(s) or Group If no personal author
(2020)… author. (Year, Month Day).
Title. Website name. URL
OR
Gallagher, J. (2020, August
...(Gallagher, 4). Testing and tracing 'key to website name are
2020). schools returning', scientists the same omit the
say. BBC News.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/h avoid repetition.
ealth-53638083
3
If there is an issue
number (11 in this
case), include it in
brackets after the
volume number – the
issue number is not
italicised. Include
page numbers and
DOI number (if
available).
No publisher is
needed.
NOTES
Nagorski is the writer
of this review.
If the review is
untitled, place the
material in brackets
immediately after the
year and keep the
named use name of
body responsible for
authorship.
When the author and
website name to
Give date on which
you retrieved the
information only if
the information is
likely to change i.e.:
wiki, blog.
(If this is the case,
put Retrieved Year,
Month Day from
before the URL).
August 2022
Online official HM Revenue Group author. (Year). Title If no personal author
publication & Customs (Series or reference number). named use name of
(2020)… Publisher. URL body responsible for
authorship.
OR HM Revenue & Customs. Include any
(2020). Tackling the tax gap important series
…(HM (HC 372; SE/2019/21). numbers.
Revenue & National Audit Office. Include URL.
Customs, https://www.nao.org.uk/wp-
2020). content/uploads/2020/07/Tac
kling-the-tax-gap.pdf

Page numbers
If you are quoting or are using ideas from a specific page or pages of a work, you are
encouraged to provide a page or paragraph number.

If you are referring to only one page of a book, type p. before the page number e.g.
(Milner & O’Byrne, 2019, p. 20).

If you are referring to more than one page of a book, type pp. before the page
numbers e.g. (Milner & O’Byrne, 2019, pp. 20-21).

If you are quoting from an ebook which does not display page numbers, name the
major sections (often the chapter, section, and paragraph number). This is an
example of a direct quotation: One of the author’s points is that “people don’t rise
from nothing” (Gladwell, 2018, Chapter 1, Section 2, para. 5).

Direct quote in-text citation examples

You can include direct quotes in the following ways, depending on your sentence
structure:

Discussing data collection, Matthews and Ross (2010) note that “it is a
practical activity, one that has to be carried out with time, spatial and resource
constraints” (p.181), and therefore needs careful consideration.

Or when the quote ends the sentence:

Careful consideration is needed with data collection as “it is a practical

activity, one that has to be carried out with time, spatial and resource
constraints” (Matthews & Ross, 2010, p.181).

4
August 2022
Further information and advice

Working with Endnote

Choose the Bibliographic Style – APA 7th if using Endnote software.

On Library Guides

Visit the APA referencing pages http://libguides.swansea.ac.uk/apa7referencing

On the web

American Psychological Association. (2020). Academic writer tutorial: Basics of 7th

edition APA style. https://extras.apa.org/apastyle/basics-7e/?
_ga=2.18869361.919888230.1597766522-1408059126.1597766522#/

[Lessons 16 and 18 are particularly useful for citing and references]

The APA Style Blog (https://apastyle.apa.org/blog) covers many tricky item types –
see the Search option at the top right.

Books in the Library

American Psychological Association. (2020). Publication manual of the American

Psychological Association: The official guide to APA style (7th ed.).

5
August 2022