How to Create a Reference Page in APA Style
As noted before, the References page goes at the end of our research paper, project, or presentation, and it includes a detailed list of sources we used in our paper. Each item in the References list is called a bibliographic citation. We may include books, electronic books, articles, web sites, charts, images, etc. in our References page.
This page provides links to sources that will help us create a References page in APA style, but we will likely need to look up specific examples as we create our own References page. There are several specific resources that can help with this:
- Library Guide on APA Format
- Printable APA Format Handout
- Reference List: Basic Rules Links to an external site. from the OWL web site (also see the other reference list information in the left menu of this page)
- Citation Fox APA Links to an external site.from University Libraries, SUNY Albany -- interactive source that shows us examples of APA citations for every eventuality
Important things to remember about References pages:
- Bibliographic citations in APA style always start with an author's (or creator's) last name, unless there is no author and then they start with the title of the work we're citing. (See sample papers below).
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Each bibliographic citation is indented (called a hanging indent).
- See instructions for adding a hanging indent in Microsoft Word Links to an external site., courtesy of Concordia University Library.
- See instructions for adding a hanging indent in Google docs Links to an external site..
- See instruction for adding a hanging indent and double spacing in MS Word Links to an external site..
- Reference pages are alphabetized from A-Z. (See sample papers below).
- Reference pages are double-spaced.
- It's useful to look at samples of APA papers to see what the formatting looks like.