APA Citation Workshop: In-Text Citations

Short quotations

If you are directly quoting from a work, you will need to include the author, year of publication, and the page number for the reference (preceded by "p."). Introduce the quotation with a signal phrase that includes the author's last name followed by the date of publication in parentheses.

According to Jones (1998), "Students often had difficulty using APA style, especially when it was their first time" (p. 199). 

Jones (1998) found "students often had difficulty using APA style" (p. 199); what implications does this have for teachers?

If the author is not named in a signal phrase, place the author's last name, the year of publication, and the page number in parentheses after the quotation.

She stated, "Students often had difficulty using APA style" (Jones, 1998, p. 199), but she did not offer an explanation as to why.

Long quotations

Place direct quotations that are 40 words, or longer, in a free-standing block of typewritten lines, and omit quotation marks. Start the quotation on a new line, indented 1/2 inch from the left margin, i.e., in the same place you would begin a new paragraph. Type the entire quotation on the new margin, and indent the first line of any subsequent paragraph within the quotation 1/2 inch from the new margin. Maintain double-spacing throughout. The parenthetical citation should come after the closing punctuation mark.

Jones's (1998) study found the following: 
Students often had difficulty using APA style,
especially when it was their first time citing  sources. This difficulty could be attributed to the  fact that many students failed to purchase a style  manual or to ask their teacher for help. (p. 199)

Short Summary or paraphrase

If you are paraphrasing an idea from another work, you only have to make reference to the author and year of publication in your in-text reference, but APA guidelines encourage you to also provide the page number (although it is not required.)

According to Jones (1998), APA style is a difficult citation format for first-time learners.
APA style is a difficult citation format for first-time learners (Jones, 1998, p. 199).

Long Summary or paraphrase

If your are paraphrasing many ideas from the same work, you need to provide  a in-text citation after each idea or statement of a fact.

Note for Hospitality students only: The only exception you can use is that if a whole paragraph is from the same source... and each paragraph contains a separate specific fact... then you can alternate sentences and this can indicate that the whole paragraph is cited. So if there are 8 sentences all in a paragraph and each one has a fact from the same source... sentences 1, 3, 5, 7 could have the same in-text citations.