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Resources in Social Work: Citing Material

About APA style 7th Edition

American Psychological Association (APA) style is commonly used for citing references in student papers in science and social science courses, such as Psychology, Nursing, and Social Work.

The purpose of documentation is to:

  • Identify (cite) other people’s ideas and information used within your essay or term paper.
  • Indicate the authors or sources of these in a References list at the end of your paper.

This guide is based on the APA Manual (7th ed.) that was published in 2020.

Getting Started!

The following sections provide you with information and examples that will help you to cite the sources that you come across during your research.

General Guidelines

Books

Articles

Websites

Audiovisual Media

Images & Art

Other...

For more detailed information, refer to the APA Manual (6th ed.) available at the library, ask your instructor, or Ask Us.

What's Different in the APA Style 7th Edition

From Owl at Purdue 

  • Running heads are no longer required for student papers.
  • Professional papers include a running head on every page, including the title page. However, the “Running head:” label used in the sixth edition is no longer used.
    • The running head is written in all capital letters. The running head should either be identical to the paper’s title, or a shortened form of the title that conveys the same idea. However, running heads should not exceed 50 characters (including spaces and punctuation).
  • The section labels for abstracts and reference lists follow the conventions for level one headings (i.e., in addition to being centered and written in title case, they are also in boldface).
  • Font guidelines are now somewhat looser in order to account for differences in computer specifications and users’ accessibility needs. So long as the same font is used throughout the text of the paper, a variety of fonts are acceptable.

For more changes see the link at the top.

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