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APA 7th Edition - Citation Guide - CBS Library

Format your Reference List

The references list should be on a new page, and should be the last section of your paper.

Heading of Reference List

The heading at the top of the reference list should say References at the top (not Bibliography or Works Cited, unless your instructor tells you otherwise) and bolded.

Hanging Indent

All reference lists should have a hanging indent. An example of a hanging indent is shown below:

To create a hanging indent in Word, you can press the Control key along with the letter T.

control+ T

Spacing

Line spacing in the reference list should be set to double (2.0).

Alphabetizing

When organizing your references list, you must alphabetize your references. Generally, you will organize by the author's last name. Go letter by letter and ignore spaces, hyphens, punctuation etc.

If a work has no author, use the title to alphabetize. You will use the first significant word to alphabetize; this means you skip words like the, a, and an.

Example of Proper Order:

  1. Alcott, L. M. (1868)...
  2. Alcott, L. M. (1893)...
  3. Anonymous. (1998). Beowulf...
  4. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (n.d.).
  5. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2017).
  6. Etiquette in Florida. (n.d.).
  7. Grammar Girl. (2009, May 21)...
  8. Johnson, C. L., & Tuite, C. (Eds.). (2009)...
  9. Johnson, S. K. (2003)...
  10. Oxford English dictionary (2nd ed.). (1989)...
  11. A prescription for health care. (2009). Consumer Reports...
  12. Southeast Asia. (2003). In The new encyclopaedia Britannica...

For more information on creating and formatting references, go to the Reference Components page.

Source: Publication Manual, 2.12; 9.44-9.49

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