APA 7 Referencing Guide for UK Students
APA 7th edition (published by the American Psychological Association) is widely used in UK psychology, education, health sciences, nursing and social work departments. The most recent version, published in 2019, introduced several important changes from APA 6, including new rules on author names, running heads, bias-free language and digital object identifiers. Always check whether your institution specifies APA 6 or APA 7 before beginning - they are not fully interchangeable.
In-text citation format
APA 7 uses the author-date format: (Author surname, Year). For a direct quote, include the page number: (Smith, 2021, p. 47) - note the space after 'p.' For two authors, use an ampersand: (Smith & Jones, 2021). For three or more authors, use 'et al.' from the first citation: (Smith et al., 2021). If you are citing the same author with multiple works from the same year, add a letter suffix: (Smith, 2021a) and (Smith, 2021b).
Journal articles
Format: Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Year). Title of article in sentence case. Journal Name in Title Case and Italics, Volume(Issue), page range. https://doi.org/xxxxx - Example: Nguyen, T. H., & Roberts, C. (2022). Digital learning environments and student engagement. British Journal of Educational Technology, 53(4), 881-897. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjet.13209 - APA 7 no longer requires 'Retrieved from' before a URL or DOI unless a retrieval date is needed (e.g. for content that changes).
Books and chapters
For a book: Author, A. A. (Year). Title of book in sentence case and italics. Publisher. For an edited book chapter: Author, A. A. (Year). Title of chapter. In E. E. Editor (Ed.), Title of book in italics (pp. xx-xx). Publisher. In APA 7, place of publication is no longer required for books published by well-known publishers. The publisher name is listed as given on the title page without 'Publishers', 'Inc.', 'Co.' etc.
Websites and online sources
Format: Author, A. A. (Year, Month Day). Title of page in sentence case. Site Name. URL - Example: NHS England. (2023, October 5). Mental health five year forward view. NHS England. https://www.england.nhs.uk/mental-health/taskforce/ - If no author is given, move the site name to the author position. If no date is available, write (n.d.) in place of the year. Only include a retrieval date if the content is likely to change.
Key differences from APA 6
The main changes in APA 7 include: running heads are no longer required for student papers (only for manuscripts submitted for publication); up to 20 authors can now be listed before using an ellipsis (previously limited to 7); DOIs should be formatted as hyperlinks (https://doi.org/...); the publisher's location is no longer required; and student paper title pages now include the course name, instructor name, and assignment due date. Check all of these with your module guide.
Key tips
- Download the free APA 7 quick reference guide from the APA website as a handy desktop reference.
- Sentence case means only the first word of a title (and proper nouns) are capitalised in APA - unlike Harvard.
- Always include a DOI when one is available - it is now the preferred identifier over a URL for journal articles.
- Use the Purdue OWL APA 7 guide as a free, reliable online reference for unusual source types.
- Run your reference list through a citation checker, but always verify manually - automatic tools make errors.
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