Changes in the 7th Edition of the APA Publication Manual (2019)
The American Psychological Association (APA) released the 7th edition of its widely used Publication Manual in the fall of 2019. For those accustomed to the 6th edition of the manual, “APA 7” has made a few notable changes, most of which affect the format of references. For a review of these changes, see below for a comparison of the “old” (6th edition) and “new” (7th edition) rules. The “new rule” is followed by the section of the APA guide where the rule, or a relevant example, is to be found. Print copies of the new APA guide may be found in the reference sections of Peabody Library (on the Writing Reference shelf) and of Central and Law Libraries (under call number BF76.7).
Changes to the format of end-of-paper references
- Old rule: In a reference for an article (or book) with eight or more authors, list the first six authors, followed by an ellipsis ( . . . ) and then the final author.
- New rule: Use an ellipsis in a reference only when there are 21 or more authors, to separate the 19th from the final author. (Section 10.4)
- Old rule: List the place of publication in a reference for a book, using the first-listed place of publication or the location of the publisher’s home office.
- New rule: Do not list the place of publication in a reference for a book. (Section 9.29)
- Old rule: Digital object identifiers (DOIs), where available, should be applied to the end of references, but they can be formatted in a variety of ways.
- New rule: DOIs should still be put at the end of references, and they must be in the https://doi.org/xxxxx format, to ensure that they function as hyperlinks. (Section 9.35; also see section 9.36 for guidance on using shortDOIs.)
- Old rule: Write “Retrieved from” before URLs in references.
- New rule: Do not write “Retrieved from” before URLs in references. (Section 9.35)
- Old rule: In a journal reference, include the issue number of the journal only if the journal volume is not continuously paginated.
- New rule: Always include the issue number in a journal reference. (Section 9.25)
Change to in-text citations
- Old rule: Follow a complicated formula to determine how many authors to list in an in-text citation.
- New rule: For all in-text citations to articles with three or more authors, use the first author’s name followed by “et al.” (Section 8.17)
Change to paper formatting
- Old rule: When formatting the header of a paper, put “Running head:” before the paper title on only the first page.
- New rule: Do not use “Running head:” in the paper header on any page. (Section 2.8)
