APA REFERENCE STYLE

INTERNET
Huge quantities of information are
now available electronically via the
Internet. Most college students now
have access to the World Wide Web,
either on computers at school or at
home by dialing up a server with a
modem. Electronic texts (or "e-texts")
are popping up more and more in
research papers.
There are a number of reasons
for this. On one hand, the internet
gives users access to the
information on hundreds of
thousands of servers throughout
the world-the breadth and depth
of available knowledge is
incredible.
On the other hand, the
documents on the
internet are "surfable"
from a single location,
bringing a global library
to your computer .
However, several
problems have arisen
from this surge in the
availability and popularity
of electronically-
accessed information.
First, many students have no idea how
to cite electronic texts. Only the most
current style manuals give any hint as
to how to write a reference entry for ,
say , a Web page; even then, the
citation formats are sometimes
confusing and outdated. Interestingly
enough, it is Web sites like this one
that can help solve this problem.
Second, compared to print-based
resources, e-texts are relatively
unstable. While a book consists of
information encoded in ink on a
printed page, an e-text exists as
magnetic pulses over a telephone
line.
As anyone who uses
computers can tell you,
though, servers go down
and phone connections get
cut. Electronic documents
can literally be here today
and gone tomorrow .
As we've mentioned before,
the whole purpose of a
reference is to allow readers
to find a source themselves.
If the source itself no longer
exists, this causes problems
for validity and verification.
One possible solution to this
problem is to keep careful
records. Saving e-texts (either
as screenshots or text files)
will allow you to produce the
source for a reader , even if
the document has disappeared
from the server on which you
found it.
In addition, it's also wise to
use many different types of
documents-books and
journals, as well as e-texts-
rather than relying heavily
on one kind of source.
 Author(s) of document

if an author is given it is usually

at the very beginning or very end
of a particular document; when in
doubt, look for an email address-
this will often lead you to the
name of the person who authored
the document.
 Date of Publication

if given, the document's date

will be included somewhere in
its text. There is a special way
to note if the document has no
specific date. date of
publication on the web (or the
date of most recently updated
version)
 Title of document

Title of document the placement

of documents' titles varies.
Generally , web authors place
a title at the top of the actual
web page. If no title is there,
use the title of the window as it
opens in your web browser.
 Volume and issue number

(on-line journals) if a
volume and issue
number is given, it will
probably be in the
header for the document,
close to the title
 Location of document

also varies according

to the source of your
document. See below
for details on this
citation element.
 AUTHOR(S) OF DOCUMENT

Assuming that an author or

authors are given, put each
author's last name, then a
comma, then the first initial of the
first name, then any additional
initials. A period should follow
each initial.
Separate the last author from the second-
to-last author with a comma and
ampersand (&). Separate any additional
authors by commas. If the listed author is
a group or institution, include its full name.
In the case of institutional authorship, add
a period to end the section; for individual
authors, no extra period is needed-the
period after the final initial is sufficient.
One author
Buchholz, T.
Two authors
James, M. & Henrichsen, L.
Three authors
Gregg, E., Chapman, S., & Gass, L. W.
Institutional author
Online Pig Latin Institute.
 DA TE OF PUBLICA TION

For web pages which give the date on which

they were electronically published, include
the year of publication online, in
parenthesis, then end with a period. If no
date is given in the e-text, put "n.d." in the
parenthesis.

Standard form (1995).

No date given (n.d.).
 TITLE OF DOCUMENT

For web pages, give the full title of the

page, including the subtitle if one is given.
Capitalize only the first word of the title,
and the first word of any subtitle; also
capitalize any proper names in the title.
Separate title and subtitle with a colon (:).
Don't put a period after a web page title--
the period for this element will go after the
brackets which follow the document type.
Don't underline titles of web pages.
To cite articles in on-line journals
(generally accessible through email),
you will need to follow the format
germane to standard journals: put the
article title, without any specific
formatting, followed by a period, then
the on-line journal title, underlined,
followed by the document type in
brackets
 Web page

Investigations into Pig Latin usage in

chat room communication [document
type].
Web page with subtitle
Pig latin and email: Who would've unk-thay? [document type].
A discussion on international topics in Pig Latin
 TYPE OF DOCUMENT

Knowing what type your document is

requires some knowledge about how
the Internet works. The most common
use of the internet is still electronic
mail. Email makes use of the network
of computers that actually comprises
the internet, but emailed documents
are not usually accessible to the
public.
On-line journals, however ,
often make use of email as a
method of distribution-a person
sends a message with a certain
"request code" in the text, and
receives an "issue" of the journal
by return email
The second most popular use of the
Internet is the World Wide Web. Web
pages are viewed by use of a "web
browser", which takes text,
formatting, graphics and links and
combines them on a user's screen.
Other uses of the internet include
discussion groups and newsgroups,
which generally deal with a specific
subject.