Cite Your Sources: CSE (Name-Year)

A basic in-text citation includes the author's last name and the year of publication. The following section explains what citation information should be included for various situations.

The reference list comes at the end of your paper and provides the full bibliographic information for your materials.The following section shows you how to format various kinds of entries.

In-text citation:

… was tested (Smith 1970).
… for measurement (ISO 1979).
… (Elias and Williams 1981).

End Reference:

Author AA, Author BB. Year. Title of work. Edition. Place of publication (State or Prov): Publisher name. Number of pages p.

Agrios GN. 1978. Plant pathology. 2nd ed. New York (NY): Academic Press. 703 p. 

Davidson RH, Lyon WF. 1979. Insect pests of farm garden, and orchard. 7th ed. New York (NY): John Wiley & Sons. 596 p.

In-text citation:

… (Lui et al. 1995).

End Reference:

• List the first 10 authors, with the 10th author's initials followed by a comma and "et al."

Author AA, Author BB, Author CC. Year. Title of work. Edition. Place of publication (State or Prov): Publisher name. Number of pages p.

Aubrey DA, Nadkarni NM, Broderick CP. 2013. Patterns of moisture and temperature in canopy and terrestrial soils in a temperate rainforest, Washington. Botany. 91(11):739-744. 

In-text citation:

• ​Follow the standard author/date format.

... (Burns and Thorpe 1979).

End Reference:

Author AA, Author BB. Year. Article title. Journal Title. Volume number(issue number):inclusive pages.

Burns LH, Thorpe G. 1979. Fears and phobias. Journal of Internal Medical Research. 17(2):235-246.

In-text citation:

• ​Follow the standard author/date format.

... (Tong et al. 2001).

End Reference:

Author AA, Author BB. Date of publication. Article title. Journal Title (edition) [medium designator]. [date updated; date cited];Volume(issue):inclusive pages. Available from: URL doi#

Tong V, Abbott FS, Mbofana S, Walker MJ. 2001. In vitro investigation of hepatic extraction. Journal of Pharmacy & Pharmaceutical Sciences [Internet]. [cited 2001 May 3];4(1):15-23. Available from: http://www.ualberta.ca/~csps/JPPS4(1)/F.Abbott/RSD1070.pdf doi:10.1136/jpps.460.7600.1070

• If there is no pagination in your online material, estimate how many pages it has:

Ganz PA. 1997 Apr. Menopause and breast cancer. Innovations in Breast Cancer Care [Internet].[cited 1997 Nov 4];2(3);[about 10 p.]. Available from: http://www.meniscus.com/bcc/Art2_23.html/.

• When the reference ends with a URL, do not follow with a period unless the URL ends with a forward slash.

In-text citation:

• Follow the standard author/date format. 

... (Gilman et al. 1990).

End Reference:

Author AA, Author BB, editors. Year. Title of work. Edition. Place of publication: Publisher name. Number of pages p.

Gilman AG, Rall TW, Nies AS, Taylor P, editors. 1990. The pharmacological basis of therapeutics. 8th ed. New York (NY): Pergamon. 1380 p. 

In-text citation

• Follow the standard author/date format.

... (Kuret and Murad 1990).

End Reference:

Author(s) of the part. Year. Title of the part. In: Author(s) or Editor(s). Title of book. Edition. Place of publication: Publisher name. p. pages of part.

Kuret JA, Murad F. 1990. Adenohypophyseal hormones and related substances. In: Gilman AG, Rall TW, Nies AS, Taylor P, editors. The pharmcological basis of therapeutics. 8th ed. New York (NY): Pergamon. p. 1334-1360.

• If the author of the part also is the author or editor of the book, place the book information before the part information.

Author(s) or Editor(s). Year. Title of book. Place of publication: Publisher name. Kind of part and its numeration, title; p. pages of part.

Hebel R, Stromberg MW. 1976. Anatomy of the laboratory rat. Baltimore (MD): Williams & Wilkins. Part C, Digestive system; p. 43-54.

In-text citation:

Use the abbreviation for the name of the organization.
... (HSF 2008).
... (ISO 1979).

End Reference:

• If there is a personal author and a group author, use the personal author.
• If an organization, use the abbreviation in the in-text citation, e.g., as (HSF 2008), as well as at the beginning of the end reference.
• Alphabetize the entry in the end references as though the name were spelled out in full.

[HSF] Heart & Stroke Foundation. 2008. Blood pressure action plan [Internet]. Ottawa (ON); [cited 2008 Aug 12]; [1 page]. Available from: http://www.heartandstroke.com/site/c.iklQLcMWJtE/b.3484475/.

[IOM] Institute of Medicine (US). 1975. Legalized abortion and public health: report of a study by a committee of the Institute of Medicine. Washington (DC): National Academy of Sciences (US).

In-text citation:

• ​Follow the standard author/date format.

... (Rosenberger and Specter 1989).

End Reference:

Author AA, Author BB. Date of publication. Article title. Newspaper title (edition). Section:beginning page of article (column number).

Rensberger B, Specter B. 1989 Aug 7. CFCs may be destroyed by natural process. Washington Post. Sect. A:2 (col.5).

In-text citation:

NOTE: When neither organization or author are known, consider carefully whether or not this source should be used. Generally, an anonymous source is not an acceptable reference in a scientific report. If an organization is listed, use this as the author. Please see Organization/Group as Author

Do not use "Anonymous." Instead, include the first word(s) of the title (only as many as are needed to distinguish the source from others) followed by an ellipsis (...).

… (Protocol... 2004).

End Reference:

• When neither organization or author are known, consider carefully whether or not this source should be used. Generally, an anonymous source is not an acceptable reference in a scientific report.
• If an organization is listed, use this as the author. Please see Organization/Group as Author.
• Omit author from reference, and begin with title. Do not use "Anonymous." (The in-text reference is Protocol... 2004)

Protocol for sterile procedures. 2004. Toronto (ON): Association for Microbiological Standards. 35 p.

In-text citation:

… (Smith [date unknown]).

End Reference:

Smith RA. [date unknown]. Health problems in the elderly. New York (NY): John Wiley & Sons. 315 p.

In-text citation:

• Unpublished information that is not available to other scholars is indicated parenthetically in the text only, with a note indicating it is not in the References list.
• Instead, add a "Notes" section at the end of your paper to provide further details about the communication, meeting, or materials, such as purpose, time, date, location, etc.

… (a 1998 Mar 26 e-mail from JR Ewing to me; unreferenced, see "Notes").
… (my 2004 Feb 17 notes from BIOL1030 lecture by T Dukator; unreferenced, see "Notes").

End Reference:

Include in the References list only those items that would be retrievable by other scholars (i.e., in a public archive such as a library).

• If not retrievable, add a "Notes" section at the end of your paper to provide further detail. 
• If retrievable but no title is available, construct one using the first few words of the document, and place it in square brackets. After the location information, include the library call number or other information.

For manuscripts:

Author(s). Date. Title of material. Physical description. Notes.

Darwin C. 1863. Letters to Sir William Jackson Hooker. 2 boxes. Located at: Archives, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, London (England); MS L.4562.

For a conference:

Author(s). Date of the conference. Title of paper. Paper presented at: Title of conference. Number and name of the conference; Place of the conference.

Antani S, Long LR, Thoma GR, Lee DJ. 2003. Anatomical shape representation in spine x-ray images. Paper presented at: VIIP 2003. Proceedings of the 3rd IASTED International Conference on Visualization, Imaging and Image Processing; Benalmadena, Spain. 

In-text citation:

If the homepage has no author, or if the organization is acting as both the author and the publisher, include the first word(s) of the homepage title followed by an ellipsis. Use only as many words as you need to distinguish the source from others.   

… (Plant Pathology… 2011)

End Reference:

• A homepage is the first or introductory page of a website.

Author(s). Date of publication or copyright. Title of homepage [medium designator]. Edition. Place of Publication: Publisher; [date updated; date cited]. Available from: URL

• If the homepage has no author, or if the organization is acting as both the author and publisher, begin with the homepage title and use the organization name as the publisher:

Title of homepage [medium designator]. Date of publication or copyright. Edition. Place of publication: Publisher; [date updated; date cited]. Available from: URL

Plant pathology at the University of Wisconsin - Madison [Internet]. c2011. Madison (WI): University of Wisconsin - Madison, College of Agricultural and Life Sciences; [cited 2011 Jul 6]. Available from: http://www.plantpath.wisc.edu/index.php

In-text citation

If the part or contribution of the website has no author other than the author of the site, include the first word(s) of the homepage title followed by an ellipsis. Use only as many words as you need to distinguish the source from others. 

… (Health Canada 2010)

End Reference:

• You may need to cite a portion of a website that is NOT a homepage, journal article, or book.
• If there is an author of the part, use this pattern:

Author(s). Date of publication or copyright. Title of part. Title of homepage [medium designator]. Place of publication: Publisher; [date updated; date cited]; [extent of part]. Available from: URL

Lai A. 2010. Somnambulism (sleepwalking): asleep with your eyes wide open. End your sleep deprivation [Internet]. Stanford (CA): Sleep and Dreams; [2011 Jul 3]; [about 7 screens]. Available from: http://www.end-your-sleep-deprivation.com/somnambulism.html

• If there is no author for the part other than the author of the site, begin with the homepage citation:

Title of homepage [medium designator]. Date of Publication or copyright. Place of publication: Publisher. Title of part; date of publication of part [date updated; date cited]; [extent of part]. Available from: URL

Health Canada [Internet]. 2010. Ottawa (ON): Health Canada. Nutrition and healthy eating; 2010 Feb 08 [cited 2011 Mar 8]; [1 screen]. Available from: http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/fn-an/nutrition/index-eng.php

In-text citation:

• Treat an article in a course reader as a part of an edited book or collection, citing the instructor as editor (unless another editor is indicated).

End Reference:

• Treat an article in a course reader as a "Part of an Edited Book or Collection," with the instructor of the course as editor.
• Use the page numbers of the reader, not the page numbers of the original source, even if they are reproduced in the reader

In-text citation:

• Treat these as books with the instructor as author (unless another author is indicated).

End Reference:

• Treat these as books, with the instructor as author (unless another author is indicated).

Stengos T. 2003. ECON*4640 Applied Econometrics course manual. Guelph (ON): University of Guelph. 

In-text citation:

• Treat these as books with the instructor as author if they are published, but as unpublished information if they are your own notes or are unpublished.
• Course or lecture notes may be considered “published” if they have been copied and distributed in print or on the web with the instructor’s permission.

End Reference:

• Treat these as books if they are published, but as unpublished information if they are your own notes, or are unpublished.
• Lecture notes are considered published if they have been copied and distributed in print or on the web with the instructor's permission.

 Print:

Stengos T. 2003. ECON*4640 Applied Econometrics course manual. Guelph (ON): University of Guelph. 

Online:

Stengos T. 2003. ECON*4640 Applied Econometrics course notes. [Internet]. Guelph (ON): University of Guelph; [cited 2003 Nov 23]. Available from: http://uofguelph.ca/econometrics.htm

Written personal communication such as letters and email should be cited within your paper and acknowledged in a "Notes" section, rather than being included in the References list (see example in In-Text Citations, under Unpublished Information).

… (Zelickson and Robbins 1986, p 24).

According to the CSE, you should never place in a reference list material that you have not seen.

• Always obtain the original document or item to verify that the information is accurate.
• If you are unable to locate the original, as in the example below, you need to cite the source that you actually did look at, but include enough information in your text to explain how you obtained the information.

… Brown (2003) describes the results of a 1911 study by A. F. King in which X was found to absorb Y.

Your reference list will include Brown 2003 but not King 1911.

Order them chronologically, earliest to latest.

… (Jones 1985, 1993, 2006).

If there are several in the same year, add a designator (a, b, c, etc.) to the year in the citation and the reference list.
… (Jones 2007a, 2007b).

Include the "a" and "b" when listing these sources in your reference list.

List them chronologically, and alphabetically if they were published in the same year. Separate authors with a semi-colon.

… (Sergeant 1973, 1975; Klevezal and Thompson 1980; Jones 1998a, 1998b; Alberts et al. 2001; Stanford 2001).

If the citations would otherwise be identical, provide initials or enough other names to distinguish between them.

… (Smith NB 1993; Smith TR 1993).
… (Elias BL and Elias SR 2004).
… (Smith, Jones, et al. 1990; Smith, Williams, et al. 1990).