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Guidelines to APA Style: Quotation

Libguide on citing sources in APA Style.

When to use a quotation?

A quotation is a text passage that you copy verbatim from the source. 

You use a quotation:

  • When reproducing an exact definition
  • When an author has said something memorably or succinctly
  • When you want to respond to exact wording

Rules for quotation

  • The quotation is followed by a reference in parentheses that lists the last name of the author(s), the year, and page number(s).
  • Page numbers are indicated by the abbreviation 'p.' (page). If a quotation (in the original text) runs to the next page, 'pp.' (pages) is used:
"Each research project aims to provide knowledge, insight and information that can contribute towards solving a problem" (Verschuren & Doorewaard, 2010, p. 33), as does our research project.

 

  • A quote is not in italics and the text may not be changed.
  • If a section of text within the quote is irrelevant, it may be omitted. In place of the omitted portion, place the inhibition sign (three dots) with a space between the dots:
"How well you nourish yourself does not depend on the selection of any one food. . . . Diet-planning principles and dietary guidelines are key concepts to keep in mind whenever you are selecting foods" (Whitney & Rolfes, 2022, p. 35).

 

  • An error in a quotation can be indicated by specifying [sic] immediately after the error.
  • You are allowed to make a lower case out of a capital letter if the quote is not at the beginning of a sentence. 

 

Short quotation (less than 40 words)

A quote of less than 40 words is enclosed in "quotation marks" in the running text.

  • When the author(s) are named in the text, they do not need to be listed again in parentheses.
According to Frith and Martin (2021) "there is bureaucracy in social work, and if it hinders effective professional practice it is damaging to the profession" (p. 6).

 

  • If you do not mention the author leading up to the citation, place the author's name and the year and page number(s) in parentheses.

As can be expected, "footballer's wages and transfer fees generates huge amounts of media attention as well as moans and groans on message boards, social media and in pubs across the country" (Maguire, 2021, p. 51).

 

Block quotation (40 words or more)

A quote of 40 words or more is displayed in a stand-alone, indented block, without quotation marks. Above and below the block quote will be a blank line.

  • Author(s) in the running text:

Wagh et al. (2021, p. 47) define data munging with SQL as follows:

Data munging (or wrangling) is the phase of data transformation. It trans-forms data into various states so that it is simpler to work and understand the data. The transformation may lead to manually convert or merge or update the data manually in a certain format to generate data, which is ready for processing by the data analysis tools. In this process, we actually transform and map data from one format to another format to make it more valuable for a variety of analytics tools.

In our research ....

 

  • Author in parentheses:

In Fundamentals of Data Science data munging with SQL is described as follows:

Data munging (or wrangling) is the phase of data transformation. It trans-forms data into various states so that it is simpler to work and understand the data. The transformation may lead to manually convert or merge or update the data manually in a certain format to generate data, which is ready for processing by the data analysis tools. In this process, we actually transform and map data from one format to another format to make it more valuable for a variety of analytics tools. (Wagh et al., 2021, p. 47)

In our research ....

 

Note: In the second example, in the text the title of the book is given in italics. The dot comes before the source reference here because the reference is not a part of the quotation.