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Social Problems Research Guide

Topic Style: Citation and Formatting Information

For courses in sociology, use the American Sociological Association (ASA) Style. *The information on this guide pertains to the 7th ed.*

For additional help, check out ASA Help from Purdue Owl

If the information you need is not listed in the ASA Style Guide, see the Chicago Manual of Style.

Format Your Paper

  • All text (including footnotes, references, and endnotes) must be doubled spaced.
  • Text should be a 12-point serif font (e.g., Times New Roman)
  • Margins must be at least 1 inch on all four sides
  • Number pages (style guide doesn't specify where-best advice place in footnote centered)
  • Include a title page with the following: 
    • Running Head = SHORTENED TITLE in header.
    •  in the center of the paper: title of paper (Bold & title caps), author(s) and institution(s) of author(s) (list vertically if more than one author), Word Count = (text, footnotes, and references)
  • Starting with page 2 header should include SHORTENED TITLE in all caps
  • If required, on a separate page provide a short (150-200 word) abstract headed with the title on the first line.
  • Begin the text of the paper on a separate page headed with the title of the paper on the first line (all caps).

*see section 6.4.2 in the ASA Style Guide for an example.

**Please see your instructor’s specific document formatting instructions. If none are provided, follow these formatting guidelines .**

  • Start your references on a new page. Center the title, "REFERENCES," in all caps.
  • List all of the works you have cited in the paper.
  • List the references in alphabetical order by the author's last name, or the name of the organization, whichever is the first part of the citation.
  • The list is double-spaced with a hanging indent, meaning that, for a citation on more than one line, each line after the first is indented .5" from the left margin.

To create the hanging indent, highlight your list. Then find the paragraph settings in Word, you'll click the little icon in the lower right corner of the "Paragraph" section of the main toolbar. Then, choose the indentation style of hanging, and set it to .5".

paragraph feature in Word

Hanging indent feature in Word

*See Chap. 4 and 6 from the ASA Style guide

**Please see your instructor’s specific document formatting instructions. If none are provided, follow these formatting guidelines .**

ASA Reference Citation Format

**not shown in examples below, but use hanging indent for entries that are longer than one line

General Format

Author1 (last name first), Author2 (First name(s) Last name(s)), and Author 3. Year of publication. "Article Title." Name of Publication (italicized) Volume Number (Issue Number). doi or url.

online articles:  If you use an electronic article from a journal that is also available in print form, do not include page numbers.

 

Article with URL
Knoll, Benjamin R. 2009. "Amigo De La Raza? Reexamining Determinants of Latino Support in the U.S. Congress." Social Science Quarterly 90(1). https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1540-6237.2009.00610.x.

Article with Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
Adler, Patricia A., Steven J. Kless, and Peter Adler. 1992. "Socialization to Gender Roles: Popularity among Elementary School Boys and Girls." Sociology of Education 65(3). doi:10.2307/2112807.

Web Version of Newspapers & Magazine (include URL)
Clary, Mike. 2000. "Vieques Protesters Removed Without Incident." Los Angeles Times, May 5. http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/updates/lat_vieques000505.htm.

*For additional examples, see section 4.3 on pages 55-63 and section 5.2.2 on pages 87-88 in the ASA's Style Guide (2022).

Basic form for a book entry: Author1 (last name first), Author2 (surname last), and Author 3. Year of publication. Book Title. Location of publisher, state or province (replace state/province with country if a non-US/Canada publisher): Publisher's Name.

**not shown in examples below, but use hanging indent for entries that are longer than one line

One Author  
De Anda, Roberto M. 1995. Chicanas and Chicanos in Contemporary Society. Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon.

Two Authors
Herrera-Sobek, María, and Helena María Viramontes. 1995. Chicana (W)rites: On Word and Film. Berkeley, CA: Third Woman Press.

*note: only first author's name is inverted (e.g., last name, First).

Edition of Book
Acuña, Rodolfo F. 2011. Occupied America: A History of Chicanos. 7th ed. Boston, MA: Longman.

Edited Book
Jelin, Elizabeth, ed. 1991. Family, Household, and Gender Relations in Latin America. NY: Routledge, Chapman and Hall.
Note: When two or more editors place "eds".

Chapter in Book
Ruiz, Vicki L. 1987. "Star struck: Acculturation, Adolescence, and Mexican American Women, 1920-1950." Pp. 333-54 in Small Worlds: Children and Adolescents in America, 1850-1950, edited by E. West and P. Petrik. Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas.

E-book
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. 2002. The Dress of Women: A Critical Introduction to the Symbolism and Sociology of Clothing. Westport, CN: Greenwood Press. http://site.ebrary.com/lib/sjsu/docDetail.action?docID=10005606.

Dictionaries/Encyclopedias

When citing an article/entry from an encyclopedia or major dictionary, use the same guidelines as you would for a book chapter.

 

For additional examples, see section 4.3.2, pages 59, 61-63, and 67-68. See also section 5.2.1 on pages 85-88 in the ASA's Style Guide (2022).

**not shown in examples below, but use hanging indent for entries that are longer than one line

Government Documents/ Public Documents (Reports, Constitutions, Laws, and Ordinances)
Since the nature of public documents is so varied, the form of entry for documents cannot be standardized. The essential rule is to provide sufficient information so that the reader can locate the reference easily. For example see the following:

United States. Dept. of Housing and Urban Development. 1999. Rehab a home with HUD's 203(k): HUD and FHA are on your side. Washington, DC: U.S. Dept. of Housing and Urban Development.

U.S. Census Bureau. 1990. Characteristics of Population. Vol. 1. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.

U.S. Congress. House of Representatives. 2007. Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007. H.R. 2. 110th Congress, 1st Session, 2007. https://www.congress.gov/bill/110th-congress/house-bill/2.

*See page 89-94 and appendix in the ASA Style guide for additional examples.

Legal Citations

Court cases and legislative acts follow a format stipulated by legal publishers.The act or case is listed first, followed by volume number, abbreviated title, and the date of the work in which the act or case is found. The volume number is given in Arabic numerals, and the date is parenthesized. Court cases are italicized, but acts are not. Case names, including v., are italicized.

Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483 (1954).

U.S. Constitution, Article 1, Section 4.

If retrieved from an online database, such as Nexis Uni or HeinOnline, provide access information.

Ohio v. Vincer (Ohio App. Lexis 4356 [1999]).

 

*See page 89-94 and the appendix in the ASA Style guide for additional examples.

Dissertations and Theses
Thiele, Megan. 2011. "Class, Cultural Capital and the Elite University: A Look at Academic and Social Adjustment and Relations with Authority." PhD dissertation, Department of Sociology, University of California, Irvine. ProQuest, 874157583.
Note: The number listed at the end of the citation is the ProQuest document ID.

*See page 158 and the appendix in the ASA Style guide for additional examples.

**not shown in examples below, but use hanging indent for entries that are longer than one line

Forthcoming, Unpublished, Working Paper

Name of author. Year. "Title of Presentation." Location where the article was presented or is available or has been accepted for publication but has not yet been published.

Conger, Rand D. Forthcoming. “The Effects of Positive Feedback on Direction and Amount of Verbalization in a Social Setting.” Sociological Perspectives.

Schrodt, Philip A. 2006. "Twenty Years of the Kansas Event Data System Project." Department of Political Science, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS. Unpublished manuscript.

*See page 158 and appendix in the ASA Style guide for additional examples.

PowerPoint Presentation & Paper/Poster Sessions

Ford, Jessie, Paula England, and Jonathan Bearak. 2015. "The American College Hookup Scene: Findings from the Online College Life Survey." PowerPoint presentation. http://trailas.asanet.org/Pages/Resource.aspx?ResourceID=12959.

Smith, Tom. 2003. “General Social Survey.” Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Association, Atlanta, GA, August 16.

*See page 159 and appendix in the ASA Style guide for additional examples.

Include as much information as you can find about the website. Key bits of information: title of specific page used, title of the whole site, owner/publisher of the site, publication or revision date, URL.

**not shown in examples below, but use hanging indent for entries that are longer than one line

Websites

IBM (International Business Machines). 2009. "2009 Annual Report." http://www.ibm.com/annualreport/2009/2009_ibm_annual.pdf.

WERA (World Education Research Associton). n.d. "About WERA." Accessed June 30, 2018. https:wera.site-ym.com?AboutWERA.

(Include date of access for websites with unknown publication date)

For additional examples, see section 5.2.3 on pages 88-90 in the ASA's Style Guide (2022).

Blogs

Harrington, Brooke. 2010 "Economic Sociology." Contexts, blog, American Sociological Association, December 13.  http://contexts.org/economicsociology/.

DVD

Director. Year of video’s release. Title of Video. Location of production company: Production Company. Format.

Example: Spielberg, Steven. 1994. Schindler’s List. Universal City, CA: MCA Universal Home Video. DVD.

Online Video

McCright, Aaron. 2020. "Climate Change and Polarized America." Produced by the American Sociological Association. August 15. Video. https://youtu.be/JItRpbwQ0EM.

Dataset

Schneider, Barbara, and Linda J. Waite. 1998-2000. The 500 Family Study. Ann Arbor, MI:Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2008-06-03. doi:10.3886/ICPSR4549.v1.

Ruggles, Steven, Katie Genadek, Ronald Goeken, josiah Grover, and Matthew Sobek. 2017. Integrated Public Use Microdata Series:Version 7.0 [dataset]. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota. doi:10.18128/DO10.V&.0. 

 

Table  in PDF or Excel spreadsheet format

Scientists and Engineers Statistical Data System (SESTAT). 2006. "Table B-1: U.S. Scientists and Engineers, by Detailed Field and Level of Highest Degree Attained: 1999." http://nsf.gov/statistics/us-workforce/1999/tables/TableB1.pdf.

 

Survey Instrument

NSF (National Science Foundation). 2006. "2006 Survey of Doctorate Recepients." Arlington, VA: National Science Foundation. Http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/srvydoctoratework/surveys/srvydoctoratework_2006.pdf.

 

For additional examples, see appendix in the ASA's Style Guide (2022).

ASA Citing Within Your Text

General Formatting:

Basic form for citations in the text includes the last name of the author(s) and year of publication. Include page number when you quote directly from the work or refer to specific passages.

 If you are including the author’s name in your text, follow it with the publication year in parentheses:
Jelin (1977) indicates similar patterns for women in Argentina. 

If the author's name is not in the text, enclose the last name and year in parentheses:
Women also migrate to become involved in petty trade (Arizpe 1978).

For direct quotes:

One study found that "the variation in men's earnings relative to their peers in the labor force was not a reliable predictor of men's...flight from feminizing occupations" (Wright and Jacobs 1994:531).

Specific Examples of In-Text Citations

Type of Citation

First Citation in Text

Subsequent Citations in Text

Parenthetical Format, First Citation in Text

Parenthetical Format, Subsequent Citations in Text
One work by one author Walker (2007) Walker (2007) (Walker 2007) (Walker 2007)
One work by two authors Walker and Allen (2004) Walker and Allen (2004) (Walker and Allen 2004) (Walker and Allen 2004)
One work by three authors Bradley, Ramirez, and Soo (1999) Bradley et al. (1999) (Bradley, Ramirez, and Soo 1999) (Bradley et al. 1999)
One work by four or more authors Wasserstein et al. (2005) Wasserstein et al. (2005) (Wasserstein et al. 2005) (Wasserstein et al. 2005)
Groups/institutions as authors (readily identified through abbreviation) NIMH (2003) NIMH (2003) (NIMH 2003) (NIMH 2003)
Groups as authors (no abbreviation) University of Pittsburgh (2005) University of Pittsburgh (2005) (University of Pittsburgh 2005) (University of Pittsburgh 2005)

See American Sociological Association Style Guide (2022) for more information. Table from the University of Nebraska Kearney Library ASA Style Guide.

If citing two or more works by the same author:
According to Wilson (1978, 1987) race and class play a significant role in today's society.
 
If citing multiple works by several authors:
After the Civil Rights movement a growing number of racial/ethnic scholars such as Almaguer (1975), Barrera (1978), and Takaki (1979) challenged... 
or 
The subjects of this study seemed to perform their duties as determined by the institutional arrangements within which they worked (Watson, Kumar, and Michaelsen 1993; Cox, Lobel, and McLoed 1991; Fitzgerald 1993).

For unpublished material, use forthcoming to indicate material scheduled for publication. For dissertations and unpublished papers, cite the date. If no date is available, use n.d. in place of the date.

Previous studies by Smith (forthcoming) and Jones (n.d.) concluded....

If there is no author given, use the name of the organization or “corporate author” that is responsible for the publication, if there is one. Abbreviations of the full organization name is acceptable. Or,  use the first few words of the reference list entry (usually the title) and the year. Use quotation marks around titles of articles or web pages and italicize titles of books, periodicals, or reports. Treat in-text citations to legal materials such as court cases, statutes, and legislation the same as works with no author.

(ASA 2010)

(Social Class 2008)

Machine-readable data files, cite authorship and date:
....(Pew Research Center 2011).

See American Sociological Association Style Guide (2022) for more information.

Block quotations are set off in a separate, indented paragraph and should be used for longer quotations (generally, 50 words or more). Block quotations should not be enclosed in quotation marks and can be singled spaced..

As stated by Wright and Jacobs (1994:531):

The variation in men's earnings relative to their peers in the labor force was not reliable predictor of men's attrition. This finding is inconsistent with the prediction that declines in earnings are responsible for male flight from feminizing occupations.

OR

As a previous study found:

The variation in men's earnings relative to their peers in the labor force was not reliable predictor of men's attrition. This finding is inconsistent with the prediction that declines in earnings are responsible for male flight from feminizing occupations. (Wright and Jacobs 1994:531)

taken from the ASA Style Guide, 7th ed., 2022, p. 52