Rules

In-text citations

• Sources are numbered consecutively in the order they appear in the text. If you cite the same source multiple times, the same number is used.
• In the text, only the reference number is given, in parentheses, optionally with page numbers:
  • … as a clarifying factor in the diagnosis (1, p. 72)
• You may give the author's name or other information in the text where relevant, but the citation is only a number:
  • The Health Personnel Act (8) states that …
  • … in the Government's climate strategy (10) it is proposed that …
  • … as suggested by Miller et al. (11) the vaccine should …
• If you cite several sources at once, list the references with commas, without spaces, like this: (1,3,7)
• Or use a hyphen: (1-4), where sources 1, 2, 3 and 4 support the same point.

Quotations

Direct quotations must be reproduced verbatim and cited with page numbers. Quotations of three lines or fewer are written directly into the text and marked with quotation marks. Quotations longer than three lines are placed in a separate indented paragraph. Quotation marks are not used for the indented block. Read more about using direct and indirect quotations here.

Reference list

• The reference list is ordered numerically.
• List the first six authors followed by "et al." if there are more than six authors.
• Use official abbreviations for journal titles. Official abbreviations can be found, for example, in the PubMed Journals database.

Reference types

Examples are listed in the sidebar by source type.