Criminal Justice Sources

Citation styles provide rules for how to cite your sources. The three most common citation styles are APA, MLA and Chicago. APA tends to be used for Criminal Justice. The most common format for APA citations is to do a brief author-date-page citation in parenthesis within your text, followed by a full citation at the end of your paper in the Reference List section. Example:
 

Children who have at least one high-quality friendship are less likely to be arrested as adolescents (Berndt, 2002, p. 9).  

Reference List:

Berndt, T. J. (2002). Friendship quality and social development. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 11, 7-10.

VERY OFTEN, you can AUTOMATICALLY GENERATE and COPY/PASTE CITATIONS FOR YOUR REFERENCE LIST. See below for directions. You will still need to learn how to do in-text parenthetical citations, however. It is also a very good idea to become familiar with the actual rules of the citation styles so that you can correct the auto-generated citations, because they often have small errors in them. To see examples and explanations of the rules for APA Style:
OWL @ Purdue Guide to APA Style
  In-Text Citations: The Basics
  Reference List: Basic Rules
  Reference List: Electronic Sources (including journal articles found online, etc.; more rules on journal articles here)
  Reference List: Books