How to format your references using the British Journal of Developmental Psychology citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for British Journal of Developmental Psychology. For a complete guide how to prepare your manuscript refer to the journal's instructions to authors.

Using reference management software

Typically you don't format your citations and bibliography by hand. The easiest way is to use a reference manager:

PaperpileThe citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNoteFind the style here: output styles overview
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and othersThe style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeXBibTeX syles are usually part of a LaTeX template. Check the instructions to authors if the publisher offers a LaTeX template for this journal.

Journal articles

Those examples are references to articles in scholarly journals and how they are supposed to appear in your bibliography.

Not all journals organize their published articles in volumes and issues, so these fields are optional. Some electronic journals do not provide a page range, but instead list an article identifier. In a case like this it's safe to use the article identifier instead of the page range.

A journal article with 1 author
Bernstein, R. (2015). Into the wilderness. Science (New York, N.Y.), 347(6227), 1282.
A journal article with 2 authors
Engwerda, C. R., & Good, M. F. (2012). Immunology. Platelets kill the parasite within. Science (New York, N.Y.), 338(6112), 1304–1305.
A journal article with 3 authors
Ledingham, K. W. D., McKenna, P., & Singhal, R. P. (2003). Applications for nuclear phenomena generated by ultra-intense lasers. Science (New York, N.Y.), 300(5622), 1107–1111.
A journal article with 8 or more authors
Kamalakar, M. V., Dankert, A., Bergsten, J., Ive, T., & Dash, S. P. (2014). Enhanced tunnel spin injection into graphene using chemical vapor deposited hexagonal boron nitride. Scientific Reports, 4, 6146.

Books and book chapters

Here are examples of references for authored and edited books as well as book chapters.

An authored book
Gerardi, M. H. (2003). Settleability Problems and Loss of Solids in the Activated Sludge Process. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
An edited book
Allhoff, F., & Lin, P. (Eds.). (2009). Nanotechnology & Society: Current and Emerging Ethical Issues. Springer Netherlands.
A chapter in an edited book
Terasaki, H., & Komizo, Y.-I. (2010). Direct Analysis of Solidification-Mode During Welding for the Assessment of Hot-Cracking. In T. Kannengiesser, S. S. Babu, Y.-I. Komizo, & A. J. Ramirez (Eds.), In-situ Studies with Photons, Neutrons and Electrons Scattering (pp. 77–83). Springer.

Web sites

Sometimes references to web sites should appear directly in the text rather than in the bibliography. Refer to the Instructions to authors for British Journal of Developmental Psychology.

Blog post
O`Callaghan, J. (2016, September 28). Everything You Need To Know About Elon Musk’s Plan To Colonize Mars. IFLScience; IFLScience. https://www.iflscience.com/space/everything-you-need-to-know-about-elon-musks-plan-to-colonize-mars/

Reports

This example shows the general structure used for government reports, technical reports, and scientific reports. If you can't locate the report number then it might be better to cite the report as a book. For reports it is usually not individual people that are credited as authors, but a governmental department or agency like "U. S. Food and Drug Administration" or "National Cancer Institute".

Government report
Government Accountability Office. (1979). NAVSTAR Global Positioning System--A Program With Many Uncertainties (PSAD-79-16). U.S. Government Printing Office.

Theses and dissertations

Theses including Ph.D. dissertations, Master's theses or Bachelor theses follow the basic format outlined below.

Doctoral dissertation
Collette, J. C. (2017). Validation of the tgFgfr1-EGFP Mouse Line as a Tool to Study Fibroblast Growth Factor Receptor 1 Cellular Localization and Expression After Experimental Manipulations [Doctoral dissertation]. University of Louisiana.

News paper articles

Unlike scholarly journals, news papers do not usually have a volume and issue number. Instead, the full date and page number is required for a correct reference.

New York Times article
Moore, K. A. (2007, August 21). Take Al Qaeda to Court. New York Times, A19.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by name and year in parentheses:

This sentence cites one reference (Bernstein, 2015).
This sentence cites two references (Bernstein, 2015; Engwerda & Good, 2012).

Here are examples of in-text citations with multiple authors:

  • Two authors: (Engwerda & Good, 2012)
  • Three authors: (Ledingham et al., 2003)
  • 6 or more authors: (Kamalakar et al., 2014)

About the journal

Full journal titleBritish Journal of Developmental Psychology
AbbreviationBr. J. Dev. Psychol.
ISSN (print)0261-510X
ISSN (online)2044-835X
ScopeDevelopmental Neuroscience
Developmental and Educational Psychology

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