How to format your references using the Children citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Children. 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
1.
Wilson, A. For Scientists Who Want a Career in Law, the Options Are Greater than Ever--and Some Don’t Even Involve Going Back to School. Nature 2003, 423, 666–667.
A journal article with 2 authors
1.
Deng, K.; Siliciano, R.F. HIV: Early Treatment May Not Be Early Enough. Nature 2014, 512, 35–36.
A journal article with 3 authors
1.
Esteban, J.; Mayoral, L.; Ray, D. Ethnicity and Conflict: Theory and Facts. Science 2012, 336, 858–865.
A journal article with 4 or more authors
1.
Bjedov, I.; Tenaillon, O.; Gérard, B.; Souza, V.; Denamur, E.; Radman, M.; Taddei, F.; Matic, I. Stress-Induced Mutagenesis in Bacteria. Science 2003, 300, 1404–1409.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book
1.
Tan, Y. Artificial Immune System Applications in Computersecurity; John Wiley & Sons, Inc.: Hoboken, NJ, 2016; ISBN 9781119076582.
An edited book
1.
Neurorehabilitation Technology; Reinkensmeyer, D.J., Dietz, V., Eds.; 2nd ed. 2016.; Springer International Publishing: Cham, 2016; ISBN 9783319286013.
A chapter in an edited book
1.
Acheson, K.; Vollmers, C. Teaching Promotion and Integrated Marketing Communications. In Proceedings of the 1994 Academy of Marketing Science (AMS) Annual Conference; Wilson, E.J., Black, W.C., Eds.; Developments in Marketing Science: Proceedings of the Academy of Marketing Science; Springer International Publishing: Cham, 2015; pp. 13–13 ISBN 9783319131610.

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 Children.

Blog post
1.
O`Callaghan, J. Cassini Snaps Best Ever Image Of Saturn’s Odd Moon Pandora Available online: https://www.iflscience.com/space/cassini-snaps-best-ever-image-of-saturns-odd-moon-pandora/ (accessed on 30 October 2018).

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
1.
Government Accountability Office Commercial Space Launch Insurance: Views Differ on Need for Change to Insurance Approach but Clarification Is Needed; U.S. Government Printing Office: Washington, DC, 2016;

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation
1.
Buckley, K.M. Diversity and Evolution of 185/333, an Immune -Related Gene Family from the Purple Sea Urchin, Strongylocentrotus Purpuratus. Doctoral dissertation, George Washington University: Washington, DC, 2008.

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
1.
Crow, K. 3-Card Monte Is Vanishing, Just Like Your $50 Bill Did. New York Times 2001, 146.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in square brackets:

This sentence cites one reference [1].
This sentence cites two references [1,2].
This sentence cites four references [1–4].

About the journal

Full journal titleChildren
AbbreviationChildren (Basel)
ISSN (online)2227-9067
Scope

Other styles