How to format your references using the Contemporary Sociology citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Contemporary Sociology. 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:

Paperpile	The citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNote	Find the style here: output styles overview
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and others	The style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeX	BibTeX 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

Verrijzer, C. P. 2001. “Transcription Factor IID--Not so Basal after All.” Science (New York, N.Y.) 293(5537):2010–11.

A journal article with 2 authors

Peters, Shanan E., and Michael Foote. 2002. “Determinants of Extinction in the Fossil Record.” Nature 416(6879):420–24.

A journal article with 3 authors

Tuthill, P. G., J. D. Monnier, and W. C. Danchi. 2001. “A Dusty Torus around the Luminous Young Star LkH Alpha101.” Nature 409(6823):1012–14.

A journal article with 4 or more authors

Stellamanns, Eric, Sravanti Uppaluri, Axel Hochstetter, Niko Heddergott, Markus Engstler, and Thomas Pfohl. 2014. “Optical Trapping Reveals Propulsion Forces, Power Generation and Motility Efficiency of the Unicellular Parasites Trypanosoma Brucei Brucei.” Scientific Reports 4:6515.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Somjit, Nutapong, Ian Robertson, and Mitchai Chongcheawchamnan. 2016. Microwave and Millimetre-Wave Design for Wireless Communications. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

An edited book

Santiago-Fandiño, V., H. Tanaka, and M. Spiske, eds. 2016. Tsunamis and Earthquakes in Coastal Environments: Significance and Restoration. Vol. 14. Cham: Springer International Publishing.

A chapter in an edited book

Fasthuber, Robert, Francky Catthoor, Praveen Raghavan, and Frederik Naessens. 2013. “Case Study 2: DSIP Architecture Instances for FIR Filtering.” Pp. 171–218 in Energy-Efficient Communication Processors: Design and Implementation for Emerging Wireless Systems, edited by F. Catthoor, P. Raghavan, and F. Naessens. New York, NY: 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 Contemporary Sociology.

Blog post

Andrew, Elise. 2014. “Brain Pathway Rediscovered After 100 Years.” IFLScience. Retrieved October 30, 2018 (https://www.iflscience.com/brain/brain-pathway-rediscovered-after-100-years/).

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. 1988. Customs Automation: Observations on Selected Automated Commercial System Modules. IMTEC-89-4BR. Washington, DC: 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

Nichols, Jennifer. 2012. “Genetic and Genomic Mechanisms of Neonatal Hyperoxic Lung Injury in the Inbred Mouse.” Doctoral dissertation, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC.

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

Yablonsky, Linda. 2010. “Art and Action.” New York Times, October 17, M242.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Verrijzer 2001).
This sentence cites two references (Peters and Foote 2002; Verrijzer 2001).

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

Two authors: (Peters and Foote 2002)
Three authors: (Tuthill, Monnier, and Danchi 2001)
4 or more authors: (Stellamanns et al. 2014)

About the journal

Full journal title	Contemporary Sociology
Abbreviation	Contemp. Sociol.
ISSN (print)	0094-3061
Scope	Sociology and Political Science