How to format your references using the Ecology and Society citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Ecology and Society. 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

Bainbridge, W. S. 2007. The scientific research potential of virtual worlds. Science (New York, N.Y.) 317(5837):472–476.

A journal article with 2 authors

State, M. W., and N. Šestan. 2012. Neuroscience. The emerging biology of autism spectrum disorders. Science (New York, N.Y.) 337(6100):1301–1303.

A journal article with 3 authors

Hansen, L. N., M. E. Zimmerman, and D. L. Kohlstedt. 2012. Laboratory measurements of the viscous anisotropy of olivine aggregates. Nature 492(7429):415–418.

A journal article with 4 or more authors

Dennis, M. S., C. Eigenbrot, N. J. Skelton, M. H. Ultsch, L. Santell, M. A. Dwyer, M. P. O’Connell, and R. A. Lazarus. 2000. Peptide exosite inhibitors of factor VIIa as anticoagulants. Nature 404(6777):465–470.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Adams, F., and K. Aizawa. 2010. The Bounds of Cognition. Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford, UK.

An edited book

Dincer, I., C. O. Colpan, and F. Kadioglu, editors. 2013. Causes, Impacts and Solutions to Global Warming. Springer, New York, NY.

A chapter in an edited book

Tay, K.-H., S. Apostolakis, D. A. Lane, and G. Y. H. Lip. 2013. Hemorrhage Risks, Patient Perspectives, and Quality-of-Life Issues. Pages 41–51 in G. Y. H. Lip and E. Shantsila, editors. Handbook of Oral Anticoagulation. Springer Healthcare Ltd., Tarporley.

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 Ecology and Society.

Blog post

Davis, J. 2016, December 15. World’s Oldest Water Discovered 3 Kilometers Underground. IFLScience.

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. 2014. F-35 Joint Strike Fighter: Slower Than Expected Progress in Software Testing May Limit Initial Warfighting Capabilities. U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Saldivar, N. 2014. Understanding the impact of AB-12 on the child welfare workforce. Doctoral dissertation, California State University, Long Beach, Long Beach, CA.

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

St. John Kelly, E. 1994, May 29. PLAYING IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD. New York Times:148.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Bainbridge 2007).
This sentence cites two references (Bainbridge 2007, State and Šestan 2012).

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

Two authors: (State and Šestan 2012)
Three or more authors: (Dennis et al. 2000)

About the journal

Full journal title	Ecology and Society
Abbreviation	Conserv. Ecol.
ISSN (print)	1195-5449
Scope	Nature and Landscape Conservation