How to format your references using the Family Medicine citation style

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

Midgley GF. Ecology. Biodiversity and ecosystem function. Science. 2012 Jan 13;335(6065):174–5.

A journal article with 2 authors

Divakaruni AS, Murphy AN. Cell biology. A mitochondrial mystery, solved. Science. 2012 Jul 6;337(6090):41–3.

A journal article with 3 authors

Ben-Ami Bartal I, Decety J, Mason P. Empathy and pro-social behavior in rats. Science. 2011 Dec 9;334(6061):1427–30.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

Xiao X, Yao Y, Zhou LM, Wang X. Distribution of quantum Fisher information in asymmetric cloning machines. Sci Rep. 2014 Dec 8;4:7361.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Alberty RA. Enzyme Kinetics: Rapid-Equilibrium Enzyme Kinetics. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; 2011. (Methods of Biochemical Analysis).

An edited book

Fastl H. Psychoacoustics: Facts and Models. Zwicker E, editor. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer; 2007. XII, 463 p.

A chapter in an edited book

Husain Z, Dutta M. Nabadiganta: Women Workers in Kolkata’s IT Sector. In: Dutta M, editor. Women in Kolkata’s IT Sector: Satisficing Between Work and Household. New Delhi: Springer India; 2014. p. 75–96. (SpringerBriefs in Sociology).

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 Family Medicine.

Blog post

O`Callaghan J. How Close Are We To Finding Another Earth? [Internet]. IFLScience. IFLScience; 2015 [cited 2018 Oct 30]. Available from: https://www.iflscience.com/space/how-close-are-we-finding-another-earth/

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. Noncitizen Student Loan Defaults. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 1983 Feb. Report No.: HRD-83-29.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Scott E. Effects of cultural nutritional education among Hispanic women with diabetes [Doctoral dissertation]. [Long Beach, CA]: California State University, Long Beach; 2013.

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

Billard M. And Here’s How It Got on Your Head. New York Times. 2010 May 13;E6.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in superscript:

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 title	Family Medicine
Abbreviation	Fam. Med.
ISSN (print)	0742-3225
ISSN (online)	1938-3800
Scope	Family Practice