How to format your references using the Frontiers in Communication citation style

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

Cameron, A. (2015). Eric H. Davidson (1937-2015). Nature 526, 196.

A journal article with 2 authors

Lum, L., and Clevers, H. (2012). Cell biology. The unusual case of Porcupine. Science 337, 922–923.

A journal article with 3 authors

Hernlund, J. W., Thomas, C., and Tackley, P. J. (2005). A doubling of the post-perovskite phase boundary and structure of the Earth’s lowermost mantle. Nature 434, 882–886.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

Pancotto, L., De Angelis, G., Bizzarri, E., Barocchi, M. A., Del Giudice, G., Moschioni, M., et al. (2013). Expression of the Streptococcus pneumoniae pilus-1 undergoes on and off switching during colonization in mice. Sci. Rep. 3, 2040.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Walker, M. (2013). Happy-People-Pills For All. Oxford, UK: Wiley Blackwell.

An edited book

Pignolo, R. J., Crane, M. K., and Forciea, M. A. eds. (2008). Classic Papers in Geriatric Medicine with Current Commentaries. Totowa, NJ: Humana Press.

A chapter in an edited book

Wilson, D. (2005). “The Education and Training of Knowledge Workers,” in International Handbook on Globalisation, Education and Policy Research: Global Pedagogies and Policies, eds. J. Zajda, K. Freeman, M. Geo-Jaja, S. Majhanovic, V. Rust, and R. Zajda (Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands), 49–64.

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 Frontiers in Communication.

Blog post

Andrew, E. (2015). Adorable Baby Sloth Born At London Zoo. IFLScience. Available at: https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/cute-baby-sloth-born-london-zoo/ (Accessed October 30, 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

Government Accountability Office (2008). Digital Television Transition: Broadcasters’ Transition Status, Low-Power Station Issues, and Information on Consumer Awareness of the DTV Transition. 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

Ware, R. J. (2012). Middle School Students’ Perceptions of Their Interests in Reading As Defined By Engagement and Social Interaction When Using Sustained Silent Reading, SSR, and Peer Interests Reading Strategies, PIRS. St. Charles, MO: Lindenwood University.

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

Hubbard, B. (2017). With Harleys and Hamburgers, Saudis Salute U.S. on Trump’s Visit. New York Times, A12.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Cameron, 2015).
This sentence cites two references (Lum and Clevers, 2012; Cameron, 2015).

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

Two authors: (Lum and Clevers, 2012)
Three or more authors: (Pancotto et al., 2013)

About the journal

Full journal title	Frontiers in Communication
Abbreviation	Front. Commun.
ISSN (online)	2297-900X
Scope