How to format your references using the International Journal of Communication citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for International Journal of 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

Rausher, M. D. (2007). Comment on “Evolutionary paths underlying flower color variation in Antirrhinum.” Science (New York, N.Y.), 315(5811), 461; author reply 461.

A journal article with 2 authors

Cook-Andersen, H., & Wilkinson, M. F. (2015). Molecular biology: Splicing does the two-step. Nature, 521(7552), 300–301.

A journal article with 3 authors

Tang, R.-Y., Li, G., & Yu, J.-Q. (2014). Conformation-induced remote meta-C-H activation of amines. Nature, 507(7491), 215–220.

A journal article with 8 or more authors

Nerin, C., Ubeda, J. L., Alfaro, P., Dahmani, Y., Aznar, M., Canellas, E., & Ausejo, R. (2014). Compounds from multilayer plastic bags cause reproductive failures in artificial insemination. Scientific Reports, 4, 4913.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Ghaye, T. (2008). Developing the Reflective Healthcare Team. Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

An edited book

Coen, S. (Ed.). (2012). Mathematicians in Bologna 1861–1960. Springer.

A chapter in an edited book

Rémy, B., Thuillier, A., & Werner, A. (2015). Bruhat-Tits Buildings and Analytic Geometry. In A. Ducros, C. Favre, & J. Nicaise (Eds.), Berkovich Spaces and Applications (pp. 141–202). Springer International Publishing.

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 International Journal of Communication.

Blog post

Taub, B. (2016, November 30). Newly Discovered Fossils Provide Snapshot Of Life On Earth Before The Oxygen Crisis. IFLScience; IFLScience. https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/newly-discovered-fossils-provide-life-earth-before-oxygen-crisis/

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. (1996). Customs Service Modernization: Strategic Information Management Must Be Improved for National Automation Program to Succeed (AIMD-96-57). 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

Herrlich, A. (2010). Transparency and medical interventions in vital statistics reports: Quantitative research and analysis [Doctoral dissertation]. George Washington 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

Witz, B. (2017, March 15). A Button-Down Game Gets a Needed Pinch of Pizazz. New York Times, B18.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Rausher, 2007).
This sentence cites two references (Cook-Andersen & Wilkinson, 2015; Rausher, 2007).

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

Two authors: (Cook-Andersen & Wilkinson, 2015)
Three authors: (Tang et al., 2014)
6 or more authors: (Nerin et al., 2014)

About the journal

Full journal title	International Journal of Communication
ISSN (print)	1932-8036
Scope

Research and Writing Guides