How to format your references using the Journal of Medical Ethics citation style

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

Kerp H. Atmospheric CO2 from fossil plant cuticles. Nature 2002;415:38.

A journal article with 2 authors

Bradshaw W, Holzapfel C. Evolution. Tantalizing timeless. Science 2007;316:1851–2.

A journal article with 3 authors

Bruins HJ, van der Plicht J, Mazar A. 14C dates from Tel Rehov: Iron-Age chronology, pharaohs, and Hebrew kings. Science 2003;300:315–8.

A journal article with 4 or more authors

Blackburn TM, Cassey P, Duncan RP, et al. Avian extinction and mammalian introductions on oceanic islands. Science 2004;305:1955–8.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Stavetski EJ. Managing Hedge Fund Managers. Hoboken, NJ: : John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2009.

An edited book

Horimoto K, Regensburger G, Rosenkranz M, et al., editors. Algebraic Biology: Third International Conference, AB 2008, Castle of Hagenberg, Austria, July 31-August 2, 2008 Proceedings. Berlin, Heidelberg: : Springer 2008.

A chapter in an edited book

Heredia RR, López BG, García O, et al. Bilingual Reading: The Visual Moving Window. In: Heredia RR, Altarriba J, Cieślicka AB, eds. Methods in Bilingual Reading Comprehension Research. New York, NY: : Springer 2016. 99–121.

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 Journal of Medical Ethics.

Blog post

Andrew E. The Genetic Blueprint Of An Octopus Reveals Much About This Amazing Creature. IFLScience. 2015.https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/genetic-blueprint-octopus-reveals-much-about-amazing-creature/ (accessed 30 Oct 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. Transportation Enhancements: Status of the $2.4 Billion Authorized for Nonmotorized Transportation. Washington, DC: : U.S. Government Printing Office 1996.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Schwartz KA. Dynamics of Teacher Self-Efficacy: Middle School Reading and Language Arts Teacher Responses on a Teacher Sense of Efficacy Scale. 2010.

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

Healy J, Schwartz J. U.S. Suspends Pipeline Work in Tribes’ Path. New York Times. 2016;:A1.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in square brackets:

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	Journal of Medical Ethics
Abbreviation	J. Med. Ethics
ISSN (print)	0306-6800
ISSN (online)	1473-4257
Scope	Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous) Health Policy Issues, ethics and legal aspects Health(social science)

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