How to format your references using the Journal of Structural Engineering citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Journal of Structural Engineering. 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	Download the output style file
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

Brody, H. 2012. “Editorial: taste.” Nature, 486 (7403): S1.

A journal article with 2 authors

Rahman, M. A., and J. Halfar. 2014. “First evidence of chitin in calcified coralline algae: new insights into the calcification process of Clathromorphum compactum.” Sci. Rep., 4: 6162.

A journal article with 3 authors

Hess, K. L., C. J. Corda, and K. M. Lanese. 2011. “SPORE series winner. Science Buddies: advancing informal science education.” Science, 332 (6029): 550–551.

A journal article with 4 or more authors

Cordier, P., T. Ungár, L. Zsoldos, and G. Tichy. 2004. “Dislocation creep in MgSiO3 perovskite at conditions of the Earth’s uppermost lower mantle.” Nature, 428 (6985): 837–840.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Blair, R. 2011. Organic Production and Food Quality. Oxford, UK: Wiley-Blackwell.

An edited book

Dudoit, S. (Ed.). 2012. Selected Works of Terry Speed. Selected Works in Probability and Statistics. New York, NY: Springer.

A chapter in an edited book

Hallinger, P., and E. M. Bridges. 2007. “INTEGRATING TECHNOLOGY AND PROBLEM-BASED LEARNING.” A Problem-based Approach for Management Education: Preparing Managers for Action, E. M. Bridges, ed., 91–108. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands.

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 Structural Engineering.

Blog post

Andrew, E. 2014. “Ozone Layer Showing Signs Of Recovery.” IFLScience. IFLScience. Accessed October 30, 2018. https://www.iflscience.com/environment/ozone-layer-showing-signs-recovery/.

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. 1989. Computer Procurement: FAA’s $1.5-Billion Computer Resources Nucleus Project. 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

Rouhani, M. 2013. “Overdose prevention and naloxone distribution: A grant project.” Doctoral dissertation. Long Beach, CA: California State University, Long Beach.

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

Leland, J. 2016. “Gloria Steinem Never Stops.” New York Times, October 7, 2016.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Brody 2012).
This sentence cites two references (Brody 2012; Rahman and Halfar 2014).

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

Two authors: (Rahman and Halfar 2014)
Three or more authors: (Cordier et al. 2004)

About the journal

Full journal title	Journal of Structural Engineering
Abbreviation	J. Struct. Eng. (N. Y.)
ISSN (print)	0733-9445
ISSN (online)	1943-541X
Scope	Civil and Structural Engineering Mechanical Engineering Mechanics of Materials Building and Construction General Materials Science