How to format your references using the Learning and Instruction citation style

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

Jones, D. A. (2010). Financial pain should focus universities. Nature, 465(7294), 32–33.

A journal article with 2 authors

Navarro, A., & Barton, N. H. (2003). Chromosomal speciation and molecular divergence--accelerated evolution in rearranged chromosomes. Science (New York, N.Y.), 300(5617), 321–324.

A journal article with 3 authors

Long, S. B., Campbell, E. B., & Mackinnon, R. (2005). Crystal structure of a mammalian voltage-dependent Shaker family K+ channel. Science (New York, N.Y.), 309(5736), 897–903.

A journal article with 8 or more authors

Cole, B. E., Williams, J. B., King, B. T., Sherwin, M. S., & Stanley, C. R. (2001). Coherent manipulation of semiconductor quantum bits with terahertz radiation. Nature, 410(6824), 60–63.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Rim, C. T., & Mi, C. (2017). Wireless Power Transfer for Electric Vehicles and Mobile Devices. John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

An edited book

Zaidi, M. K. (Ed.). (2007). Wastewater Reuse–Risk Assessment, Decision-Making and Environmental Security. Springer Netherlands.

A chapter in an edited book

Mossakowski, T., Pawłowski, W., Sannella, D., & Tarlecki, A. (2014). Parchments for CafeOBJ Logics. In S. Iida, J. Meseguer, & K. Ogata (Eds.), Specification, Algebra, and Software: Essays Dedicated to Kokichi Futatsugi (pp. 66–91). Springer.

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 Learning and Instruction.

Blog post

Andrew, E. (2015, July 16). New Horizons Brings Pluto’s Mysterious Moons Into Sharper Focus. IFLScience; IFLScience. https://www.iflscience.com/space/new-horizons-brings-pluto-s-mysterious-moons-sharper-focus/

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. (1997). National Weather Service: Modernization Activities Affecting Northwestern Pennsylvania (AIMD-97-156). 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

Payne, N. A. (2010). Adults who have learning disabilities: Transition from GED to postsecondary activities [Doctoral dissertation]. Capella 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

Saslow, L. (2009, April 26). Suffolk County College Is Raising Tuition. New York Times, LI2.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Jones, 2010).
This sentence cites two references (Jones, 2010; Navarro & Barton, 2003).

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

Two authors: (Navarro & Barton, 2003)
Three authors: (Long et al., 2005)
6 or more authors: (Cole et al., 2001)

About the journal

Full journal title	Learning and Instruction
Abbreviation	Learn. Instr.
ISSN (print)	0959-4752
Scope	Developmental and Educational Psychology Education

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