How to format your references using the Mathematics Education Research Journal citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Mathematics Education Research Journal. 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

Nelson, S. (2008). Big data: The Harvard computers. Nature, 455(7209), 36–37.

A journal article with 2 authors

Sincich, L. C., & Horton, J. C. (2002). Divided by cytochrome oxidase: a map of the projections from V1 to V2 in macaques. Science (New York, N.Y.), 295(5560), 1734–1737.

A journal article with 3 authors

Li, D., Zhang, P., & Yan, J. (2014). Ab initio molecular dynamics study of high-pressure melting of beryllium oxide. Scientific reports, 4, 4707.

A journal article with 8 or more authors

Alleman, M., Sidorenko, L., McGinnis, K., Seshadri, V., Dorweiler, J. E., White, J., et al. (2006). An RNA-dependent RNA polymerase is required for paramutation in maize. Nature, 442(7100), 295–298.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Smith, G. S. (2013). Straight to the Top. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

An edited book

Luisi, P. L., & Stano, P. (Eds.). (2011). The Minimal Cell: The Biophysics of Cell Compartment and the Origin of Cell Functionality. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands.

A chapter in an edited book

Thaman, K. H. (2007). Partnerships for Progressing Cultural Democracy in Teacher Education in Pacific Island Countries. In T. Townsend & R. Bates (Eds.), Handbook of Teacher Education (pp. 53–66). 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 Mathematics Education Research Journal.

Blog post

Andrew, E. (2015, January 19). Watch SpaceX’s Rocket Explode During Return Experiment. IFLScience. IFLScience. https://www.iflscience.com/space/watch-spacexs-rocket-explode-during-return-experiment/. Accessed 30 October 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. (2012). K-12 Education: Selected States and School Districts Cited Numerous Federal Requirements As Burdensome, While Recognizing Some Benefits (No. GAO-12-672). 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

Liza, J. S. (2009). Mentors’ perceptions of bullying in middle and high school settings (Doctoral dissertation). California State University, Long Beach, Long Beach, CA.

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

Shear, M. D. (2017, August 1). In Trump’s Silence, Pence Takes a Swipe at Russia. New York Times, p. A8.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Nelson 2008).
This sentence cites two references (Nelson 2008; Sincich and Horton 2002).

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

Two authors: (Sincich and Horton 2002)
Three or more authors: (Alleman et al. 2006)

About the journal

Full journal title	Mathematics Education Research Journal
Abbreviation	Math. Educ. Res. J.
ISSN (print)	1033-2170
ISSN (online)	2211-050X
Scope	General Mathematics Education

Research and Writing Guides