How to format your references using the Music Education Research citation style

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

Zatorre, Robert J. 2013. “Predispositions and Plasticity in Music and Speech Learning: Neural Correlates and Implications.” Science (New York, N.Y.) 342 (6158): 585–589.

A journal article with 2 authors

Olson, Peter, and Douglas Hanahan. 2009. “Cancer. Breaching the Cancer Fortress.” Science (New York, N.Y.) 324 (5933): 1400–1401.

A journal article with 3 authors

Bingenheimer, Jeffrey B., Robert T. Brennan, and Felton J. Earls. 2005. “Firearm Violence Exposure and Serious Violent Behavior.” Science (New York, N.Y.) 308 (5726): 1323–1326.

A journal article with 11 or more authors

Li, Qiang, Minyou Chen, Matjaž Perc, Azhar Iqbal, and Derek Abbott. 2013. “Effects of Adaptive Degrees of Trust on Coevolution of Quantum Strategies on Scale-Free Networks.” Scientific Reports 3 (October): 2949.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Simon, Laurent, and Juan Ospina. 2015. Closed-Form Solutions for Drug Transport through Controlled-Release Devices in Two and Three Dimensions. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

An edited book

Cercignani, Carlo, and Ester Gabetta, eds. 2007. Transport Phenomena and Kinetic Theory: Applications to Gases, Semiconductors, Photons, and Biological Systems. Modeling and Simulation in Science, Engineering and Technology. Boston, MA: Birkhäuser.

A chapter in an edited book

Pieracci, Fredric M., and Ernest E. Moore. 2014. “Principles and Philosophy of Damage Control Surgery.” In Trauma Surgery: Volume 1: Trauma Management, Trauma Critical Care, Orthopaedic Trauma and Neuro-Trauma, edited by S. Di Saverio, G. Tugnoli, F. Catena, L. Ansaloni, and N. Naidoo, 43–64. Milano: 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 Music Education Research.

Blog post

Andrew, Elise. 2015. “Seal Attacks And Devours Guts Of 5 Sharks In One Sitting.” IFLScience. IFLScience. https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/seal-attacks-and-devours-guts-5-sharks-one-sitting/.

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. 2017. Homeland Security: Progress Made to Implement IT Reform, but Additional Chief Information Officer Involvement Needed. GAO-17-284. 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

Tripputi, Mark Thomas. 2009. “Use of Mediation in Designing Clinical Trials with Two Primary Endpoints.” Doctoral dissertation, Washington, DC: 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

Detrick, Ben. 2017. “Following a Giant’s Flamin’ Hot Footsteps.” New York Times, October 7.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Zatorre 2013).
This sentence cites two references (Zatorre 2013; Olson and Hanahan 2009).

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

Two authors: (Olson and Hanahan 2009)
Three authors: (Bingenheimer, Brennan, and Earls 2005)
4 or more authors: (Li et al. 2013)

About the journal

Full journal title	Music Education Research
Abbreviation	Music Educ. Res.
ISSN (print)	1461-3808
ISSN (online)	1469-9893
Scope	Music Education