How to format your references using the Northeastern Naturalist citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Northeastern Naturalist. 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:

PaperpileThe citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNoteDownload the output style file
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and othersThe style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeXBibTeX 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
Moreno, E. 2014. Cancer: Darwinian tumour suppression. Nature 509:435–436.
A journal article with 2 authors
Manukyan, M., and P.B. Singh. 2014. Epigenome rejuvenation: HP1β mobility as a measure of pluripotent and senescent chromatin ground states. Scientific reports 4:4789.
A journal article with 3 authors
Gilchrist, A., K.J. Resch, and A.G. White. 2007. Quantum information: source of triggered entangled photon pairs? Nature 445:E4-5; discussion E5-6.
A journal article with 4 or more authors
Ives, A.R., A. Einarsson, V.A.A. Jansen, and A. Gardarsson. 2008. High-amplitude fluctuations and alternative dynamical states of midges in Lake Myvatn. Nature 452:84–87.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book
Tue, N.V., M. Reichel, and M. Fischer. 2016. Berechnung und Bemessung von Betonbrücken. Wilhelm Ernst & Sohn, Verlag für Architektur und technische Wissenschaften GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin, Germany.
An edited book
Baba, A., G. Tayfur, O. Gündüz, K.W.F. Howard, M.J. Friedel, and A. Chambel (Eds.). 2011. Climate Change and its Effects on Water Resources: Issues of National and Global Security. Vol. 3. NATO Science for Peace and Security Series C: Environmental Security, Springer Netherlands, Dordrecht. XVI, 318 p. 114 illus., 74 illus. in color pp.
A chapter in an edited book
Damaschke, P. 2008. Multiple Hypernode Hitting Sets and Smallest Two-Cores with Targets. Pp. 32–42, In B. Yang, D.-Z. Du, and C.A. Wang (Eds.). Combinatorial Optimization and Applications: Second International Conference, COCOA 2008, St. John’s, NL, Canada, August 21-24, 2008. Proceedings. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg.

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 Northeastern Naturalist.

Blog post
Andrew, E. 2014. Penn & Teller Call Bullshit on Anti-Vaccination. IFLScience. IFLScience. Available online at https://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/penn-teller-call-bullshit-anti-vaccination/. Accessed October 30, 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. 1988. ADP Planning: Allegations of Inadequate Procurements at the National Archives. U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation
Ponder, S. 2010. Parent information nights: An elementary school principal’s search to increase parent input and affect the learning-at-home environment. Doctoral dissertation. Lindenwood University, St. Charles, MO.

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
Carter, D.T. 2016. What Donald Trump Owes George Wallace. New York Times8 January 2016:SR6.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Moreno 2014).
This sentence cites two references (Manukyan and Singh 2014, Moreno 2014).

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

  • Two authors: (Manukyan and Singh 2014)
  • Three or more authors: (Ives et al. 2008)

About the journal

Full journal titleNortheastern Naturalist
AbbreviationNortheast. Nat. (Steuben)
ISSN (print)1092-6194
ISSN (online)1938-5307
ScopeEcology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics

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