How to format your references using the Nursing Outlook citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Nursing Outlook. 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
Huang, A. S.-H. (2004). Follow your nose. Nature, 428(6979), 221–222.
A journal article with 2 authors
Grant, P. R., & Grant, B. R. (2006). Evolution of character displacement in Darwin’s finches. Science (New York, N.Y.), 313(5784), 224–226.
A journal article with 3 authors
Robison, B. H., Reisenbichler, K. R., & Sherlock, R. E. (2005). Giant larvacean houses: rapid carbon transport to the deep sea floor. Science (New York, N.Y.), 308(5728), 1609–1611.
A journal article with 8 or more authors
Allwood, D. A., Xiong, G., Faulkner, C. C., Atkinson, D., Petit, D., & Cowburn, R. P. (2005). Magnetic domain-wall logic. Science (New York, N.Y.), 309(5741), 1688–1692.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book
Müller, B., & Van de Voorde, M. (2017). Nanoscience and Nanotechnology for Human Health. Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA.
An edited book
Salo, A., Keisler, J., & Morton, A. (Eds.). (2011). Portfolio Decision Analysis: Improved Methods for Resource Allocation (Vol. 162). Springer.
A chapter in an edited book
Chang, E.-C., & Li, Q. (2006). Hiding Secret Points Amidst Chaff. In S. Vaudenay (Ed.), Advances in Cryptology - EUROCRYPT 2006: 24th Annual International Conference on the Theory and Applications of Cryptographic Techniques, St. Petersburg, Russia, May 28 - June 1, 2006. Proceedings (pp. 59–72). 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 Nursing Outlook.

Blog post
Fang, J. (2014, December 19). NASA Just Emailed A Wrench To The International Space Station. IFLScience; IFLScience. https://www.iflscience.com/space/how-nasa-emailed-wrench-space/

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. (2002). Space Transportation: Challenges Facing NASA’s Space Launch Initiative (GAO-02-1020). 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
Freedman, R. (2014). Assessing the functional recovery and connectivity potential of restored estuaries in southern California using juvenile predator fish movements [Doctoral dissertation]. 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
Shpigel, B. (2017, March 25). Dempsey’s Hat Trick Seals a Win and Steadies a World Cup Campaign. New York Times, SP2.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Huang, 2004).
This sentence cites two references (Grant & Grant, 2006; Huang, 2004).

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

  • Two authors: (Grant & Grant, 2006)
  • Three authors: (Robison et al., 2005)
  • 6 or more authors: (Allwood et al., 2005)

About the journal

Full journal titleNursing Outlook
AbbreviationNurs. Outlook
ISSN (print)0029-6554
ScopeGeneral Nursing

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