How to format your references using the The American Surgeon citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for The American Surgeon. 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

Clayton J. RNA interference: the silent treatment. Nature. 2004 Sep 30;431(7008):599–605.

A journal article with 2 authors

Rodrigues AR, Tabin CJ. Developmental biology. Deserts and waves in gene expression. Science. 2013 Jun 7;340(6137):1181–2.

A journal article with 3 authors

Preis T, Moat HS, Stanley HE. Quantifying trading behavior in financial markets using Google Trends. Sci Rep. 2013;3:1684.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

Curie C, Panaviene Z, Loulergue C, Dellaporta SL, Briat JF, Walker EL. Maize yellow stripe1 encodes a membrane protein directly involved in Fe(III) uptake. Nature. 2001 Jan 18;409(6818):346–9.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Hellesland J, Challamel N, Casandjian C, Lanos C. Reinforced Concrete Beams, Columns and Frames. Hoboken, NJ USA: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; 2013.

An edited book

Brown ID, Poeppelmeier KR, editors. Bond Valences. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer; 2014. VIII, 262 p. 110 illus., 63 illus. in color. (Structure and Bonding; vol. 158).

A chapter in an edited book

Spoor M. Inequality, Poverty and Conflict in Transition Economies. In: Spoor M, editor. Globalisation, Poverty and Conflict: A Critical “Development” Reader. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands; 2005. p. 47–65.

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 The American Surgeon.

Blog post

Andrews R. IFLScience. IFLScience; 2016. How Many Calories Does Having Sex Really Burn?

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. English Language Learning: Diverse Federal and State Efforts to Support Adult English Language Learning Could Benefit from More Coordination. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 2009 Jul. Report No.: GAO-09-575.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Correa L. Urban-rural differences in overweight and obese status among adolescents [Doctoral dissertation]. [Long Beach, CA]: California State University, Long Beach; 2015.

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

Scheiber N. Fight for $15 Widens Focus. New York Times. 2016 Nov 29;B1.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in parentheses:

This sentence cites one reference (1).
This sentence cites two references (1,2).
This sentence cites four references (1–4).

About the journal

Full journal title	The American Surgeon
ISSN (print)	0003-1348
ISSN (online)	1555-9823
Scope