BMA Reference Styles

Harvard & Vancouver

BMA: British Medical Association

UNSW: Univ of New South Wales
Monash University

Online tutoring constructing references

Harvard
Vancouver
American Psychological Association (APA)
Modern Language Association (MLA)
Other styles
http://www.lib.monash.edu.au/vl/cite/citecon.htm
http://inforskills.port.ac.uk/refcite/refstyle.htm
http://www.lib.uiowa.edu/hardin/guides/html

http://www.bma.org.uk/ap.nsf/Content

What is referencing?
A system that allows you to acknowledge the sources
of information (words, information, ideas) you use in
your writing

There are two main methods of referencing articles in

journal and book publications:
1. Harvard (author-date)
2. Vancouver (author-number)

Many professional publications often have their own

house style which introduce specific variations with
these general conventions

Harvard Style

This reference system uses the authors

name and date of publication in the body of
the text
The bibliography is given alphabetically by
author
General principles of Harvard System:
requires you to have BOTH in-text
references & a list of references at the end
of your work

There are many variations on Harvard style

1.

2.

Leicester University, UK
http://www.le.ac.uk/library/sources/subject3/har
vard.html
Year of publication is not in brackets & is
followed by a full stop.
Article titles are not placed within quotes.
Volume numbers are in bold and are not
spelled out
Monash University, Australia
http://www.lib.monash.edu.au/vl/cite/hrvex.htm
Article titles are in double quotes

General Principles of Harvard System

Include 3 pieces of information about a source

within the text (in-text citations):
1. Name(s) of the author(s)
2. Year of publication
3. Page number (when directly quoted)
At the end of the text, you must include list of
references (all the books, journal articles, etc)
you have referred full bibliographical
information must be included

In-text citations
1.

2.

Citations may be placed at the end of a

sentence (before the concluding punctuation) in
brackets:
The theory was first developed by Browne
(Gibbs 1981)
To integrate the authors surname into your
sentence, followed by the year of publication, in
parentheses:
Gibbs (1981) states that Browne was the first to
develop the theory

In-text citations
3.

4.

To cite a direct quotation write the text word by word &

place inverted commas at the beginning and end of quote.
The author, date, & page number must be included.
Australia is a settler society (Hudson & Bolton 1997,
p.9)
To cite a quotation from an author who attributes it to
another source you must acknowledge both sources in
your text.
Graham Gibbs, in his 1981 study into student learning
wrote that because students are aware of their tutors
mastery of the subject matter, it is quite common for
them to assume that their reader has no needs at all
(Gibbs 1981, p.39, cited in Bowden 1985, p.35)

In-text citations
5.

6.

To refer to more than one work separate the

references either with a semicolon or the word
and
(Entwistle 1977; Haddon 1969)
or
Entwistle (1977) and Haddon (1969) both
demonstrated that
To cite more than one work by the same author
arrange citations in chronological order
(Smith 1981, 1984, 1985)

In-text citations
7.

8.

To cite more than one author

(Sontag & Paglia 1987)
or
Sontag and Paglia (1987) assert that
To cite more than three authors use the
surname of the first author and et al. (and
others):
Brown et al. (1987) argued that
or
(Brown et al. 1987)

In-text citations
9.

10.

To cite authors with the same surname who have

published in the same year use their initials to
indicate different people:
The theory was first developed early this century
(Smith, AK 1979) but later many of its elements
were refuted (Smith, JA 1979)
To cite an author who published more than one
work in the same year attach an a, b, c, d etc.
after the year
Dawkins (1972a, 1972b) completed a number of
studies on

In-text citations
11.

To cite from newspaper:

If there is no author, list the name of the
newspaper, the date, year and page number
(The Jakarta Post 7 March 1994, p.8)

12.

If there is an author
(Peters 2000)
To cite a CD-ROM include the full title and year
of publication
(Microsoft Encarta, 1995)

In-text citations
13.

To cite a document within a website:

Information should include authors name or
organization responsible for the site and the date
created/revised
(United Nations, 1999)

14.

If the authors name is unknown, cite the website

URL
(http://www.aaa.unsw.edu.au)
To quote from a privately obtained interview or
personal communication include the abbreviation
pers. comm. in your reference
(Daly 1994, pers. comm., 7 Aug)

List of Reference Books

Present full bibliographic details in the following order:

1. Authors surname and initial(s)
2. Year of publication
3. Name of article (between single quotation marks & with
minimal capitalisation)
4. In: initial(s) and surname(s) of editor(s)
5. Title of publication (in italics/underlined with minimal
capitalisation)
6. Edition (if applicable, abbreviated as edn)
7. Publisher
8. Place of publication
9. Page number(s) if applicable
Leeder SR, Dobson AJ, Gribberd RW & Patel NK. (1996). Brain
sex: the real difference between men and women, In: The
essential gender differences handbook, ed Chen WF, 2nd edn,
Oxford University Press, New York.

List of Reference Articles

The details required in order are:

1. Authors surname and initial
2. Year of publication
3. Title of article (between single quotation
marks and with minimal capitalisation)
4. Title of journal/newspaper (in
italics/underlined, using maximal
capitalisation)
5. Volume number, if applicable
6. Issue number or month (if applicable)
7. Page numbers of the article

Example of different articles

Journal article
Huffman, LM. 1996, Processing whey protein for use
as food ingredient, Food Technology, vol.50, no.2,
pp.49-52.
Conference paper
Bohrer S, Zielke T & Freiburg V. (1995). Integrated
obstacle detection framework for intelligent cruise
control on motorways, IEEE Intelligent Vehicles
Symposium, Detroit, MI Piscataway, pp. 276-281.
Newspaper article
Simpson, L. 1997, Tasmanias railway goes private,
Australian Campus News, 3-9 Oct., p.10.

List of Reference Internet Sources

Methods of referencing are changing

1. Author
2. Date of publication/last date site updated
3. Title of publication (in italics)
4. Name of sponsor of site
5. Place of sponsor of site
6. Date of viewing
7. URL or internet address (between pointed brackets)
Winston, J. 1999, A look at referencing, AAA Educational
Services, viewed 20 October 2002,
<http://www.aaa.edu.au/aaa.html>.
ASTEC 1994, Metadata: the foundations of resource
description, D-lib Magazine, [Online] Available at:
http://www.dlib.org/dlib/July95/07weibel.html

Vancouver Style
Developed by US National Library of Medicine (NLM) &
adopted by the International Committee of Medical
Journal Editors (ICMJE)
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/bsd/uniform_requirements.html
Medical journals (BMJ) generally require the Vancouver
style
http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/advice/stylebook/basics.shtml
The NLM abbreviation for a journal title is commonly
required by medical journals
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/tsd/serials/terms_cond.html

Vancouver Style
Use a number series to indicate references
The bibliography lists references in numerical order as
they appear in text
Journal names are abbreviated
Main advantage:
The main text reads more easily
References in bibliography are directly correlated to
numbers, saving the readers time in searching
More economical style
Excessive punctuation, spacing & formatting is
absent

Variations on Vancouver style

frequently include:
In-text numbers used to cite are often in
superscript
Capitalisation, particularly in book titles
Place of publication & publisher may be
reversed from the order
Page numbers sometimes elided as 805-9 or in
full as 805-809
Abbreviations for journal titles or full titles
Punctuation conventions vary considerably
between publications

In-text Citing
A number is allocated to a source in the order in which
it appears in the text.
If the source is referred to again, the same number is
used.
The authors name can also be integrated into the text
Either square [ ] or curved brackets ( ) can be used as
long as it is consistent
Superscripts can also be used rather than brackets
Numbers should be inserted to the left of colons and
semi-colons
Full stops are placed either before or after the
reference number whatever format is chosen, its
important that the punctuation is consistently applied

Examples of in-text
Citing
as one author has put it the darkest days were
still ahead [1]: which is well documented in the
literature. [2-5] This proves that the darkest days
were still ahead. [1]
Scholtz (2) has argued that
Ninety percent of diabetics patients are type 2
diabetes.3

Reference list Journal

Article
Authors surname Initials. Title of article. Title of
journal [abbreviated]. Year of publication Month date;
Volume Number (issue number):page numbers.
Journal titles are abbreviated
Only first words of article title and words that
normally begin with a capital letter are capitalised
First 6 authors are listed; thereafter add an et al.
after the sixth author
If the journal has continuous page numbering, you
may omit month/issue number

Examples Journal Article

Non-continuous pagination
Smithline HA, Mader TJ. Determining pretest probability
of DVT: clinical intuition vs. validated scoring systems. N
Engl J Med. 2003 Apr 4;21(2):161-2.
Continuous pagination
Gao SR, McGarry M, Ferrier TL, Pallante B, Gasparrini B,
Fletcher JR, et al. Effect of cell confluence on production
of cloned mice using inbred embryonic stem cell line. Biol
Reprod. 2003;68(2):595-603.

Reference list Books

Authors surname Initials. Title of chapter. In: Editors
surname Initials, editor. Title of the book. # ed. [if not
1st] Place of publication: Publishers name; Year of
publication. p.#.[page numbers of numbers]
Only first words of article title and words that
normally begin with a capital letter are capitalised
Add editor(s) after the editors name(s)
Abbreviate page numbers to p.
Abbreviate numbers when appropriate

Examples Books
Personal author
Carlson BM. Human embryology and developmental
biology. 3rd ed. St. Louis: Mosby; 2004.
Edited book
Brown AM, Stubbs DW, editors. Medical physiology. New
York: Wiley; 1983.
Chapter in a book
Blaxter PS, Farnsworth TP. Social health and class
inequalities. In: Carter C, Peel JR (eds). Equalities and
inequalities in health. 2nd ed. London: Academic Press;
1976. p. 165-78.

Reference List Other

Sources
CD-Rom/DVD
The format is added after the title eg. [DVD]
Conference Paper
Authors surname Initials. Title of paper. In: Editors
surname Initials, editor. Title of Conference; Date of
conference; Place of publication: Publishers name; Year of
publication. p. page numbers
Website/homepage
Author/Editor/Organizations name. Title of the page
[homepage on the internet]. Place of publication:
Publishers name; [updated yr month day; cited yr moths
day]. Available from: (URL)

Examples Other Sources

CD-Rom/DVD
Collier L, Balows A, Sussman M, editors. Topley and Wilsons
microbiology and microbial infections [CD-ROM]. 9th ed. London:
Arnold; 1998.
Conference Paper
Anderson JC. Current status of chorion villus biopsy. In: Tudenhope
D, Chenoweth J, editors. Proceedings of the 4th Congress of the
Australian Perinatal Society; 1986 Sep 13-14; Brisbane,
Queensland: Australian Perinatal Society; 1987. p. 190-6.
Website/homepage
HeartCentreOnline. Boca Raton, FL: HeartCentreOnline, Inc.; c20002004 [updated 2004 May 23; cited 2004 Oct 15]. Available from:
http://www.heartcenteronline.com/