General in-text citation rules
Harvard citation style uses the author/date system for in-text citations. When formatting your in-text citations, you should always:
For example:
By the middle of this century, emerging markets will be nearly twice as large as the current developed economies (Van Agtmael 2007)
"By the middle of this century, emerging markets will be nearly twice as large as the current developed economies" (Van Agtmael 2007, p.12)
The author’s name may be integrated into the sentence, followed by the year of publication (and page number/s if applicable)
For example:
Robertson and Pitel (2011) predict an average growth of 5% for the continent for 2011 …
Robertson and Pitel (2011, p. 12) predict an average growth of 5% for the continent for 2011 …
The following examples illustrate general rules that can be applied to all information sources, including books, journal articles, websites, standards and patents, maps, and more.
| Source | Example |
| One author | (Harris 2001) |
| Up to three authors | (Wang and Roush 2000) |
| More than three authors | (Tayler et al. 2003) |
| No author | (Black's Medical Dictionary 1992) |
| Organization as author | (ACI Committee 2008) |
| No date | (Singh n.d.) |
| Editor | (ed. Jones 1998) |
| More than one editor | (eds. Bullinger and Warnecke 1985) |
| Paraphrases or direct quotes | (Deininger 2003, p.65) |
| Standards | (ASTM Standards 2010) |
| Patents | (Allard, Dyson and Spaven 2006) |
| Market research reports | (Keynote 2010) |
| Maps | (Department of Mines and Energy 2008) |
Reference list entry for a book always include:
For example:
Ashby, M.F. (2005) Materials selection in mechanical design. 3rd edn. Oxford: Elsevier Butterworth Heinemann
When creating your reference list entry for a book chapter, always include:
For example:
Dahleh, M.D. (2005) '6.5 Matrix methods,' in DeSilva, C.W. (ed.) Vibration and shock handbook. Boca Raton: Taylor & Francis, pp.6-14
When creating your reference list entry for an e-book, always include:
For example:
Winterbone, D.E. (1997) Advanced thermodynamics for engineers. Knovel. [Online]. Available at: http://www.knovel.com [Accessed 6 January 2011]
NOTE: Only cite books as e-books if you have accessed them online or through a Library database. Digitized books from the Library homepage should be cited as you would cite a print book.
When creating your reference list entry for a journal article, always include:
For example:
Zhu, S. and Chai, G.B. (2010) 'Ductile and brittle material failures in low-velocity impact.' Journal of Materials: Design and Applications, 224(L4), pp. 152-173
When creating your reference list entry for a web site or document, always include:
For example:
Thompson, B. (2009) What role for TV in wired world? [Online]. Available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8115671.stm [Accessed 20 September 2013]
When creating your reference list entry for a standard, always include:
For example:
ASTM Standards (2008) C192/C 192M-07, Standard practice for making and curing concrete test specimens in the laboratory. Section four: Construction vol.04.02. West Conshohocken, PA: ASTM International.
When creating your reference list entry for a patent, always include:
For example:
Allard, R.J.W., Dyson, J. and Spaven, J.W. (2006) A cleaning head. UK Patent Office Patent no. GB2402047B [Online]. Available at: http://gb.espacenet.com [Accessed: 10 January 2011].
When creating your reference list entry for a thesis or dissertation, always include:
For example:
Mirza, N. (2007) Investigation of steering drift during straight line breaking. PhD thesis, University of Bradford
When creating your reference list entry for a conference paper, always include:
For example:
Corfield, K. (1992) 'Engineering as a liberal art.' International, quality and environmental issues: Proceedings of the 3rd world conference on engineering education, vol 1. University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth, 20-25 September. Southampton: Computational Mechanics Publications, pp. 75-84