How does ASA differ from APA?

The biggest difference: ASA puts a colon before page numbers (Wilson 1987:46) while APA uses a comma and “p.” (Wilson, 1987, p. 46). ASA also spells out authors' first names in the reference list rather than using initials only, and does not use “&” between authors.

Should I include access dates for online journal articles?

Not for stable journal articles with a DOI. Purdue OWL's ASA guide shows retrieval information — “Retrieved [date] (URL)” — for web pages, which are the sources that change or lack publication dates.

Can I use “ibid.” for repeated citations?

No. ASA has no “ibid.” For a repeated citation, simply give the author-date form again, even if it is the same source as the previous citation.

Do I use “et al.” from the first citation?

It depends on the author count. Purdue OWL's ASA guide gives three authors as “(Carr, Smith, and Jones 1962)” on first citation and “(Carr et al. 1962)” afterwards; four or more authors take “et al.” from the first citation.

What heading does the reference list take?

“References”. Purdue OWL's ASA references page sets the heading as REFERENCES; “References Cited” is an anthropology convention, not an ASA one.

How to Cite in ASA Format: American Sociological Association Guide

This guide covers how to cite sources in ASA format, the citation style of the American Sociological Association, used across sociology and criminology.

The Official Source and What This Page Rests On

The American Sociological Association Style Guide is sold by ASA and is not free to read. ASA's own pages return HTTP 403 to automated requests, so this page does not quote the guide directly. Two things are checkable, and both are stated here rather than glossed over:

The edition. The current edition is the seventh (2022). The Library of Congress catalogue record for ISBN 978-0-912764-58-0 (LCCN 2021952593) gives the edition statement "Seventh edition.", the imprint "Washington, DC: American Sociological Association, [2022]" and the class mark HM569 .A54 2022, and quotes the publisher's own description: "The ASA Style Guide, 7th edition, is the authoritative reference for writing, submitting, editing, and copyediting manuscripts for ASA journals and other publications following ASA's unique format." The sixth edition is 2019 (Open Library, ISBN 978-0-912764-55-9, edition statement "Sixth edition.").
The rules. The formats below follow Purdue OWL's ASA guide, which reproduces ASA's in-text and reference-list rules and which names the ASA Style Guide as its source. Where Purdue's wording matters, it is quoted.

Every worked example on this page is a real, published source, checked today against Crossref, Open Library or the publisher's own page.

Quick Overview

ASA uses an author-date system with two parts:

In-text citations — author's surname and year in parentheses
References — full source details, alphabetized, at the end

It resembles APA but differs in several visible ways, listed at the foot of this page.

In-Text Citations

Give the surname and year in parentheses, with no comma between them.

One Author

Concentrated urban poverty reshaped the opportunity structure of the inner city (Wilson 1987).
Wilson (1987) traced the effects of concentrated urban poverty.

Two Authors

A teaching fellowship can double as graduate teacher training (Innocente and Baker 2018).

Three Authors

Name all three on first citation, then use "et al.":

First citation: (Bateman, Baumann, and Johnston 2019)
Later citations: (Bateman et al. 2019)

Four or More Authors

"Et al." from the first citation, after the first author's surname.

Direct Quotes

Page numbers follow the year after a colon, with no space. Purdue OWL states the rule: "Pagination follows the year of publication after a colon (note that in the in-text citation, there is no space between the colon and the page number)."

The authors report that "gaining internet access promotes late adopters' civic participation and turnout" (Frey, Baldassarri, and Billari 2024:214).

Multiple Works, Same Parentheses

Separate with semicolons, ordered alphabetically or chronologically.

Several studies bear on this (Frey, Baldassarri, and Billari 2024; Innocente and Baker 2018; Wilson 1987).

Same Author, Same Year

Add lowercase letters after the year: (Wilson 1987a, 1987b).

Reference List Basics

The list is headed References, alphabetized by the first author's surname, with hanging indentation and double spacing.

Basic Structure

Last, First. Year. "Article Title." Journal Title Volume(Issue):Pages.

Journal Article

Innocente, Nathan and Jayne Baker. 2018. "The Sociology Teaching Fellowship: A Mentorship Model for Graduate Student Teacher Training." Teaching Sociology 46(4):335–45.

Journal Article with DOI

Bateman, Tyler, Shyon Baumann, and Josée Johnston. 2019. "Meat as Benign, Meat as Risk: Mapping News Discourse of an Ambiguous Issue." Poetics 76:101356. doi:10.1016/j.poetic.2019.03.001.

Where a journal numbers articles rather than paginating them, as Poetics does here, the article number stands in for the page range.

Journal Article with a Page Range and a DOI

Frey, Vincenz, Delia S. Baldassarri, and Francesco C. Billari. 2024. "Bridging the Digital Divide Narrows the Participation Gap: Evidence from a Quasi-Natural Experiment." Sociological Science 11:214–32. doi:10.15195/v11.a9.

Book

Wilson, William Julius. 1987. The Truly Disadvantaged: The Inner City, the Underclass, and Public Policy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Edited Book

Smelser, Neil J. and Paul B. Baltes, eds. 2001. International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences. Amsterdam: Elsevier.

Chapter in Edited Book

Purdue OWL's ASA guide uses "Pp." and page numbers for the chapter's location, and initials rather than full first names for the editors.

Cornfield, Daniel B. and William Canak. 2007. "Immigrants and Labor in a Globalizing City: Prospects for Coalition Building in Nashville." Pp. 163–77 in Labor in the New Urban Battlegrounds, edited by L. Turner and D. B. Cornfield. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

Website

Purdue OWL shows web sources with retrieval information — "Retrieved [date]" followed by the URL in parentheses.

U.S. Census Bureau. 2023. "Income in the United States: 2022." Retrieved September 22, 2026 (https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2023/demo/p60-279.html).

Key ASA Conventions

No comma before year — write (Wilson 1987), not (Wilson, 1987)
Colon before page numbers — write (Wilson 1987:46), not (Wilson 1987, p. 46)
Sentence-case article titles — capitalize the first word and proper nouns
Headline-style book titles — capitalize the major words
"Pp." for chapter page ranges — "Pp. 163–77 in …"
"Retrieved" for web pages — retrieval date then URL in parentheses
Full journal names — do not abbreviate journal titles
Full first names in the reference list — not initials only, as APA uses

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Adding a comma before the year — ASA uses (Wilson 1987), not (Wilson, 1987) as APA does.
Using "p." or "pp." in-text — ASA uses a colon: (Wilson 1987:46).
Wrong title capitalization — article titles are sentence case; book titles are headline style.
Using "et al." too early for three authors — name all three on first citation, then shorten.
Abbreviating journal names — ASA uses full journal titles.
Calling the list "References Cited" — that heading belongs to anthropology style; ASA uses "References".

Who Uses ASA Style?

ASA is the standard for:

Sociology journals, especially ASA's own
Criminology and criminal justice
Social work research
Demography and urban studies
Some interdisciplinary social science journals

ASA vs. APA

Element	ASA	APA
Author–year separator	No comma	Comma
Page numbers in text	Colon (:46)	"p." (p. 46)
Author names in list	Full first names	Initials
Article titles	Sentence case	Sentence case
"et al." threshold in text	3 authors after first citation; 4+ from the first	3+ from the first
Retrieval dates	Shown for web pages	Only if content may change

Sources for This Page

Purdue OWL. "ASA Style." https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/asa_style/index.html — in-text rules, the REFERENCES heading, "Pp." and retrieval-date conventions quoted above.
Library of Congress catalogue record LCCN 2021952593 for the seventh edition (2022) of the American Sociological Association Style Guide, and the Open Library record for the sixth edition (2019).
Crossref records for the Innocente–Baker, Bateman et al. and Frey et al. articles and for the Cornfield–Canak chapter; Open Library for Wilson, Smelser–Baltes and Labor in the New Urban Battlegrounds; census.gov for the web-page example.

Wonders can export your sources in ASA format automatically — colon page format and all.