How to cite a book chapter in APA 7

Use this format when a book is a collection and each chapter has its own author, with someone else as editor.

Reference list format

Chapter Author, A. A. (Year). Title of the chapter in sentence case. In E. E. Editor & F. F. Editor (Eds.), Title of the book in sentence case (pp. xx–xx). Publisher. DOI or URL

Nakamura, H. (2022). Learning from failure in group projects. In D. Osei & P. Bright (Eds.), Collaboration in higher education (pp. 88–104). Westbrook University Press.

• Chapter author. Surname first, then initials. This is the person whose name starts the entry.
• Chapter title. Sentence case, with no italics and no quotation marks.
• “In” and the editors. After the word In, the editors are written with initials before the surname, not inverted, followed by (Ed.) for one editor or (Eds.) for several.
• Book title. Italic, in sentence case.
• Pages. The chapter’s page range, in parentheses with the book title and “pp.” before the numbers. If the book is a later edition, give it in the same parentheses after a comma, for example (2nd ed., pp. 88–104).
• Publisher. The name only, with no city.
• DOI or URL. If the chapter has a DOI, add it after the publisher. If it has no DOI but a stable link that works for readers, add that.

In-text citation

Cite the author of the chapter, not the editors, with the year.

• Parenthetical: (Nakamura, 2022)
• Narrative: Nakamura (2022) describes…

Chapter or whole book?

Cite the chapter when you used a chapter written by one author in a book that has an editor. Cite the whole book when one author wrote all of it. See citing a book in APA 7.

Check before you submit

• The right edition. Cite the edition of the book you actually used, and its page range.