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Referencing style - APA 7th: Tables and Figures

A guide to using the APA 7th edition referencing system for in-text citations and reference lists.

Copyright attribution for tables and figures

Here are some examples of a infographic and graph treated as figures and a table.  See our introduction to images, tables and figures for overall guidance and for links to more detailed APA recommendations on the set up requirements of figures and tables.  

If your table or figure has been copied directly from another source or has been adapted from other data sources then you will need to include a copyright attribution in the Notes field and a full end-text reference. 

Copied Figure

This figure has been taken from a journal article found in The Lancet.  

It has not been changed or adapted but copied directly from the journal. 

As the first figure in your article, it would be numbered as such, rather than taking the figure number that was assigned to it in the original article.    The name and note also reflect its relevance to your article. 

 

As it has been copied directly from a publication that requires a copyright acknowledgement this has been added to the Note. section. 

The acknowledgement begins with  "From" and follows the format shown in the APA Publication Manual. 

 

Note:  

  • When you refer to the figure in-text you can just use the figure title rather than the author-date style e.g. As per Figure 1....

 

  • You must provide a full text reference for the source of the figure following the end-text
  • reference guidelines for that format. 

See the example on APA 7 referencing style: Images, tables and figures.

Figure 1

Lancet 2018 - Pathways between climate change and human health 

Note: The identified inter-relationships between climate change ecosystem impacts and human impacts have guided the areas of Government policy and legal frameworks that are the subject of this review.  From:  "The 2018 report of the Lancet Countdown on health and climate change: Shaping the health of nations for centuries to come," by N. Watts et al., 2018, The Lancet, 392 (10163), Figure 1, p.2482.  (http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(18)32594-7). Copyright 2018 by Elsevier Ltd.

Adapted Figure: 

This figure is an example of a graph. It was created by a UWA student for their economics assignment. 

It is based on a number of data-sets available from the World Economic and Financial Surveys Database. 

In the Note. information needed to clarify the contents of the figure and significance to their work has been provided.

As this graph has been adapted from existing data on a site that maintains copyright ownership of that content it requires a copyright acknowledgement added to the Note. section.

It is prefaced with the words "Adapted from" to highlight it is based on a modification of existing data figures. 

 

Note:  As per above, a full end-text reference will also be required. See the example on APA 7 referencing style: Images, tables and figures.

Created Table:

This is an example of a typical table that might be generated to represent data created by a student or researcher as part of their studies. 

 

If you have created your own data and placed this into a table (or figure) you would own the copyright and as such, it is not necessary to provide a copyright statement.

 

 

Copyright acknowledgment:  This table example  was sourced from https://www.w3.org/WAI/WCAG20/Techniques/working-examples/PDF20/table.pdf

 

Copied Table: 

This table has been copied from an online blog and is the second table used in your work. 

As such the Table number reflects the position in your work.  The table title and note also reflect its relevance to your use of it. 

 

As the table is copied from another source, a full end-text reference will also be required. 

See the example on APA 7 referencing style: Images, tables and figures.

Table 2  

Farley's (2018) inquiry into municipalities' economic development.

Note: An example of the analysis of spending priorities and outcomes based on the completed ICMA survey instrument.  From: "Community wealth shapes local economic development programs," by B. Farley, 2018, October 10, Bill Farley, Ph.D., Social Equity research/Advisory services for activists & communities. (https://billfarley.net/2018/10/10/community-wealth-shapes-local-economic-development-programs/)

 

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