Using the name-year citation style, the above example becomes:
There are many undergraduate texts on Process Control (Kombo, 1991; Orodho, 1990; Paul, 1995; Wamahiu, 1988). The most popular seems to be the book by Kombo (1991). However, the only one to deal with process design and process control in an integrated manner is that by Orodho (1995).
The first citation named 4 authors using their surname. Associated with each surname is the year of the publication. Notice that they are presented in alphabetical order, within round parentheses, (…). The author is separated from the year by a comma. Author-year pairs are separated by semi-colons. The next two citations named the authors using their surnames with the publication year of the cited publications enclosed in parentheses. Therefore, there are two ways to use the name-year citation style. When using this citation style, the reference list is presented in alphabetical order.
How a publication is cited also depends on the number of authors. If there are two authors, then cite as follows: “Orodho and Kombo (2002) modified the Minimum Variance objective function to include…” or
“The Generalized Minimum Variance self-tuning algorithm was proposed in the late 1970s (Orodho and Kombo, 2002).” When a publication has more than two authors, cite as follows:
“Montague et al. (1987) considered…”
At the point at which a source is cited in the text, indicate the author’s surname, followed by the year of publication.
In a sentence simply indicate the surname and put the year of publication of the document in brackets, that is, Kombo (2004). However, if the source is indicated at the end of a sentence or paragraph, then include both the author and year of publication in brackets (Kombo, 2004).
A comma separates the author’s name and year of publication. If an author has published several works in the same year and one is using more than one of these, then lower case letters are used after the year for identification, that is, Orodho (2003a, 2003b, 2003c and so On).
If several sources are being referred to at the same time, then the authors should be organized alphabetically and the sources separated using semi colons (Kombo, 2004; Orodho, 2003).
If quotations are used, indicate the author, year of publication and page(s) of the quotation. Page(s) can be indicated by using p. (pp. if many) or using colon i.e. (Orodho, 2003, p.69) or (Orodho, 2003: 69). If many pages (Orodho, 2003: pp. 69-71) or (Orodho, 2003: 69-71).
There are a number of types of publications used in research. These materials include articles, magazines, journals, conference proceedings, books, dissertations, theses and research reports. Each category of materials requires a different presentation format. However the general order of organizing the references is as follows:
- Surname of the author
- Initials of the author
- Date of publication
- Title of the material
- Place of publication
- Publishers
Author’s surname, initials, (year of publication). Title of material. Place of Publication: Publishers.
