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Q. What is a volume/issue number?

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Answered By: Theresa Bell (she/her/hers) Last Updated: Nov 02, 2021 Views: 265045

APA Style (7th ed.)

When creating a reference to a periodical, such as a journal article, volume and issue numbers are standard elements. The difference between the numbers is that " volume typically refers to the number of years the publication has been circulated, and issue refers to how many times that periodical has been published during that year" (Wikipedia, n.d., para. 2).

Volume numbers in references should be italicized (American Psychological Association [APA], 2020, p. 294), but "do not italicize the issue number, the parentheses, or the comma after the issue number" (APA, 2020, p. 294).

In the reference below, the volume number is 49 and the issue number is 4:

Godfrey, D. (2005). Adapting historical citations to APA Style. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media , 49 (4), 544-547. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15506878jobem4904_15

If a resource doesn't have a volume or issue number, omit that information from the reference (APA, 2020, p. 294).

American Psychological Association. (2020). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (7th ed.). https://doi.org/10.1037/0000165-000

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APA 7th Edition Style Guide: Volume/Issue

About In-text Citations
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Volume/Issue
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Volumes and Issues

Both volume and issue information, if present, is required in references for books and journals.

Books

A book that is part of a multivolume set will have a volume number in the reference. Abbreviate the word Volume as Vol. and Volumes as Vols. followed by the Arabic volume number. The volume number follows the title of the book and comes after the edition statement (when there is one), it is enclosed in parentheses.

Scott, L. (2011). Parental nutrition. Clinical nutrition (2nd ed., Vol. 3)....

Kyle, P. (2003). People and places (Vols. 1-5)...

Both volume and issue numbers are required in references to journal articles. Not all journals have issue numbers.

Write all volume numbers as Arabic numerals and italicize (no abbreviation for volume). The issue number proceeds immediately after the volume and is not italicized. Place all issue information within parentheses.

5 is the volume number and 3 is the issue number: Advertising to Adolescents: An Examination of Skepticism. (2011). Global Journal of Business Research, 5 (3), 85-91.

3 is the volume number and 4 is the issue number: Moreira, J. P. (2010, December). Health literacy: A new dimension for healthcare development. Journal of Marketing & Management in Healthcare, 3 (4), 239-240.

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APA 7th Edition Citation Examples

Volume and Issue Numbers

Magazine and journal volume and issue number formatting

Page Numbers
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APA does not use "Volume", "Vol.", "v.", "Issue," "No.", or related terms. Use italics for the volume number.

12 is the volume number (in italics) and 4 is the issue number.

See Publication Manual , p. 294.

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Article Types: What's the Difference Between Newspapers, Magazines, and Journals?

Journal Articles
Definitions
Choosing What's Best

Journal Article Characteristics

Magazine Articles
Trade Magazine/Journal Articles
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Newsletter Articles

PMLA -- Publications of the Modern Language Association (an example of an academic journal)

Analyzing a Journal Article

Authors : Authors of journal articles are usually affiliated with universities, research institutions, or professional associations. Author degrees are usually specified with the author names, as are the affiliations.

Abstract : The article text is usually preceded with an abstract. The abstract will provide an overview of what the article discusses or reveals and frequently is useful in identifying articles that report the results of scientific studies. Use of Professional Terminology and Language: The language used in journal articles is specific to the subject matter being covered by the journal. For example, an article written for a psychological journal is written in an academic rather than popular style and will make heavy use of psychological terms.

In Text References : Journal articles normally will be profusely documented with sources that have provided information to the article authors and/or that provide further related information. Documentation of sources can be handled by in-text parenthetical references (MLA, APA, Chicago sciences styles), by the use of footnotes (Chicago humanities style), or by the use of endnotes (Turabian style). Individual journals will specify their own requirements for documentation.

Bibliography : Because journal articles use numerous sources as documentation, these sources are often referenced in an alphabetically or numerically arranged bibliography located at the end of the article. Format of the bibliography will vary depending on the documentation style used in the article.

Charts, Graphs, Tables, Statistical Data : Articles that result from research studies will often include statistical data gathered during the course of the studies. These data are often presented in charts and tables.

Length of Article : Journal articles, in general, tend to be fairly lengthy, often consisting of a dozen or more pages. Some journals also publish book reviews. These are typically brief and should not be confused with the full-length research articles that the journal focuses on.

Use of volume and issue numbering : Journals normally make use of volume and issue numbering to help identify individual issues in their series. Normally a volume will encompass an entire year's worth of a journal's issues. For example, a journal that is published four times yearly (quarterly) will have four issues in its yearly volume. Issues may be identified solely with numbers or with both numbers and date designations. For example, a quarterly journal will typically number its issues 1 through 4, but it might also assign season designations to the individual numbers, such as Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter. A monthly journal will have twelve issues in a yearly volume and might use the month names along with the issue numbers (issue 1, January; issue 2, February; and so on). Some magazines, trade publications, and newspapers might also make use of volume and issue numbering, so this isn't always the best indicator.

Subject Focus : Journals typically gather and publish research that focuses on a very specific field of inquiry, like criminology, or southern history, or statistics.

Overall Appearance : Journals are typically heavy on text and light on illustration. Journal covers tend toward the plain with an emphasis on highlighting key research articles that appear within a particular issue.

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Scholarly Articles: How can I tell?

Journal information, what is a citation.

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A citation is all the information you need about an article in order to CITE or credit it properly. For a scholarly journal article, this includes the AUTHOR, ARTICLE TITLE, DATE, JOURNAL, VOLUME, ISSUE, and PAGES. You may need additional information depending on the citation style you are using.

One of the first things you want to do is look at the journal citation . The information about the article, such as the journal title, volume, issue, and pages is usually on the first page of the article. You will need this information to cite the article correctly in your paper. Sometimes you can tell that the article is scholarly just by the name of the journal, but not always. Scholarly articles are generally long so looking at the number of pages is one indicator that it is scholarly.

You may also want to find out more about the journal in which the article was published. For example, you may want to know if the article is in a peer-reviewed journal.

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APA Style Guide, 7th Edition: Volume/Issue

Updated About In-text Citations
Updated In-Text Examples
What to Include
Volume/Issue
Bracketed Descriptions
URLs and DOIs
Book with Editor(s)
Book with No Author
Book with Organization as Author
Book with Personal Author(s)
Chapters and Parts of Books
Classical Works
Journal Article
Magazine Article
Multi-Volume Works
Newspaper Article
Patents & Laws
Personal Communication
Physicians' Desk Reference
Social Media
Unpublished Manuscripts/Informal Publications (i.e. course packets and dissertations)
Formatting Your Paper
Formatting Your References
Headings in APA
Annotated Bibliography

General Rules for Volumes and Issues

Both volume and issue information, if present, is required in references for books and journals.

Books

Scott, L. (2011). Parental nutrition. Clinical nutrition (2nd ed., Vol. 3)....

Kyle, P. (2003). People and places (Vols. 1-5)...

Both volume and issue numbers are required in references to journal articles. Not all journals have issue numbers.

5 is the volume number and 3 is the issue number: Advertising to Adolescents: An Examination of Skepticism. (2011). Global Journal of Business Research, 5 (3), 85-91.

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Difference Between Volume and Issue

• Categorized under Language , Words | Difference Between Volume and Issue

Volume and issue numbering helps in identifying individual issues within a journal’s series.

Since a volume covers a year’s publication, if a journal has three publications, the journal will have three issues in its yearly volume. This also means that a journal that has 12 issues within a year ( monthly publications) will have 12 issues in its yearly volume. This type of format is also applicable to trade publications, newspapers, magazines among other printed media. Volume and issue numbers are essential to researchers and scholars as they aid in making citations convenient and easy during material research. This article will try to explain further what separates these two common terms seen in many publications.

What is a Volume?

A volume can either be defined numerically or physically. On the physical aspect, a volume is simply pages bound together in form of a book. Whereas on the numerical aspect, is a series of full sets of issues that are bound together making a journals yearly volume publication.

What is an Issue?

On the other hand, an issue can be an act or a publication made from printed sheets bound together forming a book. When the term ‘issue’ is used as an act, it is the form of making a publication available or the official release of such a publication.

Differences Between Volume and Issue

Publication.

A volume of a journal or any form of publication is numbered yearly while the issue can be published several times within the same year. This means that if the first volume of a publication was in 2011, in 2020 it will be in its 9th volume. However, issues number will vary depending on how many issues were being released within the given years for example, Bi-annually or quarterly, even monthly.

Characteristics and nature

A volume is composed of a series of issues within that publication year while an issue is a collection of printed sheets that form a book. A volume of a given publication can have from 1 to over 10 issues within the same year depending on the frequency of issue publications.

Most journals tend to use volume numbers. However, it is not often that issue numbers are used. Most journals tend to paginate their publications consecutively all through the year. For example, when a journal’s first publication of the year ends on the 25th page, the preceding publication of the next year will begin on the 26th page. Once a volume is complete, it is then paginated to form a book.

Volume Vs. Issue

Summary of Volume Vs. Issue

Volume typically refers to the number of years the publication has been circulated.
Issue refers to printed sheets bound together in a book form.
Volumes is a series of issues of a given periodical.
An Issue is the act of making a publication available.
Most journals use volume numbers.
Journals can go without issue numbers.
Volumes are published yearly.
There is no time frame for an issue publication and can be as many times within a year.
Volumes and issues are important to scholars during the research process.
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Cite APA 7 Kungu, E. (2018, June 28). Difference Between Volume and Issue. Difference Between Similar Terms and Objects. http://www.differencebetween.net/language/difference-between-volume-and-issue/. MLA 8 Kungu, Evah. "Difference Between Volume and Issue." Difference Between Similar Terms and Objects, 28 June, 2018, http://www.differencebetween.net/language/difference-between-volume-and-issue/.

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ISBN, DOI, ISSN: A Quick Guide to Publication Identifiers

Publication identifiers help in finding information on an article or publication using a set of codes. All of us have names and other identifying characteristics and titles; however, these could be common to several thousands of people. In the United States, a person’s unique identifying tag is his or her Social Security number. The same is true of titles of articles, subject matter, and a host of other characteristics of the written word. A publication identifier is unique to that journal, article, or book.

There are several types of publication identifiers. Some of these are discussed here.

International Standard Book Number

The International Standard Book Number ( ISBN ) is for books. ISBNs identify printed or digital books and are used as inventory-tracking devices.
The code is usually found on the back cover of a book and includes a barcode. One shortcoming of the ISBN is that it does not provide information on all versions of a particular book because each has its own unique code, which might not be an issue since it is recognizable.
The ISBN has 13 digits and contains five types of identifying information or “elements” such as: a prefix, registration group (e.g., individual country or territory), registrant, publication, and “checksum” (i.e., a figure that is used to detect errors).
If you are a self-publishing author in the United States, you can easily retrieve your own ISBN through Bowker , the country’s official ISBN source.
If not, you can find this information on ISBNs in your country from the International ISBN Agency . By purchasing an ISBN for your publication, you ensure a better chance of it being found in a search.

Related: Need instant updates on academic writing on your cell phone? Download the FREE Enago Academy mobile app now.

Digital Object Identifier

A Digital Object Identifier ( DOI ) is used mainly in scientific journals.
Each article in each of the thousands of journals has its own unique DOI. Understanding a DOI is important when doing specific research.
The DOI format is usually numerals and letters, including some punctuation. For example, a DOI created by Wiley might look like “10.1111/j.1365-2575.2012.00413.x.”
The first number identifies Wiley, the “j” indicates a journal article, and the number range indicates the ISSN. These are followed by the year the article was received by the publisher and the tracking number.

International Standard Serial Number

The International Standard Serial Number (ISSN) comprises of seven digits followed by a “check digit” to identify any errors in citations.
ISSNs help to identify serial publications, which are those that are published regularly in sequence, such as magazines, journals, newspapers, and databases. They don’t identify content or certify its validity .
Although ISSNs do not identify the journal owner, if a journal name changes, a new ISSN is necessary. This is important when considering a title change because the change will affect cataloging and indexing.
ISSNs also have some limitations. There might be an ISSN for printed text and a different one for electronic versions.
“E-journals” are becoming quite popular given the Internet capabilities. Publishers are finding it much less costly to publish their serials online, and many do so exclusively. In addition, many of these journals are open access publications, which allow researchers to more easily gather needed information.
The ISSN format is “ISSN 0000-0000,” which is printed on the journal cover. For electronic versions, “e-ISSN” is posted on the home page and is included in the DOI.

PubMed Indexing and Referencing Numbers

The PubMed Indexing Number (PMID) is used for articles in the PubMed database , which contains more than 27 million citations from several sources.
PMIDs are unique identifiers and are assigned to each record in the PubMed system. The code is found at the end of a PubMed citation and below the article’s author list and title.
The PubMed Central referencing number (PMCID) is required for listing in the National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant proposals and reports.
PMCIDs are assigned to an article in PubMed Central, which differs from the PubMed database. These articles comply with NIH’s Public Access Policy . PMCIDs are listed below the abstract.

Serial Item and Contribution Identifier

The Serial Item and Contribution Identifier (SICI) identifies specific parts of a serial, such as volume number.
It provides more information to those involved in indexing titles and content. SICI was created by the Serials Industry Systems Advisory Committee (SISAC) to be an extension of ISSN to help identify specifics of an article. The code has become widely accepted and used by both publishers and researchers.
Item : The ISSN.
Contribution : Signifies the page numbers, title code.
Control : Type of SICI, part of article referenced (e.g., abstract), how content is presented (e.g., text), and version.

For example, “0095-4403(199502/03)21:3<12:WATIIB>2.0.TX;2-J” is SICI for “Bjorner, Susanne. “Who Are These Independent Information Brokers?” Bulletin of the American Society for Information Science , Feb–Mar. 1995, Vol. 21, no. 3, page 12.”

A CODEN is a six-character, alphanumeric code for both serial and non-serial science publications.
CODEN was designed and published in 1953 by a researcher at the Chronic Disease Research Institute to help him remember his reference publications, but became popular with scientists of all disciplines and is used for bibliographic indexing.
Usually, CODEN is for articles related to chemistry; however, publishers of non-chemistry articles can request a CODEN from the International CODEN Service.
Serial publications have a six-letter CODEN. The first four letters represent the journal title, and the fifth and sixth letters refer to one of the first six letters of the alphabet and the check character, respectively.
For non-serial publications, the first two characters of the CODEN are numbers followed by letters. The fifth character is taken from the entire alphabet, and the sixth is the check character.

In addition, as a researcher, you should recognize these various codes to make your searches less time-consuming. The links here will provide more identifying codes that you might also want to use; however, those listed here are the most common and universally used.

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Research Foundations: Locate Citation Information

Information Literacy
The Information Timeline
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Primary, Secondary, & Tertiary Materials
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Locating Citation Information

No matter which citation style you use, the first step to crediting your sources is locating the citation information. Regardless of the information format, all citations will include a minimum of title of the work, author or authors, and date of publication. Below are examples from books, ebooks, articles from databases, and academic journal articles that illustrate where to find the identifying citation information.

Book / eBook Title Page

title page of a book

Title - Full title and subtitles

Edition - books that have been revised or expanded more than once will often have an edition number

Author(s) or Editor(s) - may include one or more authors or editors of the book

Publisher - the company that published the book

Publishing City - if there are multiple cities, cite the first city listed

Book Title Page Example A larger, printable version of the title page example.

Book / eBook Copyright Page

copyright page of a book with highlighted sections

Book Copyright Page Example A larger, printable version of the copyright page example.

Academic Journal Article

example academic journal article

Academic journal articles' citations differ from book sources, and thus require you to identify a few unique pieces of information.

Author(s) - may include one or more authors of the article

Page Number - cite the entire page range in which the article appears

Publication - name of the journal the article was published in

Volume / Issue Number - identifies the exact edition of the journal where the article appears

Publication Date - date formats vary; use the format the journal provides or the citation style requires

Most citation information will appear on the first page of the article; however, the location of that information will vary from journal to journal. You can find the placement of the journal name, page number, publication date, and volume and issue number located on the top or bottom of the article’s page. The publication date may be a single year (2013), a distinct month (October 2010), specific publication cycle (Fall 2007), or an exact date (June 28, 2005). The page range of the article is another cirtical piece of citation information. Some article in printed or PDF format, will have the page numbers visible. Other articles in a digital, or HTML, format may not have obvious page ranges.

Academic Journal Article Example A larger, printable version of the journal article example.

Database Articles

There is no uniform approach to locating citation information based solely on the article itself. Many journals follow a relatively consistent format. Magazine and newspaper articles may only offer an article's title with the text and identify an author or source. Again, you are not likely to encounter standardization in the presentation of the article.

Some citation styles or professors require that you include the name of the database if retrieved through a library database. This can be tricky to discern if you are not familiar with the databases. Fortunately, most databases provide essential citation information for each article directly on the results pages or the article description page. Knowing this saves a lot of time and effort when reviewing articles.

screencapture of citation information listed in a database

example of citation information for a database article

Additionally, many databases will create an article's citation for you, in the citation style you choose. These computer-generated citations require careful review, as they may not be fully correct. Most databases will create citations that have the right information, in the right order. The biggest drawback to using databases created citations is in the formatting. Many will not include the correct spacing, punctuation, and capitalization for the citation style. Some articles, particularly those only available in HTML format, display just the first page number rather than the entire range. You may not be able to verify an exact page range without access to a PDF format in these instances. Always remeber to check these citations again an official style guide before including in a research project.

screencapture of a database generated citation in M L A style format

example of a database generated citation

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Bibliographical References – Volume & Page Numbers & Source in Book

Posted by Rene Tetzner | Nov 9, 2021 | PhD Success | 0 |

7.3.6 Volume Number

Like edition numbers, volume numbers usually appear immediately after the title of a book and use a standard abbreviation along with an Arabic numeral (‘Vol. 1’ or ‘vol. 2’), although Roman numerals are sometimes used instead (‘Vol. I’ or ‘vol. II’); the format of both the numbers and the abbreviation should be the same in all instances. Unlike edition numbers, however, volume numbers are required for first volumes as well as any subsequent ones, although you may refer to only one volume of a set of books or to all volumes in the set. In the latter case, the number of volumes rather than the volume numbers should be recorded using an Arabic numeral after the main title: ‘3 Vols.’ or ‘5 vols.’ The volume numbers of conference proceedings are sometimes recorded in the same way as they are for books and sometimes via the method used for journal volume numbers (see Section 7.3.8).

7.3.7 Book in Which the Source is Contained

If the main reference is to a chapter or essay within a book (including conference proceedings), the title and editor(s) of the book as well as the page numbers on which the chapter or essay can be found must be included in the reference as well. These often appear in one cluster, separated by commas.

The book title generally appears immediately after the chapter or essay title and uses the same format (capitalisation, italics or not etc.) as the titles of books cited as main (rather than containing) sources elsewhere in the references.
Editor names usually follow the book title, although they occasionally come before the title instead. Editor names often (but not always) appear with the surname last in this situation, even if the names of authors and editors are normally inverted when at the beginning of references (see the examples of a full bibliographical reference in different styles in Section 7.2.1); otherwise, they tend to use the same format (initials only, ‘and’ or an ampersand, internal punctuation or not etc.) as the author and editor names associated with main sources. ‘Ed.’ or ‘ed.’ for ‘editor’ (‘Eds.’ and ‘eds.’ in the plural) should accompany the name, depending on which form is used for editors in other references in the list, although sometimes the full word ‘editor’ (or ‘editors’) or the phrase ‘edited by’ is used instead for the editors of books containing the main source cited (see the examples in Sections 7.2.1 and 7.2.2).
Any volume or edition numbers relevant to the book should be included as well, and page numbers for the essay or chapter should follow, although page numbers are often placed at the end of the reference after the publisher and place of publication (see the examples in Sections 7.2.1 and 7.2.2). Page number formats vary, but ‘pp.’ or ‘pp’ (for ‘pages’) is often used along with the page numbers of books (‘pp.19–47,’ that is, instead of simply ‘19–47’), with a few exceptions, while the ‘pages’ abbreviation is almost never used with the page numbers of journals (see Section 7.3.8). Otherwise, the format of page ranges for books should be the same as that for journals.

7.3.8 Journal in Which the Source is Contained

If the main reference is to an article in a journal, the title of the journal, the relevant volume number, sometimes the issue number and either the pages on which the article is found or another kind of identifier for locating the article online are required as well.

The journal title is always necessary, generally features initial capitals on all main words and most often appears in italic font, though roman or, more rarely, bold font is used in some styles. Standard abbreviations for journal titles can be used, following, for instance, the National Library of Medicine (NLM) Catalog of Journals Referenced in the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) Databases, and guidelines will often indicate whether these are acceptable and which system should be followed. As with all elements of the reference list, the use of journal abbreviations should be as consistent as possible throughout the list. The title of the journal should precede the volume, issue and page numbers.
The volume number is also standard and follows the journal title. Punctuation can appear between the title and volume number (a comma, for instance, or a full stop after an abbreviated title), but it generally does not. Usually, the volume number is recorded in Arabic numerals, but Roman numerals are specified in some guidelines, and roman font is the norm, but some styles and guidelines call for volume numbers in italic or bold font.
If the journal uses continuous page numbering for each volume, an issue number is not required, though it can be used if you like, but if the page numbering begins afresh in each issue of a volume, the issue number is necessary for readers to find the relevant article. The issue number for a source usually appears in parentheses immediately after the volume number without an intervening space – ‘ BMC Public Health 24(67)’ – though it can appear in the same position after other punctuation, such as a colon (e.g., ‘ BMC Public Health 24:67’). Sometimes there is a supplement number as well, which can replace the issue number or appear in addition to it; a simple ‘S.’ or, better yet, ‘Suppl.’ is generally used to distinguish a supplement number.
Page numbers or their equivalent are always required, and in almost all cases ‘pp.’ or ‘pp’ (for ‘pages’) is not included when recording the page ranges for journal articles. The page range follows the volume number (or issue number if one is included), usually separated from the preceding number by a colon with or without a following space – ‘ BMC Public Health 24(67): 62–88’ – though a comma or semicolon is sometimes used instead. The format of page ranges varies depending on the guidelines or style followed, but with the exception of not using the abbreviation for ‘pages,’ it should be the same as that used for any page ranges in books included in the list (see also the additional information on page numbers in Section 7.3.9 below). For articles published online, a single page number or some other form of unique number that identifies the article is sometimes used instead of a page range.
When an online version of an article is used as a source, a DOI or URL is often recorded instead of page numbers, and sometimes instead of volume and issue numbers as well when electronic publication precedes print publication. DOIs and URLs should be consistent in format throughout the list and correct so that they reliably lead the reader to the right sources. When a URL is used, information on access or availability is often needed (just as it is for other web-based sources), with the format varying according to the style guide or guidelines followed: for example, ‘Accessed 6 November 2014’ or ‘Available at: http://www.proof-reading-service.com/ .’

7.3.9 Page Numbers

Page numbers are required when the reference is to a chapter or article within a larger book, journal or collection of conference papers, in which case the pages on which the chapter or article is found should be provided. For page numbers in books, ‘pp’ (for ‘pages’) with or without a following stop and space is generally used along with the numbers – ‘pp.19–47’ or ‘pp 19–47,’ for example – but not always. For journals, the practice is just the opposite: page numbers generally appear without any form of ‘pp.,’ though that abbreviation is used in rare cases. Between the numbers themselves, an en dash (as I have in the examples above) is the correct choice, but a hyphen (pp.17-47) is often used; as long as the guidelines are followed and your usage is consistent throughout your reference list, either is fine. The page range can be recorded with all digits retained (383–388), but in many cases the numbers are elided to as few digits as possible (‘383–8’; for further information on eliding page ranges, see Section 6.4.7 above). The commas (or, in some instances, spaces) normally found in numerals of 1,000 and above are not used in page numbers. The formats of page numbers should be consistent throughout a reference list, but the position can change depending on the type of source: for a journal article, for instance, page numbers appear at the end of the reference, but for a chapter or article in a book, they can appear either at the end or in conjunction with the book title and editor(s). Sometimes other identifying numbers are used instead of page numbers (especially for articles published online), and if there are no page numbers for a source within a book or journal, chapter, section and even paragraph numbers can be used instead, although as a general rule such numbers should only be used if they actually appear in the source (i.e., if the chapters, sections and paragraphs are numbered in the source itself).

Why PhD Success?

To Graduate Successfully

This article is part of a book called "PhD Success" which focuses on the writing process of a phd thesis, with its aim being to provide sound practices and principles for reporting and formatting in text the methods, results and discussion of even the most innovative and unique research in ways that are clear, correct, professional and persuasive.

The assumption of the book is that the doctoral candidate reading it is both eager to write and more than capable of doing so, but nonetheless requires information and guidance on exactly what he or she should be writing and how best to approach the task. The basic components of a doctoral thesis are outlined and described, as are the elements of complete and accurate scholarly references, and detailed descriptions of writing practices are clarified through the use of numerous examples.

The basic components of a doctoral thesis are outlined and described, as are the elements of complete and accurate scholarly references, and detailed descriptions of writing practices are clarified through the use of numerous examples. PhD Success provides guidance for students familiar with English and the procedures of English universities, but it also acknowledges that many theses in the English language are now written by candidates whose first language is not English, so it carefully explains the scholarly styles, conventions and standards expected of a successful doctoral thesis in the English language.

Individual chapters of this book address reflective and critical writing early in the thesis process; working successfully with thesis supervisors and benefiting from commentary and criticism; drafting and revising effective thesis chapters and developing an academic or scientific argument; writing and formatting a thesis in clear and correct scholarly English; citing, quoting and documenting sources thoroughly and accurately; and preparing for and excelling in thesis meetings and examinations.

Completing a doctoral thesis successfully requires long and penetrating thought, intellectual rigour and creativity, original research and sound methods (whether established or innovative), precision in recording detail and a wide-ranging thoroughness, as much perseverance and mental toughness as insight and brilliance, and, no matter how many helpful writing guides are consulted, a great deal of hard work over a significant period of time. Writing a thesis can be an enjoyable as well as a challenging experience, however, and even if it is not always so, the personal and professional rewards of achieving such an enormous goal are considerable, as all doctoral candidates no doubt realise, and will last a great deal longer than any problems that may be encountered during the process.

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Rene Tetzner

Rene Tetzner's blog posts dedicated to academic writing. Although the focus is on How To Write a Doctoral Thesis, many other important aspects of research-based writing, editing and publishing are addressed in helpful detail.

PhD Success – How To Write a Doctoral Thesis

October 1, 2021

Table of Contents – PhD Success

October 2, 2021

The Essential – Preliminary Matter

October 3, 2021

The Main Body of the Thesis

October 4, 2021

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13.1 Formatting a Research Paper

Learning objectives.

Identify the major components of a research paper written using American Psychological Association (APA) style.
Apply general APA style and formatting conventions in a research paper.

In this chapter, you will learn how to use APA style , the documentation and formatting style followed by the American Psychological Association, as well as MLA style , from the Modern Language Association. There are a few major formatting styles used in academic texts, including AMA, Chicago, and Turabian:

AMA (American Medical Association) for medicine, health, and biological sciences
APA (American Psychological Association) for education, psychology, and the social sciences
Chicago—a common style used in everyday publications like magazines, newspapers, and books
MLA (Modern Language Association) for English, literature, arts, and humanities
Turabian—another common style designed for its universal application across all subjects and disciplines

While all the formatting and citation styles have their own use and applications, in this chapter we focus our attention on the two styles you are most likely to use in your academic studies: APA and MLA.

If you find that the rules of proper source documentation are difficult to keep straight, you are not alone. Writing a good research paper is, in and of itself, a major intellectual challenge. Having to follow detailed citation and formatting guidelines as well may seem like just one more task to add to an already-too-long list of requirements.

Following these guidelines, however, serves several important purposes. First, it signals to your readers that your paper should be taken seriously as a student’s contribution to a given academic or professional field; it is the literary equivalent of wearing a tailored suit to a job interview. Second, it shows that you respect other people’s work enough to give them proper credit for it. Finally, it helps your reader find additional materials if he or she wishes to learn more about your topic.

Furthermore, producing a letter-perfect APA-style paper need not be burdensome. Yes, it requires careful attention to detail. However, you can simplify the process if you keep these broad guidelines in mind:

Work ahead whenever you can. Chapter 11 “Writing from Research: What Will I Learn?” includes tips for keeping track of your sources early in the research process, which will save time later on.
Get it right the first time. Apply APA guidelines as you write, so you will not have much to correct during the editing stage. Again, putting in a little extra time early on can save time later.
Use the resources available to you. In addition to the guidelines provided in this chapter, you may wish to consult the APA website at http://www.apa.org or the Purdue University Online Writing lab at http://owl.english.purdue.edu , which regularly updates its online style guidelines.

General Formatting Guidelines

This chapter provides detailed guidelines for using the citation and formatting conventions developed by the American Psychological Association, or APA. Writers in disciplines as diverse as astrophysics, biology, psychology, and education follow APA style. The major components of a paper written in APA style are listed in the following box.

These are the major components of an APA-style paper:

Body, which includes the following:

Headings and, if necessary, subheadings to organize the content
In-text citations of research sources
References page

All these components must be saved in one document, not as separate documents.

The title page of your paper includes the following information:

Title of the paper
Author’s name
Name of the institution with which the author is affiliated
Header at the top of the page with the paper title (in capital letters) and the page number (If the title is lengthy, you may use a shortened form of it in the header.)

List the first three elements in the order given in the previous list, centered about one third of the way down from the top of the page. Use the headers and footers tool of your word-processing program to add the header, with the title text at the left and the page number in the upper-right corner. Your title page should look like the following example.

Beyond the Hype: Evaluating Low-Carb Diets cover page

The next page of your paper provides an abstract , or brief summary of your findings. An abstract does not need to be provided in every paper, but an abstract should be used in papers that include a hypothesis. A good abstract is concise—about one hundred fifty to two hundred fifty words—and is written in an objective, impersonal style. Your writing voice will not be as apparent here as in the body of your paper. When writing the abstract, take a just-the-facts approach, and summarize your research question and your findings in a few sentences.

In Chapter 12 “Writing a Research Paper” , you read a paper written by a student named Jorge, who researched the effectiveness of low-carbohydrate diets. Read Jorge’s abstract. Note how it sums up the major ideas in his paper without going into excessive detail.

Write an abstract summarizing your paper. Briefly introduce the topic, state your findings, and sum up what conclusions you can draw from your research. Use the word count feature of your word-processing program to make sure your abstract does not exceed one hundred fifty words.

Depending on your field of study, you may sometimes write research papers that present extensive primary research, such as your own experiment or survey. In your abstract, summarize your research question and your findings, and briefly indicate how your study relates to prior research in the field.

Margins, Pagination, and Headings

APA style requirements also address specific formatting concerns, such as margins, pagination, and heading styles, within the body of the paper. Review the following APA guidelines.

Use these general guidelines to format the paper:

Set the top, bottom, and side margins of your paper at 1 inch.
Use double-spaced text throughout your paper.
Use a standard font, such as Times New Roman or Arial, in a legible size (10- to 12-point).
Use continuous pagination throughout the paper, including the title page and the references section. Page numbers appear flush right within your header.
Section headings and subsection headings within the body of your paper use different types of formatting depending on the level of information you are presenting. Additional details from Jorge’s paper are provided.

Begin formatting the final draft of your paper according to APA guidelines. You may work with an existing document or set up a new document if you choose. Include the following:

Your title page
The abstract you created in Note 13.8 “Exercise 1”
Correct headers and page numbers for your title page and abstract

APA style uses section headings to organize information, making it easy for the reader to follow the writer’s train of thought and to know immediately what major topics are covered. Depending on the length and complexity of the paper, its major sections may also be divided into subsections, sub-subsections, and so on. These smaller sections, in turn, use different heading styles to indicate different levels of information. In essence, you are using headings to create a hierarchy of information.

The following heading styles used in APA formatting are listed in order of greatest to least importance:

Section headings use centered, boldface type. Headings use title case, with important words in the heading capitalized.
Subsection headings use left-aligned, boldface type. Headings use title case.
The third level uses left-aligned, indented, boldface type. Headings use a capital letter only for the first word, and they end in a period.
The fourth level follows the same style used for the previous level, but the headings are boldfaced and italicized.
The fifth level follows the same style used for the previous level, but the headings are italicized and not boldfaced.

Visually, the hierarchy of information is organized as indicated in Table 13.1 “Section Headings” .

Table 13.1 Section Headings

A college research paper may not use all the heading levels shown in Table 13.1 “Section Headings” , but you are likely to encounter them in academic journal articles that use APA style. For a brief paper, you may find that level 1 headings suffice. Longer or more complex papers may need level 2 headings or other lower-level headings to organize information clearly. Use your outline to craft your major section headings and determine whether any subtopics are substantial enough to require additional levels of headings.

Working with the document you developed in Note 13.11 “Exercise 2” , begin setting up the heading structure of the final draft of your research paper according to APA guidelines. Include your title and at least two to three major section headings, and follow the formatting guidelines provided above. If your major sections should be broken into subsections, add those headings as well. Use your outline to help you.

Because Jorge used only level 1 headings, his Exercise 3 would look like the following:

Citation Guidelines

In-text citations.

Throughout the body of your paper, include a citation whenever you quote or paraphrase material from your research sources. As you learned in Chapter 11 “Writing from Research: What Will I Learn?” , the purpose of citations is twofold: to give credit to others for their ideas and to allow your reader to follow up and learn more about the topic if desired. Your in-text citations provide basic information about your source; each source you cite will have a longer entry in the references section that provides more detailed information.

In-text citations must provide the name of the author or authors and the year the source was published. (When a given source does not list an individual author, you may provide the source title or the name of the organization that published the material instead.) When directly quoting a source, it is also required that you include the page number where the quote appears in your citation.

This information may be included within the sentence or in a parenthetical reference at the end of the sentence, as in these examples.

Epstein (2010) points out that “junk food cannot be considered addictive in the same way that we think of psychoactive drugs as addictive” (p. 137).

Here, the writer names the source author when introducing the quote and provides the publication date in parentheses after the author’s name. The page number appears in parentheses after the closing quotation marks and before the period that ends the sentence.

Addiction researchers caution that “junk food cannot be considered addictive in the same way that we think of psychoactive drugs as addictive” (Epstein, 2010, p. 137).

Here, the writer provides a parenthetical citation at the end of the sentence that includes the author’s name, the year of publication, and the page number separated by commas. Again, the parenthetical citation is placed after the closing quotation marks and before the period at the end of the sentence.

As noted in the book Junk Food, Junk Science (Epstein, 2010, p. 137), “junk food cannot be considered addictive in the same way that we think of psychoactive drugs as addictive.”

Here, the writer chose to mention the source title in the sentence (an optional piece of information to include) and followed the title with a parenthetical citation. Note that the parenthetical citation is placed before the comma that signals the end of the introductory phrase.

David Epstein’s book Junk Food, Junk Science (2010) pointed out that “junk food cannot be considered addictive in the same way that we think of psychoactive drugs as addictive” (p. 137).

Another variation is to introduce the author and the source title in your sentence and include the publication date and page number in parentheses within the sentence or at the end of the sentence. As long as you have included the essential information, you can choose the option that works best for that particular sentence and source.

Citing a book with a single author is usually a straightforward task. Of course, your research may require that you cite many other types of sources, such as books or articles with more than one author or sources with no individual author listed. You may also need to cite sources available in both print and online and nonprint sources, such as websites and personal interviews. Chapter 13 “APA and MLA Documentation and Formatting” , Section 13.2 “Citing and Referencing Techniques” and Section 13.3 “Creating a References Section” provide extensive guidelines for citing a variety of source types.

Writing at Work

APA is just one of several different styles with its own guidelines for documentation, formatting, and language usage. Depending on your field of interest, you may be exposed to additional styles, such as the following:

MLA style. Determined by the Modern Languages Association and used for papers in literature, languages, and other disciplines in the humanities.
Chicago style. Outlined in the Chicago Manual of Style and sometimes used for papers in the humanities and the sciences; many professional organizations use this style for publications as well.
Associated Press (AP) style. Used by professional journalists.

References List

The brief citations included in the body of your paper correspond to the more detailed citations provided at the end of the paper in the references section. In-text citations provide basic information—the author’s name, the publication date, and the page number if necessary—while the references section provides more extensive bibliographical information. Again, this information allows your reader to follow up on the sources you cited and do additional reading about the topic if desired.

The specific format of entries in the list of references varies slightly for different source types, but the entries generally include the following information:

The name(s) of the author(s) or institution that wrote the source
The year of publication and, where applicable, the exact date of publication
The full title of the source
For books, the city of publication
For articles or essays, the name of the periodical or book in which the article or essay appears
For magazine and journal articles, the volume number, issue number, and pages where the article appears
For sources on the web, the URL where the source is located

The references page is double spaced and lists entries in alphabetical order by the author’s last name. If an entry continues for more than one line, the second line and each subsequent line are indented five spaces. Review the following example. ( Chapter 13 “APA and MLA Documentation and Formatting” , Section 13.3 “Creating a References Section” provides extensive guidelines for formatting reference entries for different types of sources.)

In APA style, book and article titles are formatted in sentence case, not title case. Sentence case means that only the first word is capitalized, along with any proper nouns.

Key Takeaways

Following proper citation and formatting guidelines helps writers ensure that their work will be taken seriously, give proper credit to other authors for their work, and provide valuable information to readers.
Working ahead and taking care to cite sources correctly the first time are ways writers can save time during the editing stage of writing a research paper.
APA papers usually include an abstract that concisely summarizes the paper.
APA papers use a specific headings structure to provide a clear hierarchy of information.
In APA papers, in-text citations usually include the name(s) of the author(s) and the year of publication.
In-text citations correspond to entries in the references section, which provide detailed bibliographical information about a source.

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Different article types are cited in slightly different ways. So, first determine what kind of article you're citing: is it from a magazine, newspaper or peer-reviewed journal? ( Not sure how to tell? Click here for tips .)

Next, visit the style guide that you'll be using, and see which pieces of information should be included in your article's citation (author, date, article title, journal title, volume, issue, page numbers, doi), and in what order.

Then, find the pieces of information in the article's full text. Each periodical will format its articles a bit differently, but here are some tips on where to look:

Author's name : Usually toward the top of the first page (beneath the article title). Sometimes at the end of the article.
Publication date : Usually on the first page. Look near the article title or at the bottom of the first page.
Article title : Always on the first page, toward the top.
Periodical title : May appear at the top or bottom of the first page. Sometimes repeated at the bottom of subsequent pages (with volume, issue and page numbers).
Volume and issue numbers: In peer-reviewed articles, usually listed right after the periodical title.
Page numbers: The page range for the entire article is often listed right after the volume and issue numbers. If not, find the first page number, then scroll to the end of the article to find the last page number. Page numbers may be in the top corners (right or left), but can also be found at the bottom of each page.
DOI : May be at the top or bottom of the first page.

See an example journal article below (click to view larger):

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Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects (DARE): Quality-assessed Reviews [Internet].

Is volume related to outcome in health care: a systematic review and methodologic critique of the literature.

EA Halm , C Lee , and MR Chassin .

Review published: 2002 .

Authors' objectives

To review systematically the research evidence linking volume and outcome in health care, and to summarise the magnitude and significance of the association between them. To describe the methodologic rigour of the existing literature, and to highlight the research and policy implications of the findings.

MEDLINE was searched for studies published in the English language between 1 January 1980 and 31 December 2000. The strategy used combined the MeSH terms and textwords 'outcome', 'outcome assessment', 'outcome and process assessment', 'volume', 'utilization', 'frequency', 'statistics' and 'regionalization', with names of clinical conditions and procedures; further details were provided in an appendix to the review. Bibliographies were reviewed for additional articles, and experts were contacted for missed or unpublished studies. The Cochrane Controlled Trials Register was also searched.

Study selection

Study designs of evaluations included in the review

Studies of any design were eligible for inclusion. Studies from single institutions, voluntary registries or other convenience samples were excluded.

Specific interventions included in the review

Studies of the provision of health care by service providers to the target community or population were eligible for inclusion in the review. Health care provision was defined as hospital or physician volume, measured as cases per year.

Participants included in the review

Communities or populations in receipt of health services were eligible for inclusion in the review. Patients treated primarily since 1980 were included. Studies in trauma, neonatal intensive care and organ transplantation were excluded.

Outcomes assessed in the review

The outcomes assessed were health outcomes, e.g. death, stroke, or clinical complications.

How were decisions on the relevance of primary studies made?

Two of the authors reviewed each article independently. The reviewers were not blinded to the journal, authors or findings. The degree of initial agreement between the reviewers was very high. Any discrepancies were resolved by discussion, and in the rare instances when the original two reviewers did not reach full agreement, a third reviewer was used. Each study was read in order to assess its methodologic rigour and describe its results.

Assessment of study quality

The studies were assessed using key design attributes that influenced study validity and generalisability of systematic reviews and the studies on which they were based (see Other Publications of Related Interest nos.1-2). These were based on: four levels of risk adjustment and discrimination; whether investigators controlled for any specific processes of care that are known to result in better outcomes; and whether the investigators had explicitly measured the appropriateness of patient selection for procedural conditions. In addition, four other analytic attributes were determined: the type of outcomes assessed; the number of hospitals and physicians in each study; the number of volume strata examined; and the unit of analysis (whether effects of hospital and physician volume were assessed). Samples that included all patients undergoing a specific procedure were considered more generalisable to the overall population than those restricted to patients with one type of insurance. Two of the authors reviewed each article independently, using a standardised abstraction form to record the methodologic attributes of the studies. Any discrepancies were resolved by discussion, and in the rare instances when the original two reviewers did not reach full agreement, a third reviewer was used.

Data extraction

Two of the authors reviewed each article independently, using a standardised abstraction form to record study characteristics and research results. Any discrepancies were resolved by discussion, and in the rare instances when the original two reviewers did not reach full agreement, a third reviewer was used.

Data were extracted from articles examining associations between either hospital volume and death or physician volume and death. The following data were extracted: procedure or condition; number of studies included; studies with a significant volume-to-outcome association; range of time periods studied; median cases per year (and range) defining low volume; median cases per year (and range) defining high volume; median average mortality rate (and range); and median absolute difference in mortality rate for high versus low volume (and range). Studies reporting a statistically-significant mortality advantage for high-volume providers (p<0.05) were considered positive. The definition of high and low volume, and the overall mortality rate of the sample, were also recorded. All summary death rates reflected in-hospital mortality (unless otherwise specified).

Methods of synthesis

How were the studies combined?

The authors stated that the literature was too heterogeneous, even for a given procedure, for a formal meta-analysis to be attempted. Studies were therefore combined according to procedure (e.g. coronary angioplasty, total knee replacement) or condition (e.g. AIDS, myocardial infarction). The absolute difference in mortality rate between the highest and lowest volume strata reported was calculated and expressed as the number of excess deaths per 100 cases attributable to low volume. The medians and ranges for high- and low-volume thresholds, mean mortality rates and absolute differences in mortality rates were also reported. Where it was impossible to calculate a mortality difference between high- and low-volume providers because the studies assessed volume as a continuous variable, data on whether these studies demonstrated statistically-significant associations were included in the summary.

How were differences between studies investigated?

The authors do not report a formal test for heterogeneity, although they acknowledge that the studies were extremely heterogeneous, even by procedure. The association between positive findings and methodologic attributes was assessed using chi-squared tests.

Results of the review

A total of 135 studies were included in the review. These covered 27 procedures and clinical conditions. The total numbers of participants were not provided, although the majority of studies (82%) had sample sizes that exceeded 1,000, and included 20 or more hospitals and 50 or more physicians.

No study documented a statistically-significant association between higher volume and poorer outcomes. Seventy-one per cent of studies reported significant associations between better outcomes and hospital volume, and 69% between better outcomes and physician volume. Of the 21 studies that examined the independent effects of both physician and hospital volume, 12 found significant independent effects for both, 4 found significant independent effects for hospital volume only, 4 found significant independent effects for physician volume only, and one found such effects for neither. For high- versus low-volume hospitals, the strongest differences in mortality were found in the treatment of AIDS (9.3%; range: 3.7 to 20.1) and in surgery for pancreatic cancer (13.0%; range: 3.0 to 17.9), oesophageal cancer (12%; range: 11.0 to 13.9), repair of abdominal aortic aneurysms (7.9%; range: 1.5 to 18.7) and paediatric cardiac problems (11.0%; range: 2.3 to 15.5). The volume-outcome association for coronary artery bypass surgery, coronary angioplasty, carotid endarterectomy, and other cancer surgery and orthopaedic procedures was also statistically significant, although smaller. There was no simple relationship between the quality of risk adjustment and findings. Hospital volume-outcome studies that performed risk adjustment using clinical data were more likely to report significant associations (82%) than studies that used administrative data to adjust for risk (50%) or had no risk adjustment (44%) (p<0.001). A positive association between physician volume and outcomes was found in 62% of the studies with no risk adjustment, 68% of those with risk adjustment using administrative data, and 73% of investigations using clinical risk-adjustment models (p>0.2). Reports published in general medical or medical journals were more likely to find a relationship between hospital volume and outcome than those published in surgical journals (86% versus 52%; p<0.001), although no such relationship was found for studies of physician volume and outcome. No associations were found between research findings and other study methodologic characteristics, i.e. sample size, number of providers, representativeness, type of outcome, number of volume strata, measurement of process of care, or year of publication. Additional findings are reported in the review.

Authors' conclusions

For some procedures and conditions, higher volume among hospitals and physicians is associated with better outcomes. However, the magnitude of the relationship varies greatly among individual procedures and conditions. The clinical and policy significance of this finding was complicated by the methodologic shortcomings of many studies. Even where a significant association exists, volume does not give a good prediction of the outcome for individual hospitals or physicians. Differences in case-mix and processes of care between high- and low-volume providers may explain part of the observed relationship between volume and outcome.

CRD commentary

The review question and the study selection criteria were stated clearly. The literature search was restricted to MEDLINE and the Cochrane Controlled Trials Register, and also to articles published in English; the authors acknowledged that this might have resulted in relevant studies being missed. However, efforts were made to identify additional material, e.g. through manual searches of reference lists or by contact with experts. Adequate information was provided on the literature selection, validation and data extraction processes. Given the obvious heterogeneity of the included studies, the decision not to pool the included studies in a statistical meta-analysis seemed appropriate; the methodology employed to analyse volume-outcome associations via pooling by condition or procedure appears to have been appropriate. Publication bias does not appear to have been formally tested, although the authors noted that they could not exclude a negative bias that might have diminished the number of studies failing to report the expected association.

The authors' conclusions seem valid in the light of the data they present.

Implications of the review for practice and research

Practice: The authors state that higher volume among hospitals and physicians is associated with better outcomes for some procedures and conditions, but that the magnitude of the relationship varies greatly among individual procedures and conditions. The clinical and policy significance of this finding is complicated by the methodologic shortcomings of many studies. Even where a significant association exists, volume does not give a good prediction of the outcome for individual hospitals or physicians.

Research: The authors state that investigating precisely what physicians and hospitals with high volumes and good outcomes do differently from those with low volumes and poor outcomes is likely to contribute substantially to our knowledge and our ability to improve care for all patients.

Robert Wood Johnson Generalist Physician Faculty Scholars Award.

Bibliographic details

Halm E A, Lee C, Chassin M R. Is volume related to outcome in health care: a systematic review and methodologic critique of the literature. Annals of Internal Medicine 2002; 137(6): 511-520. [ PubMed : 12230353 ]

Original Paper URL

http://www.annals.org/cgi/content/full/137/6/511

Other publications of related interest

1. Hunt DL, McKibbon, KA. Locating and appraising systematic reviews. Ann Intern Med 1997;126:532-8. 2. Meade MO, Richardson WS. Selecting and appraising studies for a systematic review. Ann Intern Med 1997;127:531-7.

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Delivery of Health Care /standards; Hospitals /utilization; Humans; Outcome Assessment (Health Care); Physicians /utilization; Research Design; Surgical Procedures, Operative /statistics & numerical data; United States

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This is a critical abstract of a systematic review that meets the criteria for inclusion on DARE. Each critical abstract contains a brief summary of the review methods, results and conclusions followed by a detailed critical assessment on the reliability of the review and the conclusions drawn.

Cite this Page Halm EA, Lee C, Chassin MR. Is volume related to outcome in health care: a systematic review and methodologic critique of the literature. 2002. In: Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects (DARE): Quality-assessed Reviews [Internet]. York (UK): Centre for Reviews and Dissemination (UK); 1995-.

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09 May 2024

Cubic millimetre of brain mapped in spectacular detail

Carissa Wong

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Rendering based on electron-microscope data, showing the positions of neurons in a fragment of the brain cortex. Neurons are coloured according to size. Credit: Google Research & Lichtman Lab (Harvard University). Renderings by D. Berger (Harvard University)

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Researchers have mapped a tiny piece of the human brain in astonishing detail. The resulting cell atlas, which was described today in Science 1 and is available online , reveals new patterns of connections between brain cells called neurons, as well as cells that wrap around themselves to form knots, and pairs of neurons that are almost mirror images of each other.

The 3D map covers a volume of about one cubic millimetre, one-millionth of a whole brain, and contains roughly 57,000 cells and 150 million synapses — the connections between neurons. It incorporates a colossal 1.4 petabytes of data. “It’s a little bit humbling,” says Viren Jain, a neuroscientist at Google in Mountain View, California, and a co-author of the paper. “How are we ever going to really come to terms with all this complexity?”

Slivers of brain

The brain fragment was taken from a 45-year-old woman when she underwent surgery to treat her epilepsy. It came from the cortex, a part of the brain involved in learning, problem-solving and processing sensory signals. The sample was immersed in preservatives and stained with heavy metals to make the cells easier to see. Neuroscientist Jeff Lichtman at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and his colleagues then cut the sample into around 5,000 slices — each just 34 nanometres thick — that could be imaged using electron microscopes.

Jain’s team then built artificial-intelligence models that were able to stitch the microscope images together to reconstruct the whole sample in 3D. “I remember this moment, going into the map and looking at one individual synapse from this woman’s brain, and then zooming out into these other millions of pixels,” says Jain. “It felt sort of spiritual.”

Rendering of a neuron with a round base and many branches, on a black background.

A single neuron (white) shown with 5,600 of the axons (blue) that connect to it. The synapses that make these connections are shown in green. Credit: Google Research & Lichtman Lab (Harvard University). Renderings by D. Berger (Harvard University)

When examining the model in detail, the researchers discovered unconventional neurons, including some that made up to 50 connections with each other. “In general, you would find a couple of connections at most between two neurons,” says Jain. Elsewhere, the model showed neurons with tendrils that formed knots around themselves. “Nobody had seen anything like this before,” Jain adds.

The team also found pairs of neurons that were near-perfect mirror images of each other. “We found two groups that would send their dendrites in two different directions, and sometimes there was a kind of mirror symmetry,” Jain says. It is unclear what role these features have in the brain.

Proofreaders needed

The map is so large that most of it has yet to be manually checked, and it could still contain errors created by the process of stitching so many images together. “Hundreds of cells have been ‘proofread’, but that’s obviously a few per cent of the 50,000 cells in there,” says Jain. He hopes that others will help to proofread parts of the map they are interested in. The team plans to produce similar maps of brain samples from other people — but a map of the entire brain is unlikely in the next few decades, he says.

“This paper is really the tour de force creation of a human cortex data set,” says Hongkui Zeng, director of the Allen Institute for Brain Science in Seattle. The vast amount of data that has been made freely accessible will “allow the community to look deeper into the micro-circuitry in the human cortex”, she adds.

Gaining a deeper understanding of how the cortex works could offer clues about how to treat some psychiatric and neurodegenerative diseases. “This map provides unprecedented details that can unveil new rules of neural connections and help to decipher the inner working of the human brain,” says Yongsoo Kim, a neuroscientist at Pennsylvania State University in Hershey.

Nature 629 , 739-740 (2024)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-01387-9

Shapson-Coe, A. et al. Science 384 , eadk4858 (2024).

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McKinsey Global Private Markets Review 2024: Private markets in a slower era

At a glance, macroeconomic challenges continued.

McKinsey Global Private Markets Review 2024: Private markets: A slower era

If 2022 was a tale of two halves, with robust fundraising and deal activity in the first six months followed by a slowdown in the second half, then 2023 might be considered a tale of one whole. Macroeconomic headwinds persisted throughout the year, with rising financing costs, and an uncertain growth outlook taking a toll on private markets. Full-year fundraising continued to decline from 2021’s lofty peak, weighed down by the “denominator effect” that persisted in part due to a less active deal market. Managers largely held onto assets to avoid selling in a lower-multiple environment, fueling an activity-dampening cycle in which distribution-starved limited partners (LPs) reined in new commitments.

About the authors

This article is a summary of a larger report, available as a PDF, that is a collaborative effort by Fredrik Dahlqvist , Alastair Green , Paul Maia, Alexandra Nee , David Quigley , Aditya Sanghvi , Connor Mangan, John Spivey, Rahel Schneider, and Brian Vickery , representing views from McKinsey’s Private Equity & Principal Investors Practice.

Performance in most private asset classes remained below historical averages for a second consecutive year. Decade-long tailwinds from low and falling interest rates and consistently expanding multiples seem to be things of the past. As private market managers look to boost performance in this new era of investing, a deeper focus on revenue growth and margin expansion will be needed now more than ever.

Perspectives on a slower era in private markets

Global fundraising contracted.

Fundraising fell 22 percent across private market asset classes globally to just over $1 trillion, as of year-end reported data—the lowest total since 2017. Fundraising in North America, a rare bright spot in 2022, declined in line with global totals, while in Europe, fundraising proved most resilient, falling just 3 percent. In Asia, fundraising fell precipitously and now sits 72 percent below the region’s 2018 peak.

Despite difficult fundraising conditions, headwinds did not affect all strategies or managers equally. Private equity (PE) buyout strategies posted their best fundraising year ever, and larger managers and vehicles also fared well, continuing the prior year’s trend toward greater fundraising concentration.

The numerator effect persisted

Despite a marked recovery in the denominator—the 1,000 largest US retirement funds grew 7 percent in the year ending September 2023, after falling 14 percent the prior year, for example 1 “U.S. retirement plans recover half of 2022 losses amid no-show recession,” Pensions and Investments , February 12, 2024. —many LPs remain overexposed to private markets relative to their target allocations. LPs started 2023 overweight: according to analysis from CEM Benchmarking, average allocations across PE, infrastructure, and real estate were at or above target allocations as of the beginning of the year. And the numerator grew throughout the year, as a lack of exits and rebounding valuations drove net asset values (NAVs) higher. While not all LPs strictly follow asset allocation targets, our analysis in partnership with global private markets firm StepStone Group suggests that an overallocation of just one percentage point can reduce planned commitments by as much as 10 to 12 percent per year for five years or more.

Despite these headwinds, recent surveys indicate that LPs remain broadly committed to private markets. In fact, the majority plan to maintain or increase allocations over the medium to long term.

Investors fled to known names and larger funds

Fundraising concentration reached its highest level in over a decade, as investors continued to shift new commitments in favor of the largest fund managers. The 25 most successful fundraisers collected 41 percent of aggregate commitments to closed-end funds (with the top five managers accounting for nearly half that total). Closed-end fundraising totals may understate the extent of concentration in the industry overall, as the largest managers also tend to be more successful in raising non-institutional capital.

While the largest funds grew even larger—the largest vehicles on record were raised in buyout, real estate, infrastructure, and private debt in 2023—smaller and newer funds struggled. Fewer than 1,700 funds of less than $1 billion were closed during the year, half as many as closed in 2022 and the fewest of any year since 2012. New manager formation also fell to the lowest level since 2012, with just 651 new firms launched in 2023.

Whether recent fundraising concentration and a spate of M&A activity signals the beginning of oft-rumored consolidation in the private markets remains uncertain, as a similar pattern developed in each of the last two fundraising downturns before giving way to renewed entrepreneurialism among general partners (GPs) and commitment diversification among LPs. Compared with how things played out in the last two downturns, perhaps this movie really is different, or perhaps we’re watching a trilogy reusing a familiar plotline.

Dry powder inventory spiked (again)

Private markets assets under management totaled $13.1 trillion as of June 30, 2023, and have grown nearly 20 percent per annum since 2018. Dry powder reserves—the amount of capital committed but not yet deployed—increased to $3.7 trillion, marking the ninth consecutive year of growth. Dry powder inventory—the amount of capital available to GPs expressed as a multiple of annual deployment—increased for the second consecutive year in PE, as new commitments continued to outpace deal activity. Inventory sat at 1.6 years in 2023, up markedly from the 0.9 years recorded at the end of 2021 but still within the historical range. NAV grew as well, largely driven by the reluctance of managers to exit positions and crystallize returns in a depressed multiple environment.

Private equity strategies diverged

Buyout and venture capital, the two largest PE sub-asset classes, charted wildly different courses over the past 18 months. Buyout notched its highest fundraising year ever in 2023, and its performance improved, with funds posting a (still paltry) 5 percent net internal rate of return through September 30. And although buyout deal volumes declined by 19 percent, 2023 was still the third-most-active year on record. In contrast, venture capital (VC) fundraising declined by nearly 60 percent, equaling its lowest total since 2015, and deal volume fell by 36 percent to the lowest level since 2019. VC funds returned –3 percent through September, posting negative returns for seven consecutive quarters. VC was the fastest-growing—as well as the highest-performing—PE strategy by a significant margin from 2010 to 2022, but investors appear to be reevaluating their approach in the current environment.

Private equity entry multiples contracted

PE buyout entry multiples declined by roughly one turn from 11.9 to 11.0 times EBITDA, slightly outpacing the decline in public market multiples (down from 12.1 to 11.3 times EBITDA), through the first nine months of 2023. For nearly a decade leading up to 2022, managers consistently sold assets into a higher-multiple environment than that in which they had bought those assets, providing a substantial performance tailwind for the industry. Nowhere has this been truer than in technology. After experiencing more than eight turns of multiple expansion from 2009 to 2021 (the most of any sector), technology multiples have declined by nearly three turns in the past two years, 50 percent more than in any other sector. Overall, roughly two-thirds of the total return for buyout deals that were entered in 2010 or later and exited in 2021 or before can be attributed to market multiple expansion and leverage. Now, with falling multiples and higher financing costs, revenue growth and margin expansion are taking center stage for GPs.

Real estate receded

Demand uncertainty, slowing rent growth, and elevated financing costs drove cap rates higher and made price discovery challenging, all of which weighed on deal volume, fundraising, and investment performance. Global closed-end fundraising declined 34 percent year over year, and funds returned −4 percent in the first nine months of the year, losing money for the first time since the 2007–08 global financial crisis. Capital shifted away from core and core-plus strategies as investors sought liquidity via redemptions in open-end vehicles, from which net outflows reached their highest level in at least two decades. Opportunistic strategies benefited from this shift, with investors focusing on capital appreciation over income generation in a market where alternative sources of yield have grown more attractive. Rising interest rates widened bid–ask spreads and impaired deal volume across food groups, including in what were formerly hot sectors: multifamily and industrial.

Private debt pays dividends

Debt again proved to be the most resilient private asset class against a turbulent market backdrop. Fundraising declined just 13 percent, largely driven by lower commitments to direct lending strategies, for which a slower PE deal environment has made capital deployment challenging. The asset class also posted the highest returns among all private asset classes through September 30. Many private debt securities are tied to floating rates, which enhance returns in a rising-rate environment. Thus far, managers appear to have successfully navigated the rising incidence of default and distress exhibited across the broader leveraged-lending market. Although direct lending deal volume declined from 2022, private lenders financed an all-time high 59 percent of leveraged buyout transactions last year and are now expanding into additional strategies to drive the next era of growth.

Infrastructure took a detour

After several years of robust growth and strong performance, infrastructure and natural resources fundraising declined by 53 percent to the lowest total since 2013. Supply-side timing is partially to blame: five of the seven largest infrastructure managers closed a flagship vehicle in 2021 or 2022, and none of those five held a final close last year. As in real estate, investors shied away from core and core-plus investments in a higher-yield environment. Yet there are reasons to believe infrastructure’s growth will bounce back. Limited partners (LPs) surveyed by McKinsey remain bullish on their deployment to the asset class, and at least a dozen vehicles targeting more than $10 billion were actively fundraising as of the end of 2023. Multiple recent acquisitions of large infrastructure GPs by global multi-asset-class managers also indicate marketwide conviction in the asset class’s potential.

Private markets still have work to do on diversity

Private markets firms are slowly improving their representation of females (up two percentage points over the prior year) and ethnic and racial minorities (up one percentage point). On some diversity metrics, including entry-level representation of women, private markets now compare favorably with corporate America. Yet broad-based parity remains elusive and too slow in the making. Ethnic, racial, and gender imbalances are particularly stark across more influential investing roles and senior positions. In fact, McKinsey’s research reveals that at the current pace, it would take several decades for private markets firms to reach gender parity at senior levels. Increasing representation across all levels will require managers to take fresh approaches to hiring, retention, and promotion.

Artificial intelligence generating excitement

The transformative potential of generative AI was perhaps 2023’s hottest topic (beyond Taylor Swift). Private markets players are excited about the potential for the technology to optimize their approach to thesis generation, deal sourcing, investment due diligence, and portfolio performance, among other areas. While the technology is still nascent and few GPs can boast scaled implementations, pilot programs are already in flight across the industry, particularly within portfolio companies. Adoption seems nearly certain to accelerate throughout 2024.

Private markets in a slower era

If private markets investors entered 2023 hoping for a return to the heady days of 2021, they likely left the year disappointed. Many of the headwinds that emerged in the latter half of 2022 persisted throughout the year, pressuring fundraising, dealmaking, and performance. Inflation moderated somewhat over the course of the year but remained stubbornly elevated by recent historical standards. Interest rates started high and rose higher, increasing the cost of financing. A reinvigorated public equity market recovered most of 2022’s losses but did little to resolve the valuation uncertainty private market investors have faced for the past 18 months.

Within private markets, the denominator effect remained in play, despite the public market recovery, as the numerator continued to expand. An activity-dampening cycle emerged: higher cost of capital and lower multiples limited the ability or willingness of general partners (GPs) to exit positions; fewer exits, coupled with continuing capital calls, pushed LP allocations higher, thereby limiting their ability or willingness to make new commitments. These conditions weighed on managers’ ability to fundraise. Based on data reported as of year-end 2023, private markets fundraising fell 22 percent from the prior year to just over $1 trillion, the largest such drop since 2009 (Exhibit 1).

The impact of the fundraising environment was not felt equally among GPs. Continuing a trend that emerged in 2022, and consistent with prior downturns in fundraising, LPs favored larger vehicles and the scaled GPs that typically manage them. Smaller and newer managers struggled, and the number of sub–$1 billion vehicles and new firm launches each declined to its lowest level in more than a decade.

Despite the decline in fundraising, private markets assets under management (AUM) continued to grow, increasing 12 percent to $13.1 trillion as of June 30, 2023. 2023 fundraising was still the sixth-highest annual haul on record, pushing dry powder higher, while the slowdown in deal making limited distributions.

Investment performance across private market asset classes fell short of historical averages. Private equity (PE) got back in the black but generated the lowest annual performance in the past 15 years, excluding 2022. Closed-end real estate produced negative returns for the first time since 2009, as capitalization (cap) rates expanded across sectors and rent growth dissipated in formerly hot sectors, including multifamily and industrial. The performance of infrastructure funds was less than half of its long-term average and even further below the double-digit returns generated in 2021 and 2022. Private debt was the standout performer (if there was one), outperforming all other private asset classes and illustrating the asset class’s countercyclical appeal.

Private equity down but not out

Higher financing costs, lower multiples, and an uncertain macroeconomic environment created a challenging backdrop for private equity managers in 2023. Fundraising declined for the second year in a row, falling 15 percent to $649 billion, as LPs grappled with the denominator effect and a slowdown in distributions. Managers were on the fundraising trail longer to raise this capital: funds that closed in 2023 were open for a record-high average of 20.1 months, notably longer than 18.7 months in 2022 and 14.1 months in 2018. VC and growth equity strategies led the decline, dropping to their lowest level of cumulative capital raised since 2015. Fundraising in Asia fell for the fourth year of the last five, with the greatest decline in China.

Despite the difficult fundraising context, a subset of strategies and managers prevailed. Buyout managers collectively had their best fundraising year on record, raising more than $400 billion. Fundraising in Europe surged by more than 50 percent, resulting in the region’s biggest haul ever. The largest managers raised an outsized share of the total for a second consecutive year, making 2023 the most concentrated fundraising year of the last decade (Exhibit 2).

Despite the drop in aggregate fundraising, PE assets under management increased 8 percent to $8.2 trillion. Only a small part of this growth was performance driven: PE funds produced a net IRR of just 2.5 percent through September 30, 2023. Buyouts and growth equity generated positive returns, while VC lost money. PE performance, dating back to the beginning of 2022, remains negative, highlighting the difficulty of generating attractive investment returns in a higher interest rate and lower multiple environment. As PE managers devise value creation strategies to improve performance, their focus includes ensuring operating efficiency and profitability of their portfolio companies.

Deal activity volume and count fell sharply, by 21 percent and 24 percent, respectively, which continued the slower pace set in the second half of 2022. Sponsors largely opted to hold assets longer rather than lock in underwhelming returns. While higher financing costs and valuation mismatches weighed on overall deal activity, certain types of M&A gained share. Add-on deals, for example, accounted for a record 46 percent of total buyout deal volume last year.

Real estate recedes

For real estate, 2023 was a year of transition, characterized by a litany of new and familiar challenges. Pandemic-driven demand issues continued, while elevated financing costs, expanding cap rates, and valuation uncertainty weighed on commercial real estate deal volumes, fundraising, and investment performance.

Managers faced one of the toughest fundraising environments in many years. Global closed-end fundraising declined 34 percent to $125 billion. While fundraising challenges were widespread, they were not ubiquitous across strategies. Dollars continued to shift to large, multi-asset class platforms, with the top five managers accounting for 37 percent of aggregate closed-end real estate fundraising. In April, the largest real estate fund ever raised closed on a record $30 billion.

Capital shifted away from core and core-plus strategies as investors sought liquidity through redemptions in open-end vehicles and reduced gross contributions to the lowest level since 2009. Opportunistic strategies benefited from this shift, as investors turned their attention toward capital appreciation over income generation in a market where alternative sources of yield have grown more attractive.

In the United States, for instance, open-end funds, as represented by the National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries Fund Index—Open-End Equity (NFI-OE), recorded $13 billion in net outflows in 2023, reversing the trend of positive net inflows throughout the 2010s. The negative flows mainly reflected $9 billion in core outflows, with core-plus funds accounting for the remaining outflows, which reversed a 20-year run of net inflows.

As a result, the NAV in US open-end funds fell roughly 16 percent year over year. Meanwhile, global assets under management in closed-end funds reached a new peak of $1.7 trillion as of June 2023, growing 14 percent between June 2022 and June 2023.

Real estate underperformed historical averages in 2023, as previously high-performing multifamily and industrial sectors joined office in producing negative returns caused by slowing demand growth and cap rate expansion. Closed-end funds generated a pooled net IRR of −3.5 percent in the first nine months of 2023, losing money for the first time since the global financial crisis. The lone bright spot among major sectors was hospitality, which—thanks to a rush of postpandemic travel—returned 10.3 percent in 2023. 2 Based on NCREIFs NPI index. Hotels represent 1 percent of total properties in the index. As a whole, the average pooled lifetime net IRRs for closed-end real estate funds from 2011–20 vintages remained around historical levels (9.8 percent).

Global deal volume declined 47 percent in 2023 to reach a ten-year low of $650 billion, driven by widening bid–ask spreads amid valuation uncertainty and higher costs of financing (Exhibit 3). 3 CBRE, Real Capital Analytics Deal flow in the office sector remained depressed, partly as a result of continued uncertainty in the demand for space in a hybrid working world.

During a turbulent year for private markets, private debt was a relative bright spot, topping private markets asset classes in terms of fundraising growth, AUM growth, and performance.

Fundraising for private debt declined just 13 percent year over year, nearly ten percentage points less than the private markets overall. Despite the decline in fundraising, AUM surged 27 percent to $1.7 trillion. And private debt posted the highest investment returns of any private asset class through the first three quarters of 2023.

Private debt’s risk/return characteristics are well suited to the current environment. With interest rates at their highest in more than a decade, current yields in the asset class have grown more attractive on both an absolute and relative basis, particularly if higher rates sustain and put downward pressure on equity returns (Exhibit 4). The built-in security derived from debt’s privileged position in the capital structure, moreover, appeals to investors that are wary of market volatility and valuation uncertainty.

Direct lending continued to be the largest strategy in 2023, with fundraising for the mostly-senior-debt strategy accounting for almost half of the asset class’s total haul (despite declining from the previous year). Separately, mezzanine debt fundraising hit a new high, thanks to the closings of three of the largest funds ever raised in the strategy.

Over the longer term, growth in private debt has largely been driven by institutional investors rotating out of traditional fixed income in favor of private alternatives. Despite this growth in commitments, LPs remain underweight in this asset class relative to their targets. In fact, the allocation gap has only grown wider in recent years, a sharp contrast to other private asset classes, for which LPs’ current allocations exceed their targets on average. According to data from CEM Benchmarking, the private debt allocation gap now stands at 1.4 percent, which means that, in aggregate, investors must commit hundreds of billions in net new capital to the asset class just to reach current targets.

Private debt was not completely immune to the macroeconomic conditions last year, however. Fundraising declined for the second consecutive year and now sits 23 percent below 2021’s peak. Furthermore, though private lenders took share in 2023 from other capital sources, overall deal volumes also declined for the second year in a row. The drop was largely driven by a less active PE deal environment: private debt is predominantly used to finance PE-backed companies, though managers are increasingly diversifying their origination capabilities to include a broad new range of companies and asset types.

Infrastructure and natural resources take a detour

For infrastructure and natural resources fundraising, 2023 was an exceptionally challenging year. Aggregate capital raised declined 53 percent year over year to $82 billion, the lowest annual total since 2013. The size of the drop is particularly surprising in light of infrastructure’s recent momentum. The asset class had set fundraising records in four of the previous five years, and infrastructure is often considered an attractive investment in uncertain markets.

While there is little doubt that the broader fundraising headwinds discussed elsewhere in this report affected infrastructure and natural resources fundraising last year, dynamics specific to the asset class were at play as well. One issue was supply-side timing: nine of the ten largest infrastructure GPs did not close a flagship fund in 2023. Second was the migration of investor dollars away from core and core-plus investments, which have historically accounted for the bulk of infrastructure fundraising, in a higher rate environment.

The asset class had some notable bright spots last year. Fundraising for higher-returning opportunistic strategies more than doubled the prior year’s total (Exhibit 5). AUM grew 18 percent, reaching a new high of $1.5 trillion. Infrastructure funds returned a net IRR of 3.4 percent in 2023; this was below historical averages but still the second-best return among private asset classes. And as was the case in other asset classes, investors concentrated commitments in larger funds and managers in 2023, including in the largest infrastructure fund ever raised.

The outlook for the asset class, moreover, remains positive. Funds targeting a record amount of capital were in the market at year-end, providing a robust foundation for fundraising in 2024 and 2025. A recent spate of infrastructure GP acquisitions signal multi-asset managers’ long-term conviction in the asset class, despite short-term headwinds. Global megatrends like decarbonization and digitization, as well as revolutions in energy and mobility, have spurred new infrastructure investment opportunities around the world, particularly for value-oriented investors that are willing to take on more risk.

Private markets make measured progress in DEI

Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) has become an important part of the fundraising, talent, and investing landscape for private market participants. Encouragingly, incremental progress has been made in recent years, including more diverse talent being brought to entry-level positions, investing roles, and investment committees. The scope of DEI metrics provided to institutional investors during fundraising has also increased in recent years: more than half of PE firms now provide data across investing teams, portfolio company boards, and portfolio company management (versus investment team data only). 4 “ The state of diversity in global private markets: 2023 ,” McKinsey, August 22, 2023.

In 2023, McKinsey surveyed 66 global private markets firms that collectively employ more than 60,000 people for the second annual State of diversity in global private markets report. 5 “ The state of diversity in global private markets: 2023 ,” McKinsey, August 22, 2023. The research offers insight into the representation of women and ethnic and racial minorities in private investing as of year-end 2022. In this chapter, we discuss where the numbers stand and how firms can bring a more diverse set of perspectives to the table.

The statistics indicate signs of modest advancement. Overall representation of women in private markets increased two percentage points to 35 percent, and ethnic and racial minorities increased one percentage point to 30 percent (Exhibit 6). Entry-level positions have nearly reached gender parity, with female representation at 48 percent. The share of women holding C-suite roles globally increased 3 percentage points, while the share of people from ethnic and racial minorities in investment committees increased 9 percentage points. There is growing evidence that external hiring is gradually helping close the diversity gap, especially at senior levels. For example, 33 percent of external hires at the managing director level were ethnic or racial minorities, higher than their existing representation level (19 percent).

Yet, the scope of the challenge remains substantial. Women and minorities continue to be underrepresented in senior positions and investing roles. They also experience uneven rates of progress due to lower promotion and higher attrition rates, particularly at smaller firms. Firms are also navigating an increasingly polarized workplace today, with additional scrutiny and a growing number of lawsuits against corporate diversity and inclusion programs, particularly in the US, which threatens to impact the industry’s pace of progress.

Fredrik Dahlqvist is a senior partner in McKinsey’s Stockholm office; Alastair Green is a senior partner in the Washington, DC, office, where Paul Maia and Alexandra Nee are partners; David Quigley is a senior partner in the New York office, where Connor Mangan is an associate partner and Aditya Sanghvi is a senior partner; Rahel Schneider is an associate partner in the Bay Area office; John Spivey is a partner in the Charlotte office; and Brian Vickery is a partner in the Boston office.

The authors wish to thank Jonathan Christy, Louis Dufau, Vaibhav Gujral, Graham Healy-Day, Laura Johnson, Ryan Luby, Tripp Norton, Alastair Rami, Henri Torbey, and Alex Wolkomir for their contributions

The authors would also like to thank CEM Benchmarking and the StepStone Group for their partnership in this year's report.

This article was edited by Arshiya Khullar, an editor in the Gurugram office.

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What is a volume/issue number?
The difference between the numbers is that " volume typically refers to the number of years the publication has been circulated, and issue refers to how many times that periodical has been published during that year" (Wikipedia, n.d., para. 2). Volume numbers in references should be italicized (American Psychological Association [APA], 2020, p ...
How to Find a Volume Number on a Journal
The volume number of a journal, or any other periodical text, refers to the number of years the text has been in publication. For example, all issues of a journal released in its third year of publication would be categorized under volume three. Volume number is required if you are citing the journal in certain ...
journals
If I'm reading a journal article for which the reference for example is stated as "Journal of Examples 3, 74-78 (2014)", how can I tell whether it's the volume or issue number that is given? In many circumstances, I understand that it's quite easy to tell. For example, if the number is quite high, it's probably not the issue number.
APA 7th Edition Style Guide: Volume/Issue
Submit your Paper for APA Review; Volumes and Issues. Both volume and issue information, if present, is required in references for books and journals. ... Global Journal of Business Research, 5(3), 85-91. 3 is the volume number and 4 is the issue number: Moreira, J. P. (2010, December). Health literacy: A new dimension for healthcare development.
The "issue" with issue numbers in journal articles
However, the specific pieces of information included in the source element vary (e.g., references for journal articles and magazines generally include volumes and issues, whereas references for newspaper articles do not). This post is dedicated to journal articles, which may contain both volume and issue numbers.
Volume and Issue Numbers
Volume and Issue Numbers ; Magazine and journal volume and issue number formatting; More info; Page Numbers ; Undated Sources ; Citing a Source Within a Source ; In-Text Citations; Articles Toggle Dropdown. Academic Journals ; Magazines ; Newspapers ; Encyclopedia Articles ; Book, Film, and Product Reviews ; Websites; Online Classroom Materials ...
Journal Articles
Use of volume and issue numbering: Journals normally make use of volume and issue numbering to help identify individual issues in their series. Normally a volume will encompass an entire year's worth of a journal's issues. For example, a journal that is published four times yearly (quarterly) will have four issues in its yearly volume.
How to Cite Edition, Volume, and Page Numbers for Books
In a reference to a whole book, cite the edition and volume numbers—separated by a comma—but do not cite a page range. Here are some templates for citing print versions of books that include edition and volume numbers: Chapter in an Edited Book. Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Year). Title of chapter.
Scholarly Articles: How can I tell?
The information about the article, such as the journal title, volume, issue, and pages is usually on the first page of the article. You will need this information to cite the article correctly in your paper. Sometimes you can tell that the article is scholarly just by the name of the journal, but not always.
APA Style Guide, 7th Edition: Volume/Issue
Both volume and issue information, if present, is required in references for books and journals. Books . A book that is part of a multivolume set will have a volume number in the reference. Abbreviate the word Volume as Vol. and Volumes as Vols. followed by the Arabic volume number. The volume number follows the title of the book and comes ...
Difference Between Volume and Issue
An Issue is the act of making a publication available. Most journals use volume numbers. Journals can go without issue numbers. Volumes are published yearly. There is no time frame for an issue publication and can be as many times within a year. Volumes and issues are important to scholars during the research process. Author.
ISBN, DOI, ISSN: A Quick Guide to Publication Identifiers
Each article in each of the thousands of journals has its own unique DOI. Understanding a DOI is important when doing specific research. The DOI format is usually numerals and letters, including some punctuation. For example, a DOI created by Wiley might look like "10.1111/j.1365-2575.2012.00413.x."
How to Cite a Journal Article in APA Style
If you want to cite a special issue of a journal rather than a regular article, the name (s) of the editor (s) and the title of the issue appear in place of the author's name and article title: APA format. Last name, Initials. (Ed. or Eds.). ( Year ). Title of issue [Special issue]. Journal Name, Volume ( Issue ).
LibGuides: Research Foundations: Locate Citation Information
Volume / Issue Number - identifies the exact edition of the journal where the article appears. Publication Date - date formats vary; use the format the journal provides or the citation style requires. Most citation information will appear on the first page of the article; however, the location of that information will vary from journal to journal.
Bibliographical References
7.3.7 Book in Which the Source is Contained. If the main reference is to a chapter or essay within a book (including conference proceedings), the title and editor (s) of the book as well as the page numbers on which the chapter or essay can be found must be included in the reference as well. These often appear in one cluster, separated by commas.
13.1 Formatting a Research Paper
Set the top, bottom, and side margins of your paper at 1 inch. Use double-spaced text throughout your paper. Use a standard font, such as Times New Roman or Arial, in a legible size (10- to 12-point). Use continuous pagination throughout the paper, including the title page and the references section.
Where do I find all of the information I need to cite an article
Look near the article title or at the bottom of the first page. Article title : Always on the first page, toward the top. Periodical title : May appear at the top or bottom of the first page. Sometimes repeated at the bottom of subsequent pages (with volume, issue and page numbers). Volume and issue numbers: In peer-reviewed articles, usually ...
PDF Reference Guide
academic research databases. Include a URL for ebooks from other websites. Do not put a period after the DOI or URL. Does the book have an edition or volume number? If so, include the number in parentheses after the title but before the period. If both, show edition first and volume second, separated by a comma. Do not put a period between the ...
Volume formulas review (article)
Pyramids and pyramid-like figures. Volume pyramid = 1 3 ( base area) ⋅ ( height) We also measure the height of a pyramid perpendicularly to the plane of its base. Because of Cavalieri's principle, the same volume formula works for right and oblique pyramid-like figures.
Is volume related to outcome in health care: a systematic review and
To review systematically the research evidence linking volume and outcome in health care, and to summarise the magnitude and significance of the association between them. To describe the methodologic rigour of the existing literature, and to highlight the research and policy implications of the findings.
Writing Strong Research Questions
A good research question is essential to guide your research paper, dissertation, or thesis. All research questions should be: Focused on a single problem or issue. Researchable using primary and/or secondary sources. Feasible to answer within the timeframe and practical constraints. Specific enough to answer thoroughly.
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Cubic millimetre of brain mapped in spectacular detail
The 3D map covers a volume of about one cubic millimetre, one-millionth of a whole brain, and contains roughly 57,000 cells and 150 million synapses — the connections between neurons. It ...
Volume 659
Volume 659 In progress (25 June 2024) This issue is in progress but contains articles that are final and fully citable. Download full issue. Previous vol/issue. ... Research Papers. select article Design and development of a chitosan-based nasal powder of dimethyl fumarate-cyclodextrin binary systems aimed at nose-to-brain administration. A ...
Global private markets review 2024
Global deal volume declined 47 percent in 2023 to reach a ten-year low of $650 billion, ... The research offers insight into the representation of women and ethnic and racial minorities in private investing as of year-end 2022. In this chapter, we discuss where the numbers stand and how firms can bring a more diverse set of perspectives to the ...
IET Radar, Sonar & Navigation: Volume 18, Issue 5
Darren Griffiths, Mohammed Jahangir, Jithin Kannanthara, Gwynfor Donlan, Chris J. Baker, Michail Antoniou, Yeshpal Singh. , Pages: 657-673. First Published: 05 November 2023. The synchronisation of networked staring radar was achieved using the improved direct signal synchronisation method.