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Scholarly Writing
Apostrophes are punctuation marks used to indicate possession; the placement of an apostrophe depends upon the word being made possessive. Apostrophes are also used in contractions; however, contractions are not common in academic writing.
Note the italicization, bolding, and highlighting used for emphasis in the examples on this page.
See the examples below:
Pavlov’s theory of classical conditioning is based on his experiments with dogs. The company’s code of conduct is included in the employee manual. Jones’s (2017) research revolved around online academic writing feedback.
Note that singular nouns ending in "s" still take an apostrophe and an additional "s" (e.g., Jones’s research).
The Nurses’ Association has a code of conduct. The researchers’ methods were sound. I did not use companies’ private documents in my analysis.
I distributed recruitment flyers at St. Paul Children’s Hospital. My goal was to explore the perceptions of participants who attended the women’s health care conference.
Instead of writing
Use the uncontracted form:
Some common apostrophe errors are easy to avoid. Do not use an apostrophe in the following situations:
INCORRECT: I received the contact information for the teacher’s who attended the conference. CORRECT: I received the contact information for the teachers who attended the conference.
INCORRECT: I received the contact information for the teacher’s who attended the conference.
CORRECT: I received the contact information for the teachers who attended the conference.
INCORRECT: I asked the CEO’s to define their own leadership style. CORRECT: I asked the CEOs to define their own leadership style.
INCORRECT: I asked the CEO’s to define their own leadership style.
CORRECT: I asked the CEOs to define their own leadership style.
INCORRECT: I initially limited my search to the publications within the last 5 years, but most of the seminal research cited in this document was written in the 1960’s. CORRECT: I initially limited my search to the publications within the last 5 years, but most of the seminal research cited in this document was written in the 1960s.
INCORRECT: I initially limited my search to the publications within the last 5 years, but most of the seminal research cited in this document was written in the 1960’s.
CORRECT: I initially limited my search to the publications within the last 5 years, but most of the seminal research cited in this document was written in the 1960s.