LibAnswers: APA FAQs

In the 7th edition of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association:

"Authors are responsible for determining authorship and for specifying the order in which two or more authors' names appear in the byline. Principal authorship and the order of authorship credit should accurately reflect the relative contributions of persons involved"(APA Ethics Code Standard 8.12b, as cited in American Psychological Association, 2020, p. 25).

When citing a work with multiple authors, you should keep the order of authors exactly as is in that publication. Your reference list is organized alphabetically by the name of the first author that appears on the list for a publication -- that list is predetermined, do not attempt to organize authors' names alphabetically within one work with multiple authors.

Example:

Feldman, C. C., Anderson, D. B., & Carey, C. K. (1987).

Gerund, H., & Duncan, V. V. (1967).

Zigler, T. G., Raft, K., & Henderson, J. K. (2001).

The reference list is ordered alphabetically by first author, but within each citation, authors' names are ordered presumably by contribution, as the proper order was given wherever you see the list of authors on the publication itself.

References

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