APA Guidelines: A brief review

Why learn APA manuscript formatting guidelines

HEC standard professional standard need to know when you publish need for continued graduate

work

APA publication guideline history

started in 1928 anthropological and

psychological journal editors met

purpose: to standardize publication formats

first guidelines 7 pages long

latest 6th edition printed 2009 summer

General formatting guidelines Margins: 1 inch around

Font: Times New Roman – 12 pt.

Line spacing: double spaced throughout

Word spacing: 1 space after commas, colons, and semi-

colons 1 space after period in name (A. B. Smith) 1 space after period separating parts of

reference citation 1 or 2 spaces after periods in sentences in

text

Citing within text

Paraphrasing within text: In a 1989 article, Gould explores some of Darwin’s most effective metaphors.

Author cited in text:Gould (1989) attributed Darwin’s success to his gift for making the appropriate metaphor.

Author not cited in text:As metaphors for the workings of nature, Darwin used the tangled bank, the tree of life, and the face of nature (Gould, 1989).

Quotes within text

Direct quote from author:Gould (1989) explains that Darwin used the metaphor of the tree of life “to express the other form of interconnectedness-genealogical rather than ecological-and to illustrate both success and failure in the history of life” (p.14).

Direct quote without name of author:Darwin used the metaphor of the tree of life “to express the other form of interconnectedness-genealogical rather than ecological” (Gould, 1989, p.14).

Long Quotes (40 words or more)

General format for long quotes: indented 5 spaces do not use quotation marks citation appears one space after last punctuation of quote

Friedman (2006) draws connections between two seemingly disparate events: November 9 (dismantling of the Berlin Wall) and September 11 (attack on the World Trade Center). He believes

these two dates represent the two competing forms of imagination at work in the world today: the creative imagination of 11/9 and the destructive imagination of 9/11. One brought down a wall and opened the windows of the world. . . [the other] putting up new invisible and concrete walls among people. (p. 543). (p. 543) (p. 543)

(p. 543)

Multiple works within same parenthesis

Example:

Several studies (Balda, 1980; Kammil, 1988; Pepperberg & Funk, 1990) confirm the use of metaphors increases learning.

One work with multiple authorsFirst citation in text:

Wasserstein, Zappula, Rosen, German, and Rock (1994) found. . .

The use of metaphors was found to be helpful (Wasserstein, Zappula, Rosen, German, & Rock, 1994)

Subsequent citations (3 or more authors): Wasserstein and colleagues (1994) found Wasserstein et al. (1994) found The use of metaphors was found to be helpful

(Wasserstein et al., 1994)

Citation from secondary source

Text:Seidenberg and McCelland’s study (as cited in Coltheart, Curtis, Atkins, & Haller, 1993).

Reference page:Coltheart, M., Curtis, B., Atkins, P., & Haller, M. (1993).

Models of reading aloud: Dual-route and parallel-distributed-processing approaches. Psychological Review, 100, 589-608.

Use sparingly!

References

References are listed on separate page Only citations that appear in the text should

appear on the reference page Everything cited in the text should appear on the

reference page. References are double-spaced, flush left with

subsequent lines indented 5 spaces

Periodicals

General format:Author, A. A (year, add month and date of publication for daily or

weekly publications). Title of article. Title of Periodical, volume number(issue), pages.

Example:

Little, D. W. (200l). Leading change: Creating the future for education technology. Syllabus International, 15(5), 22-24.

Book, edition, multiple authors

General format:Author, A. A., Author, B. B., & Author, C. C. (year of publication).

Title of work: Capital letter also for subtitle (number ed.). Location City, State Abbreviation: Publisher.

Example:Anderson, A. B., Smith, S. D., & Jones, J. C. (1978). A

distant mirror: The calamitous fourteenth century (3rd ed.). New York, NY: Knopf.

Chapter in book

General format:Author, A. A. (date of publication). Title of chapter. In A. Editor

(Ed.), Title of book (pages of chapter). Location: Publisher.

Example:James, J. E. (1988). Two sides of paradise: The Eden

myth according to Kirk and Spock. In D. Palumbo (Ed.), Spectrum of the fantastic (pp. 219-223). Westport, CT: Greenwood.

Digital Object Identifiers (DOI)

DOIs are unique strings of numbers used to identify online articles’ content and provide a persistent link to their location on the Internet.

1. When DOIs are present, no longer have to include URL.

2. When DOIs are not present, include URL

Online periodical when DOI is present

General format:

Author, A. A. (date). Title of article. Title of Journal, volume(number), page numbers. doi: xx.xxxxxxx

Example:

Herbst-Damm, K. L., & Kulik, J. A. (2005). Volunteer support, marital status, and the survival times of terminally ill patients. Health Psychology, 24, 225-229. doi: 10.1037/0278-6133.24.2.225

Online article when DOI is not present

General format: Author, A. A. (date of publication). Title of article Title of

Journal, volume(number), page numbers. Retrieved from URL

Example:Sillick, T. J., & Schutte, N. S. (2006). Emotional

intelligence and self-esteem mediate between perceived early parental love and adult happiness. Applied Psychology, 2(2), 38-48. Retrieved from http://ojs.lib.swin.edu.au/index.php/ejap

Robin Sontheimer University of Missouri-Kansas City Writing Center 2009

Title Page No more Page Header

Running head: SHORT TITLE ALL CAPS IN HEADER 1

Full Title of Paper: Sentence Case, Centered Left to Right

Name of Author

Author’s Affiliation

Author Note

Author note with more information about affiliation, research grants, conflict

of interest and how to contact.

No more than 50 characters

Full title is centered and positioned in upper half of the page

Robin Sontheimer University of Missouri-Kansas City Writing Center 2009

Levels Use levels consecutively, meaning that, if

your paper has three levels, use levels 1, 2, and 3

Levels have slightly different formattingLevel of Heading Formatting of Heading

1 Centered, Boldface, Uppercase and Lowercase Heading

2 Flush Left, Boldface, Uppercase and Lowercase Heading

3 Indented, boldface, lowercase paragraph heading ending with a period.

4 Indented, boldface, italicized, lowercase paragraph heading ending with a period.

5 Indented, italicized, lowercase paragraph heading ending with a period.

Robin Sonthei

mer Universi

ty of Missouri-Kansas

City Writing Center

2009

Levels: more like an outline

OUTLINE HOW IT WOULD LOOK IN YOUR PAPER

I. Method

a. First type

i. Part One

ii. Part Two

b. Second Type

i. Part One

ii. Part Two

II. Results

Method

In this paper I used two types of methods to figure out

the results of my experiment.

First Type: Sand Collecting

The first type of method I used was the sand

collecting method.

Part one of the sand collecting method: collection.

This part included collecting sand and putting it into

giant buckets to be sorted by grain size.

Part two of the sand collecting method: testing.

This part included…

Citing others’ work

A citation is giving credit whenever you use someone’s ideas, figures, unique approach, or specific reasoning. This is done whether you paraphrase another’s ideas or use direct quotes.

The purpose of using citations is twofold: 1. to give credit for the person whose

material you are using and 2. to offer a way for readers of your

work to find out more information about that source.

Plagiarism

Plagiarism: act of using someone else’s ideas, words, figures, unique approach, or specific reasoning without giving appropriate credit.

It’s a bad thing!

Resources

American Psychological Association (2010). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (6th ed.). Washington, DC: Author.

APA Website: www.apastyle.org

Updated APA guideline notes on ELCSE website under Student Resources (http://www.aug.edu/elcse/ELCSE_APA_Guidelines.pdf)