Having trouble with getting started on your paper? would you like your paper edited before turning it in? this libguide is to help you use the american psychological association apa style guide, which is frequently used for the social sciences including education, management, psychology, and the health sciences. Reference formats examples and explanations for citing your sources in the various formats for your references list 2. Formatting your paper how to set up your paper including the margins, font, and your references list, and view a sample paper 3. In text citations also known as parenthetical notation how to cite your references in the text of your paper 4. Endnote bibliographic citation software, which can help format your citations and is freely available for download to css faculty, staff, and students 5. Ethically use sources information on the college 39 s academic honesty policy and turnitin, an online tool to detect where sources need to be cited note: this guide is in no way a replacement for the actual manual, which is several hundred pages long, and can be found in the library on reserve or at a bookstore near you.

Please consult the apa 6th edition manual for authoritative information in greater detail. Apa american psychological association style is most commonly used to cite sources within the social sciences. This resource, revised according to the 6 th edition, second printing of the apa manual, offers examples for the general format of apa research papers, in text citations, endnotes/footnotes, and the reference page. For more information, please consult the publication manual of the american psychological association. Paiz, elizabeth angeli, jodi wagner, elena lawrick, kristen moore, michael anderson, lars soderlund, allen brizee, russell keck last edited: 2015 06 10 0:02 the american psychological association apa updated its style manual in the summer of 2009.

Please note that the first printing of the apa sixth edition contained misprints if you are using the apa manual, make sure you are using at least the second printing of the sixth edition. Traditionally, psychologists were the main users of apa, but recently, students and writers in other fields began using apa style. This resource was created following the apa manual rsquo s ldquo what rsquo s new in apa, rdquo is organized according to the apa manual chapters, and highlights updates to the sixth edition that most concern student writers instead of those interested in publishing manuscripts. The levels are organized by levels of subordination, and each section of the paper should start with the highest level of heading. julias quick and dirty guide to apa the american psychological association apa has produced a publication manual that includes all of the rules that you need to know to produce a manuscript that conforms to their standards. This manual, now in the 5th edition, has been accepted as the gold standard by many academic disciples. Other common academic style manuals include the chicago manual of style and the modern language association style manual.

If you are a graduate student, it is a really good idea to purchase the style manual accepted by the majority of the faculty in your department. Actually, these manuals have a real reason for being, other than driving students crazy. By providing a uniform way of presenting information, these style guides assist the writer in preparing their papers in a manner that will be understood by most readers. For example, because the information needed for a reference to be complete is specified, readers are assured that they can obtain a copy of a particular cited work themselves, if they are interested.

Fences By August Wilson Essay

Without all of the parts of a citation, references can be near impossible to track down. whats really important? each style manual has many, many rules, most of which the vast majority of students do not need to learn in detail. There are, however, a few major areas that you should pay attention to: page margins type styles and fonts spacing indentation headers quotations citations of sources references plagiarism reducing bias in language in addition, style manuals are terrific sources of general information about writing, including the content and organization of an academic paper and the appropriate expression of ideas in written academic discourse.

For students using lots of statistics or tables and graphs, the apa manual also has clearly written directions for including these components in a manuscript. For more information, check out the manual make sure you get the 5th edition and/or go to the apa website. The font should be 12 pt and you need to use a serif type style with the hooks and curly cues , such as times or courier.

Only one space should be added between the period at the end of a sentence and the first letter of the next. headings: these tell the reader how your text is organized they are very important. You need to decide how many levels of headings you will need, before you can figure out what they look like. The first level includes the major categories, such as the introduction, whatever you name the body of your paper, and the conclusion or discussion or both. For example, if you are writing about theories of second language development, you would use a sub heading for each of the major theories you discuss.

If you then break any of these categories into smaller groups, you would need at least one additional level. The next level should be flush to the left margin not indented , italicized, in upper and lower case letters. If you use a third level, that heading should be indented, italicized, with only the first letter of the first word in upper case and it should be followed with a period, after which you write your first sentence, without using a paragraph return. If you use more than three levels of headings, you need to check the apa manual for the correct format. The reader needs to know whether you obtained the information from some source or whether that provided is your own interpretation. When you include information from an outside source, you will typically either 1 paraphrase the original authors words or 2 use a direct quote, writing down exactly what was written in the original text. To avoid plagiarizing when you paraphrase, you need to change both the content and form of the information you read it is not enough to shuffle the words around from passive to active voice, for example or substitute synonyms within the same sentence structure.

If you are having difficulty paraphrasing something without falling into this trap, you should consider including direct quotes, which you indicate with quotations marks , from the material in question. With direct quotes you must include the page number s of the original source, along with the author s last name s and the year of the publication. If you are able to paraphrase the information, or you just want to refer to a work in general, you only need to include the author s last name s and the year of publication and then, of course, include the full citation in the reference section too. There are several ways you can do in text citations, such as in the following examples: according to smith 1989 , life can be pretty exciting. reference list: the reference list includes only and all of the sources you actually cited in the text of your paper.

This is different from a bibliography, which refers to all of the sources which you consulted to write a paper, regardless of whether you actually cited them in the text of your paper. For most academic papers, you should include a reference list, not a bibliography. formatting your references: your reference list starts on a new page and should have the word 'references' centered at the top of the page not bold, not underlined, and only the first letter capitalized. The new 5th edition of the apa manual has gone back to the old style of using hanging indents, which means that the first line of each reference goes all the way to the left margin, with the following lines of each reference indented. You can set this up on your computer by using the ruler at the top of your screen. Drag the bottom triangle to the right by 1/2 an inch, leaving the top triangle all the way to the left the opposite of how you set your paragraph indents. That should make all of your author names stick out to the left, while indenting the rest of each reference.

where do i put the periods and commas? the apa manual provides the format for each kind of citation you might use, such as journal articles, web sites, conference presentations, etc. it is really important for students taking graduate level classes to own a current copy of the apa manual. For an example of a reference section formatted in apa that includes journal articles, chapters from edited books, and authored books, click here for up to date information about citating electronic sources i.e. Web pages follow this link: additional resources can be found at the purdue online writing lab see this specific page on using apa format .