APA Series Part Two: APA Paper Format
Our editors break up how to write an APA paper
When you look at the first article of your American Psychological Association (APA) series, we talked about APA style and formatting basics. This short article will discuss how exactly to write an paper that is APA-styled tackling essay components such as the title page, abstract, and body.
Title page
The title page of an APA paper should include a concise title, the author’s name and affiliation that is institutional an author’s note, and a running head for publication. A running head is an abbreviated title of no more than 50 characters, beginning with the words “Running head,” followed by a colon, one space, and an abbreviated title—all in capital letters. Part Four of our APA series provides an APA title page example for your reference.
All pages in an APA paper should include a header. Into the header, are the running head title, followed by the page number, which should be right-justified. When page numbering is properly put up utilizing the Headers and Footers function in Microsoft Word, the computer will automatically handle the numbering that is consecutive.
The Abstract, typically a component that is crucial of APA paper, should summarize the topic and must accurately state the explanation and fundamental nature associated with the paper by such as the main ideas and major points.
We advise students to say only the most findings that are important implications. The word count limit of an varies that are abstract journal to journal, and certainly will cover anything from 150 to 250 words. The Abstract should follow the title page, on a page that is separate aided by the centered word “Abstract.”
This section just isn’t labeled. The text is contained by it of the APA paper divided into Introduction, Method, Results, and Discussion. Every one of these sections should naturally proceed with the other, which means that they do not necessarily begin on a page that is new. A title is required by each section centered on the page. And don’t forget, you need to follow APA reference guidelines to make sure your entire citations are accurate and properly formatted.
Introduction
The development of an APA paper should begin on a new page, following the Abstract. Because its position in it is made by the paper easily identifiable, the Introduction will not require a heading. Instead, are the title of this paper towards the top of the page, in upper and lower case, accompanied by the college homework helper writing. Our editors typically seek out the items that are following an APA Introduction:
- Background information about the subject
- A reason of why this issue is significant
- An overview of relevant literature
- A discussion of this hypothesis
- The way the author intends to address the issue
- Information on the paper’s organization
The Introduction must be well organized that will contain headings to really make the APA paper more understandable. Try to avoid jargon as it will only confuse your reader.
This section describes the extensive research and just how it absolutely was conducted. The strategy is very important because it concerns the reproducibility associated with research. Reproducibility, one of many principles for the Scientific Method, is the ability of a test or experiment to be replicated by independent researchers.
We seek out the following subsections in the strategy element of an APA paper: participants (or subjects), measures, and procedures (the latter two in many cases are combined in one subsection). These subheadings must certanly be left-justified. The “participants” subsection should describe the subjects (including number that is total their basic demographic information) and how they were selected and categorized. It should also explain why some subjects were not included.
The subsection for measures and procedures should specify the apparatus and materials used in the experiment, including any questionnaires or surveys. This section must describe in detail also the way the research was conducted.
The outcomes part of an APA paper presents the findings. This section should summarize the information collected and also the statistical or treatments that are analytical. Tables, figures, graphs, charts, drawings, and photographs could be included, however it is important to help keep them as easy as possible. Clearly label each visual with an Arabic numeral (e.g., Table 1, Table 2, etc.) and a title. The label and the title should appear flush left on separate lines over the table. Remember to include any source details underneath the table.
Discussion
The Discussion section is an interpretation and evaluation associated with the findings. In this section, in line with the findings discussed in the Results section, the writer should address the issues raised in the Introduction. It is not simply a reiteration for the total results or points previously made.