Writing An APA Research Paper: Simple Formatting Guidelines

The APA format is a research style that was established by the American Psychological Association. It's one of the formatting styles in a group comprising of MLA, Chicago and AP style. However, it is the most common style used by college and university students in editing a paper. For sociology, human health and psychology, professors require that this style be used to the latter. This paper will guide you on how to write your work using this style:

Page layout

You will need to restructure some of the page layouts for your work. Use half an inch as your indent. Use a double space and write with the New Times Roman. Ensure every page is numbered at the top and on the right side.

Paper organization

A good piece of work requires an organized structure. While using this style structure your paper in the following order; title page, abstract and acknowledgments, introduction, work analysis and references. In addition, some of the papers will require you to write a section on the methods used, findings and appendices.

Title page

Always create a title page for every paper you are asked to write about. The name of your paper should be in capital letters and situated at the top and in the left hand side of your page. On the right hand side of your page, write down the page number. The page numbers should be in Arabic. Afterwards, write your name and the institution's name.

Citations

This format requires that you cite other people's work whenever you use their content in your paper. Regardless of whether you have paraphrased or quoted their work ensure you cite it. Every time you cite, include the author's name and the year. It should be written in the body of your paper and in the same sentence related. There are many citation styles, choose which one suits you.

General rules

There are some very common rules that people tend to take for granted at times. Therefore, it is always good to be reminded of them. Always use an unbiased language and for phrases that may have some negatively in them always use phrases that sound more neutral. It is advisable to use an active voice rather than the passive one. For every table or figure, write it on its own page. This will make referencing more easier, since you will be using the page numbers.

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