Running head: HOW TO WRITE A PAPER IN APA 1

How to Write a Paper in APA Style So You Do Not Make Your IBET Teachers Cry

We W. Ant, Youto W. Rite, Wellso P. Lease, Follow T. Hese, Guide L. Ines

Thomas Jefferson High School for Science & Technology

HOW TO WRITE A PAPER IN APA 2

Abstract

Notice that the heading "Abstract" is not bold, nor does this first sentence start with an

indentation. This lack of an indentation is unique to the abstract. Throughout the paper, you

should use 12-point Times New Roman font and double space everything. There may be a few

exceptions regarding font size and spacing in figures, tables, or captions, but that will be

discussed in a separate forum, because if all of that were in here, I think your head would

explode. On the title page, you hopefully noticed that the full title is centered and not bold,

italicized, or otherwise formatted. On the next line, there is the list the authors, which includes

the first name, middle initial, and last name of each. The line following the authors' names

should say "Thomas Jefferson High School for Science & Technology", as that is your

institutional affiliation. On sample APA papers online, you may see a section on the title page

called "Author Note", but that is not necessary in our case as this is not a thesis or dissertation.

Often, at the end of the abstract, there is a line that says "Keywords", but you don't need that as

this is not a journal submission. The running head is a whole slew of crazy when it comes to

formatting. You need to make sure the running head and page numbers are in the heading, and

that they too (as with the rest of your paper) are in 12-point Times New Roman font. They

should conform to the 1-inch margin rules, which may mean you need to change the default

settings of your word processor. The running head on the title page should say "Running head:"

and then be followed by a shortened version of your title (no more than 50 characters). On all

subsequent pages, you should just have the shortened version of your title, not the words

"Running head". Please note that abstracts are only 150-250 words, and this is only this long

because APA has too many rules that need explanation. They really need to calm down.
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How to Write a Paper in APA Style So You Do Not Make Your IBET Teachers Cry

Notice that while this is the introduction, there is no heading that says "Introduction". On

the first main page of your paper (as this is), you continue the header with the running head (but

without the words "Running head") and page number, and then have your full title, centered, but

not with any other formatting. Then press enter to go down one line, press tab to indent, and

begin your introduction. Et voil.

From this page on, you should indent new paragraphs. This is different from the abstract,

which is not indented. I know it seems like APA just provides a set of arbitrary rules created for

the sole purpose of confounding TJ freshmen, but their intent is really not so malicious. These

style guidelines codify the aspects of scientific papers. Such a system helps those who research

and read scientific papers know what information is where, because when the formatting,

punctuation, and reference guidelines are consistent, no one has to guess what some seemingly

random name in parentheses refers to. If everyone who wrote scientific papers wrote them with

irregular or completely different formatting, no one would know what was a page number versus

a year of publication or an author's name versus a publisher's. That would get really confusing

when trying to find resources for further study. So, we use a style guide, and the one typically

used for scientific papers is APA. If you don't like it, you'd better figure out how to soon because

you're going to be using APA for a very, very, very long time.

Now, when it comes to moving on to the next section of your paper, you need to keep in

mind what a heading is, which will mean it gets a little bit of formatting, and what is not, but is

simply the next overarching section. The titles/headings that do not get bolded, underlined,

italicized, or whatever other kind of crazy things you kids do these days are: Title on the title

page, abstract, title on the first main page, and references. The headings that should be centered
HOW TO WRITE A PAPER IN APA 4

and bolded, but not underlined or italicized, are all the others: Site Description, Procedure,

Results, and Discussion. You should not change the font size for any headings.

Punctuation

Oh, look! What a coincidence! We were just talking about one of these things. Here's an

example of a heading. Notice that there's no extra spacing between the previous paragraph and

the heading or the heading and this paragraph. You may need to change the default settings so

that your word processor does not automatically add in that annoying extra space. You all know

the saying "Just say no"; well, it applies to extra spaces in APA papers as well. What I do when

I'm first starting a paper is change the "Styles" setting on Word from "Normal" to "No Spacing",

and then adjust the line spacing to double. It's what I did when I started typing this paper, and as

you can see, my "Punctuation" heading is resplendent.

With regards to punctuation, APA uses the Oxford comma, which is when a comma is

used before "and" or "or" in a series, because it helps avoid ambiguity, and all the cool kids do it.

If you don't believe me when I gush about how awesome the Oxford comma is, you should read

Linda Holmes' article "Going, Going, And Gone? No, The Oxford Comma Is Safe... For Now"

from June 30, 2011, which can be found on NPR's website. I'm not the only one with an affection

for that lovely little curly cue of a punctuation mark. There are also very funny cartoons about

why the Oxford comma is imperative for avoiding semantic faux pas.

For information on the use of other punctuation marks, please use the charts from the

APA Style blog (see, it's fashionable!): http://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/2011/08/punctuating-

around-quotation-marks.html.
HOW TO WRITE A PAPER IN APA 5

In-Text Citations

Now we get to the super fun part: citation. Correct citation is critical. When in doubt, cite.

The point of citing your sources is two-fold. First, you avoid plagiarism, which you should of

course try to do because if you plagiarize... trust me, you don't want to plagiarize. It's bad news.

Second, you make it easy for others to find out where you got your exceedingly well-researched

information because they will surely want to find out more from the sources you used to reach

your brilliant conclusions. (Also notice that while the heading "In-Text Citations" would have fit

on the previous page, no part of the paragraph following would have. This is the one exception

for using an extra space between paragraphs. We don't want headings to be lonely. Then they'd

be sad. And we don't want that.)

In-text citations are the references you give in your paper as opposed to on the

References page. It may look strange to you at first to have nearly every sentence in some

sections cited, but that's what is expected, and that's how to avoid plagiarizing. There are a few

ways you can include in-text citations. One is sententially, meaning you write something like:

According to Glotfelty (2013), one way of including in-text citations is by using the author's

name and publication year as part of the sentence itself. Another way is by including it in

parentheses at the end of the sentence: One way of including in-text citations is by using the

author's name and publication year in parentheses at the end of the sentence (Glotfelty, 2013).

Notice that the period goes outside the parentheses. If Mrs. Holman and I were both being

credited for that statement, it would look like: (Glotfelty & Holman, 2013). If it were the whole

IBET team, it would be: (Glotfelty, Holman, LaFever, & Smith, 2013) the first time and then

(Glotfelty et al., 2013) any subsequent times because there are more than two of us. Please note

the use of the Oxford comma. All hail the Oxford comma. Now, if it were all of the IBET
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English teachers, it would be (Glotfelty et al., 2013) even the first time that source was cited.

This is because there are more than five of us, and while we are all awesome, it would be

exhausting to read seven names next to all of the brilliant things we had to say. So, you instead

list the first author listed in the article's by-line, and then write "et al.". If you were writing these

other variations sententially, you would use the same logic: "According to Glotfelty, Holman,

LaFever, and Smith (2013)..." (notice and is spelled out when the citation is provided

sententially) or "According to Glotfelty et al. (2013)...". By the way, "et al." is an abbreviation

for the Latin phrase "et alii", meaning "and others". When English class isn't confusing enough,

we throw in Latin for good measure.

References Rules

Okay. Now for the biggie. References. There are a million and two variations of these

full-source citations, and it takes some sleuthing to figure out which one is appropriate for the

source you used. I know many of you will say, "But this isn't a big deal. Haven't you ever heard

of NoodleTools or EasyBib?" Yes, yes I have. And while you are certainly allowed to use such

tools, you should not rely on them solely, because they are not fool proof. If you happen to put

some information in incorrectly, the citation it spits out will be incorrect. You should always

check your work. Saying, "But that's what NoodleTools said was right" will not be an excuse for

you getting a source citation wrong.

Your references page starts with the word "References" capitalized and centered on the

page, but not bold. The header remains consistent throughout the paper, so your shortened title

and page number will be at the top. Have only one normal double space between the word

References and the first source citation. You do not indent the first line of a citation, but you do

indent all subsequent lines of that citation, which is called a hanging indentation.
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In general, citations consist of authors' names, year of publication, titles of publication,

and identifying information such as volume or issue number. An author's name is listed with the

last name first, then a comma, then a space, then the first initial, a period, then a space, then the

second initial if provided, then a period. If there is another author, put a comma after the last

period, then follow the same rules for the second author's name.

Titles of articles in APA look a little weird because most words are not capitalized. The

words that are capitalized are: the first one, proper nouns, and the first word after a colon. Titles

of journals typically have more normal capitalization rules, yet they are italicized, and you

should maintain whatever punctuation a journal uses. So if a journal has a "&", keep that; don't

change it to "and". After the title, and still in italics, is the volume number. Then without a space,

put in parentheses the issue number, not in italics. After that, put a comma, then page numbers

followed by a period. How are you holding up? Want to cry yet?

Here's a generic example provided by OWL @ Purdue's APA guide:

Author, A. A., Author, B. B., & Author, C. C. (Year). Title of article. Title of Periodical, volume

number(issue number), pages. doi:http://dx.doi.org/xx.xxx/yyyyy

I know this all seems confusing and ridiculous, but this is one area of life where conformity is

useful. Like I said before, there are many, many types of sources, and therefore, there are many,

many ways to cite them. One more thing to note: Your references page should be in alphabetical

order, and if you have multiple sources by one author, put those in chronological order, with the

most recent first. Please refer to the following resources when seeking answers for questions on

proper citation:

-APA's sample References page: http://flash1r.apa.org/apastyle/basics/data/resources/sample-

references2.pdf (The references on the following Reference page are from this.)
HOW TO WRITE A PAPER IN APA 8

-APA's Sample Paper: http://supp.apa.org/style/PM6E-Corrected-Sample-Papers.pdf

-OWL @ Purdue's guide: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/05/

You will find cases where there just isn't certain information in your sources. Maybe

there's no issue number. Maybe there's no page number. Maybe there's no regular author because

the author is a faceless organization. You are bound to find hiccoughs. The general rule is to

include as much information as you have in the order consistent with APA guidelines. If you

don't have a piece of information, skip that part and put in the next bit that you do have. The

point of these references and having consistent guidelines is so others can easily find the source

based on the information you provide. Or, so you yourself can find these sources again when

you're at university and find yourself in biology working on a research project about those cute

little critters, Ambystoma maculatum.

HOW TO WRITE A PAPER IN APA 9

References

Anderson, A. K. (2005). Affective influences on the attentional dynamics supporting awareness.

Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 154, 258281. doi:10.1037/0096-

3445.134.2.258

Chow, T. W., & Cummings, J. L. (2000). The amygdala and Alzheimers disease. In J. P.

Aggleton (Ed.), The amygdala: A functional analysis (pp. 656680). Oxford, England:

Oxford University Press.

Davis, M., & Whalen, P. J. (2001). The amygdala: Vigilance and emotion. Molecular Psychiatry,

6, 1334. doi:10.1038/sj.mp.4000812

Fleischman, D. A., Wilson, R. S., Gabrieli, J. D. E., Bienias, J. L., & Bennett, D. A. (2004). A

longitudinal study of implicit and explicit memory in old persons. Psychology and Aging,

19, 617625. doi:10.1037/0882-7974.19.4.617

Good, C. D., Johnsrude, I. S., Ashburner, J., Henson, R. N. A., Firston, K. J., & Frackowiak, R.

S. J. (2001). A voxel-based morphometric study of ageing in 465 normal adult human

brains. NeuroImage, 14, 2136. doi:10.1006/nimg.2001.0786

Rosler, A., Ulrich, C., Billino, J., Sterzer, P., Weidauer, S., Bernhardt, T., ...Kleinschmidt, A.

(2005). Effects of arousing emotional scenes on the distribution of visuospatial attention:

Changes with aging and early subcortical vascular dementia. Journal of the Neurological

Sciences, 229, 109116. doi:10.1016/j.jns.2004.11.007

Shipley, W. C. (1986). Shipley Institute of Living Scale. Los Angeles, CA: Western

Psychological Services.