APA Reference And Formatting Style—Basic Problem Of A Beginner

I have seen many people complaining that APA reference style is easy to use for in-text citation but difficult to apply when the question arises about formatting. So here are simple steps which can be obtained for APA formatting while writing some research report.

Basically APA reference style has been developed by American Psychological Association. However, with the passage of time, universities began to utilize it in different genres including arts, business, psychology etc. The main reason behind using this style has been simplicity of this referencing system. Yet the formatting is a bit difficult as compared to others.

APA in-text citation:

In-text citation means citing some source while writing a particular text. This citation is given in order to confirm two things; to make the data credible and to avoid plagiarism. For this purpose, the author name and year of publication is used in following way

Example: (author name, date)

APA formatting:

For formatting, you have to be Microsoft Word expert. You will have to do following

-margin: 1” each side

-line spacing: double

-Running head: topic/student’s roll number and page number

    *first page always have line “running head: (words which are written in running head)

-Making a cover page with:

• Author name
• Professor name
• Course
• Date

-Table of content page

-Reference page

-Appendices

Reference list:

Reference list is also one of the significant aspects which are taken under consideration while developing a paper. The list must be in alphabetical order and on a separate page. Following pattern is used for developing a reference.

For book:

Author last name, first letter of first and second name, (year) book name. place of publication; publisher.

For journals:

Author last name, first letter of first and second name, (year) “title of the article”.  journal name. place of publication; publisher.

(for detailed guide, you can refer to the official website of APA reference style.)

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