All Sources Listed in the References Must Be Cited In-Text Somewhere in Your Work

General information on APA

·  Researchers do not claim the words and ideas of another as their own; they give credit or cite others.

·  All sources listed in the References must be cited in-text somewhere in your work.

·  Enough information must be given to allow the reader to locate and read the actual source for themselves. (where a reader cannot locate a source or reads the source and finds it to be, of poor quality, lack currency, have no reputable author, contain bias, or lack sufficient depth or be factually incorrect; your paper will be undermined)

·  You should use third person point of view (avoid I and we except when referring to yourself (yourselves) as the people doing particular steps in an experiment or study) and use the active voice. (“The students responded…” or “I tested 45 students’ ability to do a set task…”)

·  Your paper should be typed, double-spaced on 8½ by 11 paper with 1 inch margins on all sides.

·  Use 10-12 point font and Times New Roman or similar font.

·  Include a page header on every page and include page numbers flush right.

·  Your title page should have a Running Head: TITLE OF YOUR PAPER and page#, whereas all subsequent pages have just the TITLE OF YOUR PAPER and page #.

Use of abbreviations:

The parts of your paper:

·  Title Page

·  Abstract

·  Introduction

·  Method (or main body)

·  Results

·  Discussion

·  References

·  Appendixes (if necessary)

Title Page

Your title page should include:

·  A running head that is structured as below, at the top of your page

Running head: TITLE OF YOUR PAPER 1

·  The title of your paper (titles do not have to be your question and should not include “extra” words)

·  Author’s name

·  Institution (your school, or class)

Type your title in upper and lowercase letters centered in the upper half of the page. APA recommends that your title be no more than 12 words in length and that it should not contain abbreviations or words that serve no purpose. Your title may take up one or two lines. All text on the title page, and throughout your paper, should be double-spaced. Remember in IB, the title of your paper does not have to be your Research Question.

Beneath the title, type the author's name: first name, middle initial(s), and last name. Do not use titles (Dr.) or degrees (Ph.D.).

Beneath the author's name, type the institutional affiliation, which should indicate the location where the author(s) conducted the research.

Abstract:

An abstract is a brief (usually from 150 to 250 words), comprehensive summary of the contents of the article and it allows readers to survey the contents of an article quickly. An abstract can be the most important paragraph in a paper. It is what is searched in abstract and other databases and is what someone may read to see if they find your paper useful.

It needs to be “dense” with information and full of the important keywords on your topic. It should be accurate, non-evaluative, coherent and readable as well as concise. If it is for a paper on an empirical study it should include the following:

1.  the problem

2.  the participants (who or what was studied)

3.  essential features of the method (how)

4.  basic findings

5.  conclusions and implications/applications

Begin a new page. Your abstract page should already include the page header (described above without the word “runner”). On the first line of the abstract page, center the word “Abstract” (no bold, formatting, italics, underlining, or quotation marks).

Beginning with the next line, write a concise summary of the key points of your research. (Do not indent.) Your abstract should contain at least your research topic, research questions, participants, methods, results, data analysis, and conclusions. You may also include possible implications of your research and future work you see connected with your findings. Your abstract should be a single paragraph double-spaced. Your abstract should be between 150 and 250 words. Type the abstract itself as a single paragraph without paragraph indentation.

You may also want to list keywords from your paper in your abstract. To do this, center the text and type Keywords: (italicized) and then list your keywords. Listing your keywords will help researchers find your work in databases.

Introduction

This is where you will introduce the problem. The body of a work opens with an introduction that presents the specific problem under study. It does not carry a heading labeling it “the introduction”. However, centre the title above the beginning paragraph.

Things to incude:

·  The importance of the problem (your question)

·  How the study relates to what you found in the literature search of work in the field

·  Your hypothesis

·  Design of your study or essay (what you intend to do)

·  Theoretical and practical implications of the study.

“References” List Page in APA Format

The references list at the end of a journal article provides the information necessary to identify and retrieve each source. Choose references with care and a critical eye and include only sources you used in the research.

·  Your references should begin on a new page. Title the new page "References" and center the title text at the top of the page.

·  All entries should be in alphabetical order.

§  Arrange entries in alphabetical order by the surname of the first author, followed by the initials of the author’s given name.

§  Watch for Eastern countries where first name/last name is in a different preferred order.

§  Alphabetize letter by letter. “Nothing precedes something.” E.g. Brown, J. R. precedes Browning, A. R.

§  Alphabetize the prefixes M’, Mc, and Mac literally as if they are all short for Mac. E.g. McAllister, and MacNeil, precedes M’Carthy.

§  When only group author is known. Use the full group name for groups such as associations, government agencies, or corporations in the References list as author. (For in-text citing, use the full name for the first citation and then you can shorten the entry (if the group is readily identifiable; e.g. UN for United Nations.). Include the short-form in square brackets after the full name if you are going to cite it again later and use the short-form. If the group is not well-known, use the full name every time.

§  Where no author is known, move the title to the author position, and alphabetize the entry by the first significant word in the title. Only use “Anonymous” for works shown as anonymously written.

§  Where more than one entry is made for a single author, arrange the entries by year of publication. However, one author entries precede multiple author entries.

§  E.g. Smith, H. (1998) precedes Smith, H. (2004)

§  If both papers were published in the same year use a and b.

§  E.g. Smith, H. (2004a) precedes Smith, H. (2004b)

§  E.g. Foster, B. (2010) precedes Foster, B. & Thomas, K. H. (2008)

·  The first line of a reference should be flush with the left margin. Each additional line should be indented (usually accomplished by using the TAB key.) (Known as the hanging indent)

·  Do not press the space bar twice after a period or other punctuation. APA style requires only one space after any form of punctuation.

·  Each reference should be double-spaced within and between references.

·  All sources cited should appear both in-text and on the reference page. Any reference that appears in the text of your report or article must be cited on the references page, and any item appearing on your reference page must be also incuded somewhere in the body of your text.

·  Titles of books, journals, magazines, and newspapers should appear in italics.

·  Ideas cited from Personal communications like letters, memos, e-mail, and interviews do not need to be included in references, and should be cited in-text only.

The Main Body: In-text Citation

Paraphrasing and Summarizing:

·  Paraphrasing is when you summarize a passage in your own words or rearrange the order of a sentence and change some of the words.

·  When paraphrasing is done, you will need to credit the source.

·  You need to separate the thoughts you used so that each thought can be cited to its source, so don’t combine thoughts from different sources in one paraphrase.

·  Include the author’s last name and the year either in a signal phrase introducing the material or in parentheses following it. A page number or another locator is not required for a summary or a paraphrase, but include one if it would help readers find the passage in a long work. APA recommends this.

Direct quotations:

·  Reproduce quotations word-for-word

·  Incorporate a short quotation (less than 40 words) into text, and enclose the quotation with double quotation marks

·  Display a quotation of 40 or more words in a free-standing block of typewritten lines and omit quotation marks

·  Start a block quotation on a new line and indent 1.3 cm or 5 spaces from the left margin; double space the entire quotation

·  When quoting, always provide the author, year, and specific page citation in the text

·  If any incorrect spelling, punctuation, or grammar in the source might confuse readers, insert the word sic, italicized and square-bracketed, immediately after the error.

·  To insert information in a quote use brackets; to omit some of the quotation use three spaced ellipsis points (…)

·  When citing a section that contains a citation of another work, leave it in. You do not need to include this work in your References list unless you actually cited from it yourself elsewhere in your paper.

·  Ordinarily, introduce the quotation with a signal phrase that includes the author’s last name followed by the year of publication in parentheses. Put the page number (preceded by “p.”) in parentheses after the quotation.

Appendixes:

·  An appendix serves two purposes: it allows the author to provide the reader with detailed information that would be distracting to read in the main body of the article, and it allows more flexibility with respect to style and layout (i.e. Tables require APA style rules, whereas Appendixes do not.

·  E.g. of Appendixes; list of terms; large tables, mathematical proof, sample question or sample calculations.

·  You may use more than one Appendix. Label them Appendix A; Appendix B etc. and refer to them in the body of your paper when appropriate.

Tables:

·  When adding tables to the body of your paper, make sure you have been very selective in choosing what Tables your reader really needs. Provide only Tables you refer to in your paper. Put other data if you think it is useful but not essential to the reader in an Appendix.

·  Use only summary data. Raw data need not be included.

·  Each table should be intelligible without reference to the text. Explain all abbreviations, units, and headings.

·  Refer in-text to Tables by their number not their page number or position (e.g. table above or below)

·  Number all tables with Arabic numerals in the order in which the tables are first mentioned in text.

·  If the paper includes an Appendix with tables, identify the tables with capital letters and Arabic numerals (e.g. Table A1 ins the first table of Appendix A).

·  For the Table Title, give every table a brief but clear and explanatory title.

·  If you reproduced or adapted your table from a copyrighted source, you must obtain written permission for print and electronic reuse, from the copyright holder and give credit in a note at the bottom of the reprinted table giving credit to the original author and to the copyright holder; E.g. Note. From “Title of article,” by A. N. Author, Title of Journal, 14, p. 34. Copyright 2010.

Figures:

·  Any type of illustration other than a table is called a figure. A figure may be a chart, graph, photograph, mind-map, drawing, cartoon, map, or other depiction.

·  Use a figure when you want a “quick glance” by the reader at something, or when a “picture is worth a thousand words” and you can more efficiently convey a concept.

·  Before adding a figure ask yourself; Is the figure necessary? Is it simple and clean and free of extra detail? If it is a graph, is the data plotted correctly, the scales correct and the axes labeled properly?

·  Number all figures consecutively with Arabic numerals. This number should appear as close to the top right edge of the figure print as possible, outside of the image area.

·  All figures should be mentioned or referred to in-text (otherwise why are they there?)

·  In-text cite by referring to the figure number not position.

·  Legends that explain the symbols used in the figure should be placed within the figure.