APA Formatting Style

What is APA Format?

CLICK HERE for sample images of APA papers.

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APA stands for the American Psychological Association, and it is the style of formatting used in the social science fields to stylize the look of the writing as well as the organization of the sources used within the writing.

You will need to check with your school to determine the formatting guidelines they wish you to follow.  Some schools have you follow the formatting style for the class you are attending.  For example, the field of English falls under the Humanities tier; therefore, if your school requires you to format your work according to the course you are attending, then you would format your work in MLA format.  

However, if you attend a school that requires you to format your work based on the degree that you are seeking (let's say that you are pursuing a degree in Social Work), then even if you are taking an English class (which falls under Humanities and thus MLA formatting), but you are a Social Work major, then you would format your paper following the APA formatting style.

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See the samples posted below.  All of the numbered samples below come from the Liberty University Online Writing Center.

1. Title Page--all papers at Liberty require a title page, even MLA, click the Title Page link.
• Genaral Formatting Quick Guides
• Quick Guide to APA
• Quick Guide to MLA
• Quick Guide to Turabian
2. Abstract
• Abstracts are for APA Format ONLY
3. Paper Layout
• General Layout for Formatting Styles
• APA Sample Paper  
• MLA Sample Paper  
• Turabian Sample Paper 
4. References Page 
1. Page 1
2. Page 2
5. Appendix

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Often it helps to understand the layout of your formatting style by seeing it compared to another formatting style.  MLA, APA, and Turabian are the three most commonly used formatting styles.  To see a formatting comparison chart--created the the OWL Purdue--between these three styles, click HERE.

You can also watch the OWL Purdue APA vidcast series on the Purdue OWL YouTube Channel.