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- Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
- Kategorie: Bildung
- Sprache: Englisch
Write right in for scholarly success While world-renowned for the precision and clarity it lends to scholarly writing, keeping track of APA style's exacting standards can be demanding (at times even excruciating!) for initiates and seasoned writers alike. Created and governed by the American Psychological Association, it provides a universal style for formatting, citations, and footnotes in psychological research, behavioral and social science journals, and beyond. Getting up to speed is tough stuff, but once you've got it, your work will have that easy-to-follow scholarly authority that will get high marks from your professors and peers alike. Your friendly, frustration-free guide for this adventure in simplifying APA style is Joe Giampalmi, who has taught more than 100 APA-style composition courses to college students. He takes the pain of following APA style away by breaking it down to its essential elements and focusing on the important stuff students encounter most. You'll work through specific, real-life examples of using APA style for psychology, criminology, business, and nursing papers. In addition to demystifying the intricacies of formatting and citation, APA Style & Citations For Dummies has got you covered in all matters of grammar and punctuation--as well as guidance on how APA style can help you negotiate issues around the ethics of authorship and the importance of word choice in reducing bias. * Develop conciseness and clarity * Pay attention to flow, structure, and logic in your writing * Know when, why, how, and what to cite * Keep your writing ethically conscious and bias-free Writing in APA style is something that almost all students will need to do at some point: APA Style & Citations For Dummies is a must-have desk reference to know how to win the approval of your professors--and earn the marks you need for success!
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APA Style® & Citations For Dummies®
Published by: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030-5774, www.wiley.com
Copyright © 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey
Published simultaneously in Canada
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Library of Congress Control Number: 2021935723
ISBN: 978-1-119-71644-0
ISBN: 978-1-119-71646-4 (ebk); ISBN: 978-1-119-71645-7 (ebk)
APA Style® And Citations For Dummies®
To view this book's Cheat Sheet, simply go to www.dummies.com and search for “APA Style And Citations For Dummies Cheat Sheet” in the Search box.
Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Introduction
About This Book
Foolish Assumptions
Icons Used in This Book
Where to Go from Here
Part 1: Conforming to Standards: APA and the Academic Environment
Chapter 1: Capitalizing on Consistency: APA and the Academic Classroom
Understanding APA and Academic Standards
Comparing APA and MLA
Identifying Your Role in Academic Process
Confronting Cultural Differences — APA and Nonnative English Students
Chapter 2: Updating and Debugging: APA Seventh Edition
Transitioning from the Sixth: APA for Today
Focusing on the Title Page and Page Organization
Eyeing the Changes with Citations and References
Addressing Bias-Free Writing Style and Updated Mechanics
Approaching APA Updates: Mindset
Student Publishing: Your Goal As a Serious Writer
Chapter 3: Understanding Expectations: APA and Discourse Communities
Understanding Academic Expectations in College
Examining APA Expectations
Overcoming Adversity
Identifying Discourse Communities You’ll Encounter in College
Chapter 4: Protecting Scholarship: Plagiarism
Academic Integrity: Get Your Sheepskin
Plagiarism and Academic Dishonesty: You Know Better
Avoiding Plagiarism: Your Responsibilities
Closing Cultural Gaps: APA Strategies for Nonnative English Students
Part 2: Earning Applause: APA Writing for the Academic Audience
Chapter 5: Writing for Success: APA Writing Style
Focusing on the Why and How: Audience and Purpose
Zeroing In: Assignment Approach and Focus
Smooth Sailing: Transitions and Flow
Writing with Attitude: Tone
Recalling Sandbox Lessons: Respectful Language
Chapter 6: Creating a Foundation: The Principal Parts of Speech, Structure, and Usage
Shining the Spotlight on the Stars of the Show: Action Verbs
Avoiding Anonymity: Nouns
Designating Replacements: Pronouns
Building Basics: Structures
Reducing Confusion: Problem Pairs
Chapter 7: Navigating Pages: Conventions of Style
Marking Cadence: Punctuation
Seeking Attention: Special Conventions
Perfecting Appearance: Spelling
Standing Tall: Capitalization
Chapter 8: Covering All Bases: Three-Level Revising
Revising: Why Rewriting Is So Important
Streamlining: Structural Organization
Paring: Paragraphs and Sentences
Whittling Words
Chapter 9: Achieving Your Personal Best: Student Improvement Plan
Understanding What Makes a College Reader
Developing Lifetime Literacy Skills: Reading for Success
Writing As a Skill for Lifetime Success
Developing Lifetime Literacy Skills: Writing for Success
Studying in Small Groups: Literacy and Socializing
Part 3: Practicing Safe Cites: Writing and Citing Sources
Chapter 10: Gaining Insight: To Cite or Not to Cite
Crediting Sources: General Guidelines
Coordinating Citations: Common Elements
Addressing Special Approaches: Personal, Authoritative, and Legal
Citing Electronic Sources: Websites, Periodicals, Software, and Visuals
Evaluating Sources
Chapter 11: Preparing for Conflict: Source Engagement
Pre-Gaming: Gathering Sources
Rehearsing: Preparing Sources
Synthesizing: Engaging with Sources
Post-Gaming: Verifying Information
Chapter 12: Formatting Last Impressions: Reference List
Playing by the Rules: General Guidelines
Coordinating Reference Elements: Author, Date, Title, and Source
Clarifying Elements: Reference Conventions and Abbreviations
Playing by the Rules: Specifics for Formatting Periodicals
Seeing Is Believing: Real-Life Reference Items
Extending References: Annotated Bibliography
Part 4: Perfecting Presentation: Beginnings, Endings, and Other Writings
Chapter 13: Preparing Appetizers and Desserts: Front and Back Materials
Opening Impressions: Formatting Front Matter
Closing Remarks: Formatting Back Matter
Chapter 14: Acing a First Impression: Formatting Title Page and Page Layout
Naming Writes: Title Page and Titles
Packaging Appearance: Formatting and Organization
Chapter 15: Understanding First Year Writing: APA Essays and Reaction Papers
Conquering College Comp: Essay Basics
Focusing on Essay Structure and Formatting
Implementing Essay Variations: Common College Essays
Reading and Responding: Reaction Paper Basics
Chapter 16: Mastering Advanced Writing: APA Review of Literature
Reviewing Literature: Searches and Steps
Studying Samples: Introduction, Body, and Conclusion
Laying Out Pages and the Title Page of the APA Literature Review
Chapter 17: Perfecting Specialized Writings: APA Reports
APA Report Writing: Creating and Organizing
Writing Reports in Six Easy-to-Follow Steps
Adapting APA Formatting to Reports
Studying Report Samples: Introduction, Body, and Conclusion
Organizing Your Report: Other Essential Sections
APA Report Writing: Specializing and Personalizing
Part 5: The Parts of Ten
Chapter 18: Ten Priorities for Proficient Academic Writing
Analyze Assignments
Focus on Audience and Purpose
Begin Assignments with Background Reading
Plan Projects
Focus on Specific Nouns and Action Verbs
Reference Sources Beyond Professors’ Expectations
Write Tight and Revise
Read and Read Some More
Write, Write, and Write
Develop a Writer’s Work Ethic
Chapter 19: Ten Strategies for Creative Source Engagement
Look for Power Language within Sources
Think Critically to Analyze Sources
Utilize Professors as a Source
Extend Conversations
Master a Variety of Signal Phrases
Use Source Engagement with Every Applicable College Paper
Engage Exclusively with Classic Sources
Engage with Anecdotes
Learn from Sources
Turn to Primary Sources
Chapter 20: Ten Tips for High-Scoring Research Papers
Form a Study Group
Peer Up
Include a Few Optional Parts
Schedule Reviews with Your Writing Center
Perfect Your Reference List
Select a Local Topic with a Global Application
Contact an Expert for an Interview
Create Checklists
Attend to Details
Utilize the Professor’s Office Hours
Index
About the Author
Advertisement Page
Connect with Dummies
End User License Agreement
List of Tables
Chapter 1
TABLE 1-1 Comparing APA and ML
TABLE 1-2 Subtle Variations between APA and MLA
Chapter 2
TABLE 2-1 Differences between the Sixth and Seventh Editions
Chapter 3
TABLE 3-1 Differentiating between High School Teachers and College Professors
TABLE 3-2 College Discourses and Relevant Language
Chapter 4
TABLE 4-1 Plagiarism versus Academic Integrity
Chapter 6
TABLE 6-1 General to Specific Nouns
TABLE 6-2: Types of Pronouns
Chapter 7
TABLE 7-1 Forming Possessives
TABLE 7-2 Foreign Forms of Nouns
Chapter 10
TABLE 10-1 Citations with Missing Elements
TABLE 10-2 Research Domains
Chapter 11
TABLE 11-1 Topic Questions and Keyword Searches
TABLE 11-2 Guidelines for Summarizing, Paraphrasing, and Quoting
Chapter 12
TABLE 12-1 Reference List Entry Abbreviations
Chapter 15
TABLE 15-1 Research Writing versus Essay Writing
Chapter 16
TABLE 16-1 Topic Ideas and Theses
Chapter 17
TABLE 17-1 Determining the Type of Report
List of Illustrations
Chapter 8
FIGURE 8-1: An unrevised college research paper.
FIGURE 8-2: Revised first draft of sample research paper.
FIGURE 8-3: The revised middle of the research paper.
FIGURE 8-4: The revised closing of the research paper.
Chapter 13
FIGURE 13-1: A sample table of contents that most professors will accept.
FIGURE 13-2: Contents page with numbering and subheadings.
FIGURE 13-3: A list of figures.
FIGURE 13-4: A sample abstract.
FIGURE 13-5: A sample executive summary for a business topic.
FIGURE 13-6: A sample appendix.
FIGURE 13-7: Alternate style appendix.
FIGURE 13-8: A sample of glossary terms common to a research paper on the topic...
FIGURE 13-9: The correct way to format.
Chapter 14
FIGURE 14-1: A title page template.
FIGURE 14-2: A title page.
FIGURE 14-3: Page 2 in an APA paper.
FIGURE 14-4: A template for headings.
Chapter 15
FIGURE 15-1: Example of essay title page.
FIGURE 15-2: An example of an acceptable title page for reaction papers.
Chapter 16
FIGURE 16-1: An example introduction of a literature review.
FIGURE 16-2: Part 1 of the body section highlighting sources and identifying pa...
FIGURE 16-3: Part 2 of the body section showing source engagement.
FIGURE 16-4: Part 3 of the body section showing synthesis of sources.
FIGURE 16-5: An example of a conclusion.
FIGURE 16-6: An example of recommendations for new research and its importance....
FIGURE 16-7: An example abstract.
FIGURE 16-8: An example of a graduate-level title page for a literature review....
FIGURE 16-9: A sample title page for a stand-alone review.
Chapter 17
FIGURE 17-1: An example of a report title page.
FIGURE 17-2: Model language from a report introduction.
FIGURE 17-3: Model language from the body of a report.
FIGURE 17-4: Model language from the conclusion of a report.
FIGURE 17-5: An example of an executive summary.
FIGURE 17-6: An example of a transmittal memo.
FIGURE 17-7: Model language from the recommendations of a report.
Guide
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Table of Contents
Begin Reading
Index
About the Author
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Introduction
If you’re a college student reading this book, you face the stresses of papers, readings, classes, commitments, and exhaustion — in addition to tuition, student loans, and transportation. Keep remembering that your college days are the best days of your life.
Writing assignments are the stress du jour for many of you. Add APA citing and formatting and it’s like starting the day with a flat tire and dead battery. Being the resourceful and intelligent person you are, you bought APA Style & Citations For Dummies to help yourself and your grade. Good decision.
You’re holding the solution to reducing a current stress and improving your research writing and citing sources — in addition to eliminating another potential stress, inadvertent plagiarism. Sorry I can’t help you with other stresses, that’s other For Dummies books, but I can help you charge your brain with APA and college writing skills.
If you’re a high school student reading this book, congratulations on the initiative and good judgment. You’re taking a major step toward developing your APA style and citation skills and preparing yourself for college writing and research.
About This Book
APA Style & Citations For Dummies emerged from the need of college and high school students to interpret the APA manual. This For Dummies book isn’t a textbook or workbook. It’s a college-level (and high school) adaptation of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, Seventh Edition. (Note the adjective “publication” in the title.) The APA publication manual is written primarily for professional scholars fulfilling requirements for advanced degrees and publishing their research in scholarly journals.
Only about 25 percent of the seventh edition offers direct guidance aligning APA with citing and referencing in traditional undergraduate research projects. This book offers 100 percent direct guidance for APA academic style writing and citing for most common undergraduate research projects.
I wrote this book based on my decades’ experience teaching APA at the high school and college levels and teaching and grading thousands of research projects. This book provides you APA fundamentals for academic writing, citing, referencing, and formatting. It provides strategies for
Bias-free writing
Revising
Citations and references
Front and back required and optional sections
Title page and page layout elements
Source engagement
Summaries, paraphrases, and quotations
The APA manual is written in a formal and scholarly tone, appropriate for its content and professional scholars respectfully obsessed with their research. This book is written for the For Dummies audience, professional scholars-in-training who enjoy a road-trip more than a research project.
This book, like your laptop manual, wasn’t designed to be read cover to cover. Here’s a quick-start menu to help you locate topics you’re looking for:
Plagiarism (
Chapter 4
)
Citations and references (
Chapters 10
–
12
)
Formatting (
Chapter 14
)
Writing style (
Chapter 5
)
Revising strategies (
Chapter 8
)
Grammar and conventions (
Chapters 6
and
7
)
APA and essays (
Chapter 15
)
APA and response papers (
Chapter 15
)
APA and reviews of literature (
Chapter 16
)
APA and reports (
Chapter 17
)
Note: This book focuses on explaining the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, Seventh Edition — in the For Dummies brand style. The For Dummies brand uses Chicago Manual of Style (like most book publishing does) and its own styles, so you may notice some formatting and such that doesn't look like APA. Just a heads-up that the text is consistent with the For Dummies brand except when it’s necessary to illustrate a point, and then I make sure the text illustrates APA formatting and style.
Specifically, you’ll notice formatting and style differences with these types of things:
End punctuation with bulleted lists
The use of contractions
Font variations
Book style page formatting
So basically when writing your research papers and essays, do as I say, not as For Dummies does.
Foolish Assumptions
I assume you share similar interests with college students I taught for decades. When I wrote this book, I made the following assumptions about you, my dear reader:
Your life is in your phone, which is more important to you than your keys.
You appreciate your parents and family for their support of your academic goals.
You have an active life, but next to your family, academics are your priority.
Your interests include music, food, friends, road trips, college activities — and some of you even listen to Frank Sinatra.
You prefer not to talk too much waiting for a class to begin; you’d rather text and post on social media.
In other words, you’re busy, but you find a way to achieve academic excellence.
Icons Used in This Book
The APA publication manual includes the organization and searchability of a smartphone, with every topic tabbed and numbered to two decimal places. It’s impressive construction. APA Style & Citations For Dummies — not as impressive, but half the cost — offers you four icons to help you explore points of interest:
When information needs highlighting, such as Chapter 5’s “reading from the perspective of the writer,” I identify it with this icon.
Warning icons, like academic progress notices, indicate caution such as Chapter 8’s warning that “writers sometimes experience false starts.”
Technical stuff signifies a brief digression in the flow of information such as Chapter 7’s “unconventional spellings of brand names.” This information is interesting, but not essential to you understanding what’s important.
Remember icons highlight points of information such as Chapter 15’s reminder that “your professor’s assignment guidelines supersede APA’s guidelines and guidelines I offer you in this book.”
Where to Go from Here
This book represents a starting point for verifying APA professor preferences. APA offers the standard for academic style writing, citing, and formatting, which are detailed for you here. But APA doesn’t award your grade, and it recognizes that departments’ and professors’ guidelines replace APA requirements.
Many professors, for example, require variations of APA’s title page, appendices, annotated bibliographies, and page number requirements with citations. To help you identify specific professor variations, chapters list questions to ask your professor. Similar resources include visiting your professor during office hours and visiting your writing center.
Feel free to start with Part 1 to get an overview to the APA or peruse the Table of Contents and Index to find a topic to pique your interest. You can then flip to that chapter and read more about what you want to discover.
For additional information related to adjusting to college life and college essay writing, check out the Cheat Sheet at www.dummies.com. Just search for “APA Style & Citations Cheat Sheet” to reference whenever you need.
Part 1
Conforming to Standards: APA and the Academic Environment
IN THIS PART …
Discover the storied history of the American Psychological Association (APA) that shaped today’s guidelines for academic writing, research, and documentation in almost every academic field — and resulted in APA becoming the leader among its peers.
Examine grade-influencing differences between APA’s sixth and seventh editions that affect title page design, page layout, citations, and references.
View side-by-side comparison charts of APA and MLA that reveal subtle game-changing differences for students transitioning documentation styles.
Apply lessons from adversity that will help you master APA, improve your writing, and succeed in college.
Read APA and college-adapting advice for nonnative English-speaking students confronted with cultural differences and language-barrier challenges.
Avoid habits highly conducive to plagiarism such as super citations, citation procrastination, and conditional common knowledge — and read a professor’s perspective on plagiarism.
Motivate yourself by visualizing your college graduation day protocol: faculty procession, academic regalia, tassel toss, and “Pomp and Circumstance.”
Chapter 1
Capitalizing on Consistency: APA and the Academic Classroom
IN THIS CHAPTER
Getting to know the APA
Positioning APA among leaders
Crossing the curriculum with APA
Studying English and APA as an add-on language
The hours you commit to studying APA style and citations, working on research and writing, and completing your required readings moves you days closer to achieving your academic goal of earning your college degree.
Congratulations on the academic success you achieved to date and your hard work that positions you toward earning your college degree in the near future. Your degree will change your life and your family’s future, especially if you’re a first-generation college graduate. Your school success has been punctuated with accomplishments and milestones such as the following:
Navigating your first day of school without your parents
Reciting the alphabet
Learning to read and write
Meeting your first forever best friend
Experiencing your first love and first heartbreak
You also survived fractions and decimals, school lockers, middle school hallways, social media embarrassment, and getting lost your first day of college classes. Some of you may even have attended the wrong class on the first day of college, but you survived the obstacles.
Today you face another challenge on your educational expedition: studying and implementing a documentation style that credits, formats, and organizes writing projects consistent with standards in your field of study. You (more likely your professor) chose the American Psychological Association (APA) style and citation guide and not Modern Language Association (MLA) or Chicago Manual of Style (CMoS) because you’re studying a social science subject such as sociology, political science, anthropology, linguistics, education, business, or communications.
Although MLA and CMoS also offer a high-quality documentation style, APA continues to grow as the documentation style of choice among academic institutions today.
Familiarizing yourself with APA and any documentation style, less challenging than navigating middle school hallways, can cause you some frustration but will eventually hardwire your brain for user-friendly access to standardize, organize, and document your academic papers. And mastering APA will make you feel as proud as surviving AP English.
Consider this chapter your jumping-off point to the APA. Here I explain a brief history of APA, the importance of documentation, and APA’s position among other documentation styles. I also offer advice for non-native language students who face the challenge of APA along with the most challenging skill for the brain — writing in a second language.
Understanding APA and Academic Standards
APA, the world’s largest association of psychologists, establishes standards for scholarly writing in most of the social and behavioral sciences for academic writing style, citing sources, and formatting documents. More than a hundred years ago, APA established organizational consistency guidelines for professional scholars, undergraduates, and high school students who created papers for scholarly publication and classroom submission. APA’s style and citation guidelines set a standard for writing and reading academic documents as well as helping manage volumes of scholarship for academic writers and readers.
A documentation style, such as APA and MLA, standardizes crediting works of others, citing sources, listing references, and organizing documents from the title page to appendices. A consistent format guides readers through text with visual consistency, logical flow of headings, and systematic organization to retrieve sources on demand. Standardization also reduces bias when sources are presented. Documentation standards are as important as punctuation standards.
Your professor and university have competitive choices for a style and citation guide. They chose the publication manual (Publication Manual of the American Phycological Association, Seventh Edition) that sold millions of copies worldwide in multiple languages. APA’s popularity continues to grow across academic disciplines and universities. In addition to APA’s growth, it’s the only documentation style with its own For Dummies version. What more could you ask for?
The following sections focus on the role of the APA supporting research in the social sciences and beyond. An early internal conflict within the APA resulted in publishing its first style guide. Students today share responsibility to honor those academic standards that were established over a century ago.
THE ORIGIN AND PURPOSE OF APA
The American Psychological Association (APA) began with a few dozen psychologists who organized around 1900 for the purpose of promoting scholarship and standards among growing numbers of academicians in the social sciences. Like many groups of academicians passionate about their beliefs, pioneering APA members experienced an intellectual dichotomy between academic diversification and academic standardization. Some members believed APA should expand academic interests into other fields of scholarship beyond the social sciences. Other members believed APA lacked the intellectual maturity to expand and should first develop standards for their specialized interests at the time.
Proponents of standardization emerged, as well as an official seven-page writing and style guide. The purpose of the early style guide was to promote professionalism and help readers manage growing libraries of research materials.
Looking back from today’s perspective, both groups were right. APA expanded academically far beyond the social sciences, and its standards for academic writing, scholarly publishing, and citing sources ranks at the top of the industry.
Standardizing how you handle topics
The APA establishes standards that provide structure and meaning to a research document. Standards identify guidelines that are important and how to achieve them. Lack of standards is like a marching band without marching orders.
APA publishes standards for topics such as
Academic writing style:
Active, direct, and concise writing that communicates clearly and succinctly
Grammar, mechanics, and conventions:
Writing guideposts that help readers smoothly navigate from page to page
Bias-free language:
Language that respects diverse populations
Citations and references:
Conventions of scholarship that credit works of others and expedite searching their sources
Document organization and formatting:
Standards for organizing title pages, text pages, references, and documents
Respecting the academic environment
APA’s respect of scholarship aligns with the academic sanctity of the college classroom. The classroom environment respects scholarship, values sharing of ideas, and welcomes debate based on evidence. APA’s standards of scholarship seamlessly blend with classroom expectations, like sunshine blends with a warm day at the beach.
Learning resembles a participation sport. Your obligation as a student includes dedication to new ideas, commitment to preparing for classes, and an open mind to new learning. Your participation includes attending every class — and mastering APA guidelines.
A recent study showed three habits common to students who achieved success in college and graduated, which the following sections identify in greater detail:
Attending class
During my decades of college teaching, I can’t recall a student who attended every class in a course and earned less than an A for the course. Those students didn’t earn the A because they perfected attendance, but because they perfected learning habits. Regular class attendance creates a learning rhythm of understanding course content and class organization.
When you attend class, you experience regular exposure to APA content such as citing, referencing, formatting, and engaging with sources. You regularly see models of other students’ assignments and hear professors’ comments on work and other students’ questions. In addition to content experiences, you're regularly reminded of deadlines, helpful resources, and adjustments to assignments.
You have immediate access to ask questions before class, during class, and after class. You actively participate in class and absorb instruction that you paid tuition for. Daily class activity is as important as daily physical activity.
Completing assignments
A body of research correlates the quality of your first college writing assignment with graduating from college. You read that correctly. You’re a risk not to graduate if you neglect or fail to submit your first college writing assignment.
Your assignments, mostly writing, show what you learned. They demonstrate your knowledge of content and your knowledge of APA writing, citing, and formatting. College writing assignments can’t be successful if you begin them a day or two before deadline, similar to habits of some high school students. Frequently, a college writing assignment is longer than essays written by some high school students.
To help you complete your assignments, keep the following tips in mind:
Begin assignments early.
Check out
Chapter 5
.
Follow APA strategies.
Chapter 5
offers some simple strategies.
Utilize resources available to help you, such as professors’ office hours and your university writing center.
Refer to
Chapter 20
for more details.
Read extensive background on topics you’re writing about.
Chapters 9
and
18
discuss this topic in greater detail.
Making friends
Don’t underestimate the importance of socializing in college, which can sometimes take two or three semesters to achieve a level of comfort. Feeling uncomfortable the first semester or two isn’t unusual. Give it time. Get involved in college activities, whether you’re a resident or commuter.
Colleges recognize the importance of incoming students assimilating into both the college discourse community and social community. Colleges offer academic, social, and athletic events. Take the initiative to introduce yourself to people. Talk with other students in your classes. Make eye contact as you walk around campus. Some of the people you meet in college will be your lifelong friends. Nerds are popular in college, both academic and social nerds.
APA AND OTHER STYLE GUIDES
Early in my college teaching career, my university required teaching MLA for writing courses and teaching APA for business courses. Later in my career, APA became the standard throughout the university. APA continues to trend throughout universities as the five-star writing and citation guide.
Here’s a look at three major documentation styles:
APA: APA expanded from its initial use as the style and citation guide primarily for psychology and now extends as the standard for sociology, anthropology, political science, geography, history, economics, business, education, communication, nursing, science, and other fields.MLA: MLA, founded in the late 1800s as an advocacy organization for scholars in the study of literature and modern languages, publishes its MLA Style Manual for students and professional scholars in the fields of language and literature. The manual sells millions of copies and published its ninth edition in 2021. Similar to APA, MLA survived philosophical disagreements.CMoS: The Chicago Manual of Style (CMoS), first published in the early 1900s, offers style and citation guidelines for students, teachers, and librarians. Chicago recently published its 17th edition and is commonly used in publishing. CMoS lacks the extensive academic use of APA and MLA. This For Dummies book uses CMoS.Other specialized style guides and their primary content area include the following:
Harvard: EconomicsVancouver and AMA (American Medical Association): MedicineOSCOLA: LawIEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers): Technical studies and electrical engineeringACS (American Chemical Society): ChemistryComparing APA and MLA
Unlike many of your professors who generally have a choice of documentation styles they teach, you’re frequently required to alternate documentation styles. You may also have the misfortune to use two different styles in two different courses. APA and MLA have enough similarities that they’re easily confused. (See the nearby sidebar for more about MLA.)
APA offers standards for organizing and developing sections of your paper’s beginning, middle, and ending. It recommends procedures for designing the title page, numbering pages, setting margins, and positioning headings and subheadings. APA prioritizes formatting for crediting and citing sources.
Not surprisingly, many professors are possessive of the content they teach, thinking they understand their specialty better than many other experts, sometimes referred to as discipline envy.
Furthermore, a content rivalry exists between APA and MLA. It’s not exactly Buckeyes versus Wolverines or Beatles versus Stones, but it’s strong enough that mixing styles of formatting isn’t healthy for your grade. Table 1-1 looks at the differences between the two most popular documentation styles for students and chapter numbers where you can read more about these topics in this book.
TABLE 1-1 Comparing APA and ML
Formatting
APA
MLA
Citations
One author
(Chapter 10)
(Lee, 2020, p. 84)
(Lee 84)
Citations
Two authors
(Chapter 10)
(Lee & Tyler, 2020, p. 47)
(Lee and Tyler 47)
Citations
Three-plus authors
(Chapter 10)
(Lee et al., 2020, p. 56)
(Lee et al. 56)
Headings and subheadings
(Chapter 14)
Five-levels of subheadings
None
Title page
(Chapter 14)
Requires formatting
None
Reference page title
(Chapter 12)
References
Works Cited
Source titles punctuation
(Chapter 7)
Sentence case
Title case
Running head
(Chapter 14)
None for students
Last name and page number
Block quotations
(Chapter 10)
40 words or longer are blocked
Block 5-plus lines of prose
Block 4-plus lines of verse
Punctuation following URL or DOI
(Chapter 12
No period follows a URL or DOI in references
A period follows a sentence-ending URL or DOI
Additional variations between APA and MLA are as subtle as the ones in Table 1-2:
TABLE 1-2 Subtle Variations between APA and MLA
Style
APA
MLA
Page
(Chapter 12)
Okay to abbreviate as p.
Doesn’t reference.
And
Okay to use &.
Use and.
URL/DOI
(Chapter 12)
Don’t insert a period after.
Use a period after.
Reference titles
(Chapter 7)
Use sentence case.
Use title case.
List of resources (Chapter 12)
Title as References.
Title as Work Cited.
In my decades of teaching APA, the following patterns of APA errors appeared regularly:
Neglecting a
hanging indentation
(first line flush left, all following lines indented five spaces) on the first line of reference items
Underlining the title on the title page
Incorrectly positioning the period before sentence-ending parenthesis rather than after parenthesis
Alphabetizing reference items by criteria other than the author’s last name
Not coordinating citations and references, which requires all citations to appear in references and all reference items to appear in citations
Not referencing figures and tables in text
Neglecting to include date in citation
The inconsistencies of APA and MLA formatting styles are evidenced by the limited consistencies of both. Here are three significant formatting similarities of both styles:
Prefer 12-point Times New Roman font (see
Chapter 14
).
Set one-inch margins of four sides (see
Chapter 14
).
Double-space lines of text (see
Chapter 14
).
Identifying Your Role in Academic Process
Early in your academic career, education was a partnership between you, your family, and your teacher. Your family provided guidance that resulted in your academic independence, enabling you to accept primary academic responsibility today. And as you discover in Chapter 9, many successful people educate themselves exclusively by reading. I emphasize the importance of reading throughout this book. You become educated by reading, such as learning about APA. In addition to reading, you educate yourself by committing to your schoolwork and satisfying curiosity.
To educate yourself in the academic environment, add two ingredients: commitment and curiosity. Your role as a college student is to bring your best effort, your A-game to every class, every assignment, every semester. That level of commitment requires work and sacrifice. College degrees are earned, not awarded. In fact, only about one-third of American adults have earned a college degree. Earning your degree requires sacrificing play time, social time, and social media time — and using that time for reading, writing, researching, and thinking. As a committed college student, you frequently need to say: “Sorry I can’t go. I have schoolwork to do.”
Becoming educated requires thinking and satisfying curiosity with topics you’re presented in the classroom. Your brain is wired with a natural curiosity to discover, a practice you began when you learned to crawl. That early curiosity was focused on objects, such as staring at your foot and wondering how it got there.
Stepping forward, your curiosity today is focused on ideas. For example, if you experienced your first view of the Grand Canyon over the South Rim, you wondered how such an expansive gash in the earth got there. When you started to talk, you had more questions than answers. Now as a college student, those answers result in more questions. The more you read and experience classes, the more you question. The more you write, the more you discover. When you write, question, and theorize, you’re thinking critically and becoming educated.
The role of APA in your life as a scholar is to provide stability and consistency as you commit to academics and satisfy curiosities. APA helps you navigate the language of scholarship as you write and read. APA is your GAS, your Guidance Activation System, that navigates you through the world of scholarship and provides you opportunities to be your best you.
Your role in the academic process includes continuing to develop your APA skills throughout high school and your college experiences. Gradually increase the complexity of your research reading so that you may apply complex sources to your research writing.
APA and high school classrooms
Your first introduction to APA in high school validates why school subjects are called disciplines. An early academic lesson (and life lesson) is that before you become a rule maker, your survival depends on being a rule follower. APA is the rule-maker, and you are the rule follower. Mastering APA requires academic discipline.
If you had the good fortune of being taught by a high school teacher obsessed with teaching you the details of APA, or MLA or CMoS, treasure them and express your appreciation to them for their passion towards academic protocol. That teacher helped inspire you to buy this book and learn additional strategies about APA.
A prerequisite for writing APA research papers requires completing the following:
Write fluent sentences.
Master writing clear concise messages that don’t distract the reader with compromised sentence structure, incorrect grammar, or misused language conventions.
Integrate sources:
Read to develop ideas to incorporate into your writing. College writing requires integrating college ideas into your writing — called
source engagement
(
Chapter 11
). College audiences demand more than your unsubstantiated opinion, they want opinions of experts and how your opinion integrates with experts’ opinions.
Document with APA guidelines:
Academic audiences expect you to document your sources consistent with standards in your field of study, APA.
APA and college courses
APA is the common denominator of writing in most college courses — similar to chocolate being the common denominator of most desserts. If APA is the standard documentation style throughout your university, you’ll master it easier because you’ll be practicing it more frequently. Until you experience that regular practice, applying APA will test your patience. It will be like trying to benefit from exercising by going to the gym once a week. Perfect practice produces perfect performance.
Your success and your degree require commitment and curiosity. Earn your degree one assignment at a time, one class at a time, one course at a time, and one semester at a time. And you already demonstrated your initiative and commitment by buying this book.
Critical thinking in college includes establishing relationships between ideas studied in different courses. For example, hypothesize answers to course-related questions such as
What is similar about revising writing in a composition course and continental drift in a geography course?
What is similar about textures in art and scales in music?
What is similar about the scientific method in chemistry and quadratic equations in physics?
APA strategies help you achieve academic success as you fulfill writing course requirements — and accumulate credits — throughout your college experience.
APA and comp courses
Your most challenging academic commitment following high school will be your first-year writing courses, usually titled College Composition I (CCI) and Composition II (CCII), essay writing courses that require research. An unfortunate statistic is first-year writing courses result in as many as 30 percent of freshmen dropping out of college. In addition to learning college writing, you’ll also be learning APA standards with that writing.
Although 30 percent of first year college students fail first-year writing courses and drop out of college, 70 percent succeed in those courses and go on to graduate. Let me help you become one of the 7 out of 10 first-year students who graduates from college.
Yes, college essay writing with APA documentation is a difficult course, and you’ll be additionally enrolled in three or four other courses that also require writing. Welcome to the world of college where four years of hard work can change your life and the lives of your children and family.
Successful essay writing requires essay writing skills (refer to Chapter 15), and APA style, documentation, and formatting skills (check out Chapters 10 through 14). Successful research writing, CCII that usually follows CCI, requires intense research and more complex documentation. APA use in essay writing, your first college writing course, lacks the intensity of APA in CCII.
CCI is one of your first and most challenging college courses, especially if you weren’t an A-B essay writer in high school and especially if you aren’t an avid book reader. Success in your first-year composition course requires following these three points for successful college writing:
Start writing assignments the day they’re assigned to you in class. Analyze the assignment and read extensive background material on the topic. Apply APA strategies as you read:
Complete APA reference elements as you read each source (see
Chapter 12
).
Identify source content (with page numbers) that you could use as summaries, paraphrases, and quotations.
As you commit time and thought to drafting your essay, complete APA citations and references in your draft.
During my decades teaching first year writing students, I frequently tracked strategies of students who wrote model essays. They began assignments early, read extensive background material before drafting, and committed to revising (refer to Chapter 8).
Commit to recurring feedback and revising.
Source engagement (see
Chapter 11
) can significantly influence your grade.
Allocate time to review APA documentation with your professor (during office hours), a peer, and your university writing center.
Refer to
Chapter 20
for more details.
APA and content courses
APA style and documentation that you learned in your composition and research courses can make you an expert-level student in your content courses. And if you earned Bs in your essays in composition courses, you should earn As in your writing assignments in content courses.
Here’s why. Most professors in content areas lack experience teaching writing like your writing professors. Consequently, their expectations for writing assignments are less than their expectations for content in their courses. Advantage you.
Stick to this three-step plan for writing APA essays in your content courses to earn a letter-grade higher than essays in your composition courses:
Nail APA guidelines such as title page, page layout (see
Chapter
14
), citations (refer to
Chapter
10
), and references (check out
Chapter
12
).
Reference four or five sources to support your thesis.
Engage with those sources as I discuss in Chapter 11.
Connect support of your thesis with class lectures, best-selling books, current events, and content in other courses.
As a reading tool (refer to Chapter 9), APA helps you identify the credibility behind ideas, the supporting details validated by scholars in the field. APA provides the skills to further explore citations and references. APA also provides the writing tools to stand out among your peers, tools such as source engagement and critical analysis like I discuss in Chapter 11.
Finally, use write-to-learn strategies to learn content and develop your writing. Chapter 9 includes explanations and examples. It’s like a two-for-one sale: You learn content and you develop your writing.
APA and online courses
You may have discovered from the pandemic that remote learning lacks the excitement (your friends) of classroom learning. And some of you discovered the convenience of remote learning and that it matched your learning style. More importantly, colleges discovered that online courses are an inexpensive and convenient platform to deliver instruction. Advantage university. You can expect online course offerings to grow.
If your student experience includes an online writing course with APA documentation, you have taken the first step toward success by buying this book. You face two challenges taking an APA online writing course and learning college writing. You miss
The face-to-face support of a class
The face-to-face support of a classroom instructor
Parts 2 and 3 help you with both challenges.
Here are a few tips for succeeding in online courses:
Maintain regular email and platform contact with your professor.
The easiest plan for an unsuccessful online experience is going MIA (missing in action).
Use online office hours to answer your APA questions.
As you complete your citing and formatting, identify your top two to three questions to email your professor during online office hours.
If you’re unsure about APA documentation, plan to have your documentation reviewed by your writing center or a trusted peer.
As you work on your research, record APA issues to review with your writing center and a trusted peer.
Regularly utilize class tools available through your learning platform.
This strategy not only provides you with course learning tools but also identifies your online presence for professors who use tracking tools to monitor students’ online participation. Focus on utilizing class handouts that contain models of APA requirements that you find challenging, such as citations and references.
Don’t fall behind with assignments.
Because professors’ recording of assignments requires more time for online courses, missing assignments may not be revealed until final grades. When life priorities interfere with completing an assignment, communicate with your professor well before the assignment due dates. Professors usually prefer visiting during office hours rather than emailing or phoning.
Utilize these strategies for improving your writing and online documentation in online courses. Here are some suggestions and their locations:
The previous section provides background for succeeding in a writing course; almost all information is applicable to online courses.
Chapter 5
strategies for APA style adapt to online writing assignments, including research papers. I explain essays and response papers in
Chapter 15
, review of literature in
Chapter 16
, and report writing in
Chapter 17
.
Chapters 6
and
7
explain APA’s focus on parts of speech and conventions that support writing.
Chapter 8
familiarizes you with a three-level approach for revising your writing. Don’t underestimate the importance of revising your college writing.
Confronting Cultural Differences — APA and Nonnative English Students
Many college students sacrifice to educate themselves. Students who work full time to support a family while pursuing a degree attend American colleges and deserve admiration from the academic community. One million nonnative English-speaking students travel to the United States to educate themselves at one of the world’s best systems of higher education.
Throughout my college teaching career, I taught essay writing and business writing to students who were learning English as an additional language. Both courses required APA citations and formatting. The commitment of students in both courses enriched my life by seeing their relentless drive to learning. I recall, for example, a student from Southeast Europe who wrote A-grade essays by checking spelling of almost every word with a tattered dictionary she carried with her until she graduated. English was her fourth language, and she studied business pursuing a career in international business.
Colleges that accept you want you to graduate and offer you the support you need to succeed. Your challenge includes finding that help. What follows are some practices to get you started.
INTERNATIONAL STUDENT EXPERIENCE
International students leave their native countries to study in the United States, learn a new culture, and gain experience to qualify for worldwide opportunities. Students I taught came from Europe, South America, the Middle East, and Far East. For example, a 20-one-year-old woman came from the Far East at the age of 18 because she didn’t want to study engineering, a requirement in her country for intelligent students like herself.
She came to Rowan University (Glassboro, New Jersey) where I taught, to study business management. She described a third-grade regimen of ten-hour school days, six days a week. Studying English was her fifth language. Her written English was impeccable, and she was one of the best business writers I’ve ever taught.
I admire these students for their courage to undertake such demanding challenges of learning a new culture, learning to write English, and simultaneously incorporate APA into their writing. For many students English was their third, fourth, and even fifth language. I admire their determination to succeed at writing, earn their college degrees, and prepare themselves for opportunities that will improve their lives. Research suggests that learning additional languages is much more difficult after puberty. These students were role models for the class because of their work ethic, interesting backgrounds, and determination to educate themselves.
Seeking a professor who supports language learning
If you as an international student aren’t offered scheduling priority to enroll you into a course that supports learning an additional language, ask your advisor to schedule you with a professor experienced teaching this specialty. If you can’t identify such a professor, ask for recommendations from an upper-level peer who is also a second language learner. Although some professors specialize teaching second language learners, many professors are experienced with strategies that support second language learners.
To help you identify these professors, here are examples of teaching strategies conducive to learning styles that meet your needs:
Guided reading strategies that include providing a reading purpose prior to reading assignments
Nonlecture teaching styles such as hands-on and active-learning classes
Numerous handouts
Team assignments
Student-centered rather than content-centered
If this is your first experience in a course learning to write English (with the added challenge of APA documenting and formatting), be patient with yourself. You’ll succeed as long as you continue trying. You’ve overcome greater challenges to be where you are. You’re learning to write a difficult language that many native speakers struggle with. Don’t be surprised if you need to take the course a second time to succeed, not a setback but opportunity to additionally improve your English proficiency.
The brain possesses a property called neuroplasticity, the ability to rewire itself and adapt to new learning experiences. Research shows that one of the brain’s most challenging adaptations is learning a new language and adapting to a new culture, which requires about a generation to learn. You ensure failure only when you stop trying.
Understanding that English isn’t easy
English is a difficult language to learn because its foundation is a combination of languages (including Greek, Latin, German, French, Spanish, Japanese, Russian, and Italian) with a combination of rules. Difficulties learning English include the following:
Inconsistent spelling rules
Pronoun agreement variations
Inconsistent plural formations with numerous irregular forms
Numerous irregular verbs
More prepositions than other languages
Word positioning sequences inconsistent with other languages
Language convention rules inconsistent with other languages
Nonverbal communication differing from other languages
Additional challenges of learning English include
Illogical academic vocabulary:
GPA, priority registration, major and minor
Eye contact:
Offensive in some cultures, expected with English
Addressing professors: Informal in some cultures, formalities expected with English culture
To develop language skills addressing professors, role play language exchange with a peer. You can also role play questions you’d ask in class and offer comments on class topics. Professors in most Western cultures expect to be addressed formally in speaking and email. Use formal language and tone, like you’re addressing an older well-respected family member. Also, look professors in the eye when you speak, an expectation of Western culture.
Inconsistent writing structure:
Beginning, middle, and end in English inconsistent with other cultures that require writing support to precede main ideas.
Making the transition seamlessly
If you’re learning English and APA as a second (or third) language, here are some strategies to help you make the transition:
Read aloud and record examples of APA documented literature.
Include reading aloud punctuation for citations and sources in reference lists.
Make a recording of APA-related words and phrases that challenge you.
Include spelling and meaning, words such as DOI (digital object identifier), source engagement, crediting sources, plagiarism, attribution, format, bias-free, in-text, and signal phrase.
Make a recording of writing-related words and phrases
. Include prewriting, peer-feedback, approach, audience, purpose, and tone.
Meet with a tutor or visit your writing center.
Set the meeting for the exclusive purpose of reviewing APA in your paper.
Read about and talk with peers about plagiarism, especially if your native culture accepts referencing sources without crediting them.
See
Chapter 4
for more information on plagiarism and add-on language students.
Write (in English) describing your use of APA in your writing and include a list of questions about APA use.
Writing about APA in English will help you learn English and APA. Write with vocabulary common to APA.
Limit your research.
Focus on basic sources such as books and scholarly journal articles that you can duplicate citation formats and reference element formats.
Over-document with citations.
Eliminate unnecessary citations with your tutor’s recommendation.
ADVOCATING FOR YOURSELF
As a college student, regardless of your cultural background, your academic and social survival depends on advocating for yourself, accepting responsibility that your happiness and adjustment to academics and college life depends on how well you attend to your own needs. For example, academically, you accept responsibility by securing your needs for classes: advisors, tutors, peer reviewers, and APA reviewer. You also accept responsibility for paying your tuition and registering for classes. If you need to shop off campus, you coordinate transportation. Be your own best friend, recognize differences between needs and wants, and figure things out.
Meet with your professors as soon as you can after the first class. Immediately following the first class is usually a good time. Introduce yourself and explain that you’re learning English as a second (third, fourth, or fifth) language and that you’ve been successful in past courses with the help of a tutor and support the university offers. Ask them if they can recommend additional resources to help with the course. Also ask if you may record classes to help you with notetaking.
