Changes in APA formatting
APA 6TH EDITION
Robin Sontheimer University of Missouri-Kansas City Writing Center 2009
Resources


http://flash1r.apa.org/apastyle/basics/index.htm
for a tutorial about APA Style
http://flash1r.apa.org/apastyle/whatsnew/index.htm
for a tutorial about the changes
Robin Sontheimer University of Missouri-Kansas City Writing Center 2009
Mechanics

About three
and a half
years ago…

0.23 cm


Two spaces instead of one after a
period at the end of sentences
Numbers expressing approximate
lengths of time are written as words
Use zero before a decimal fraction
New ways to cite statistics and present
tables
Robin Sontheimer University of Missouri-Kansas City Writing Center 2009
Title Page

No more Page Header
Running head: SHORT TITLE ALL CAPS IN HEADER
1
No more
than 50
characters
Full Title of Paper: Sentence Case, Centered Left to Right
Name of Author
Author’s Affiliation
Full title is
centered and
positioned in
upper half of
the page
Author Note
Author note with more information about affiliation, research grants, conflict
of interest and how to contact.
Robin Sontheimer University of Missouri-Kansas City Writing Center 2009
Levels
Use levels consecutively, meaning that, if your paper
has three levels, use levels 1, 2, and 3
Levels have slightly different formatting


Level of
Heading
Formatting of Heading
1
Centered, Boldface, Uppercase and Lowercase Heading
2
Flush Left, Boldface, Uppercase and Lowercase Heading
3
Indented, boldface, lowercase paragraph heading ending with a period.
4
Indented, boldface, italicized, lowercase paragraph heading ending with a period.
5
Indented, italicized, lowercase paragraph heading ending with a period.
Robin Sontheimer University of Missouri-Kansas City Writing Center 2009
Levels: more like an outline
Outline
How it would look in your paper
I. Method
a.
Method
First type
In this paper I used two types of methods to figure out
the results of my experiment.
b.
i.
Part One
ii.
Part Two
Second Type
First Type: Sand Collecting
The first type of method I used was the sand
collecting method.
Part one of the sand collecting method: collection.
II. Results
i.
Part One
ii.
Part Two
This part included collecting sand and putting it into
giant buckets to be sorted by grain size.
Part two of the sand collecting method: testing.
This part included…
Robin Sontheimer University of Missouri-Kansas City Writing Center 2009
In-Text Citations
New section about electronic sources without
pagination.
 para. should be used for electronic sources
without pagination in place of ¶


(Golan, 2007, para. 3).
 If
no para. number, cite heading and
number of paragraphs after it

(Discussion section, para.1).
Robin Sontheimer University of Missouri-Kansas City Writing Center 2009
References: electronic sources



Add as much info as print sources in the same order
Do not need the retrieval date unless source may
change over time
Add “Retrieved from” before a URL
 Shotton,
M. A. (1998). Computer addiction? A study of
computer dependency. Retrieved from
http://www.ebookstore.tandf.co.uk.asp

No period at end
Robin Sontheimer University of Missouri-Kansas City Writing Center 2009
References: electronic sources

Add the “Digital Object Identifier” (DOI)
A
number assigned to everything once it’s made available
online
 Typically located on first page of electronic journal article,
near copyright notice; also on the database landing page
for article
 If have DOI, do not need URL
 Use for BOTH electronic and print if available
Robin Sontheimer University of Missouri-Kansas City Writing Center 2009
References:
electronic sources
Herbst-Damm, K. L., & Kulik, J. A. (2005). Volunteer
support, marital status, and the survival times of
terminally ill patients. Health Psychology, 24(2),
225-229. doi:10.1037/0278-6133.24.2.225
 doi
comes last
 No period at end
Robin Sontheimer University of Missouri-Kansas City Writing Center 2009