APA Style Guide

Throughout the body of your paper, use headings to organize your content and designate specific sections and shifts in focus.

Example

A Review of the Literature, Methodology, etc.

APA 7th edition provides guidelines for formatting five levels of headings. To see examples of level 1 and level 2 headings, as they would appear in a paper, see the sample student paper below.

Place a page number in the top right corner of each page, beginning with your title page as page 1. According to APA 7th edition, a running head is not required for student papers.

In APA formatting the term figures refers to images you include in your paper. These images include drawings, photographs, line graphs, bar graphs, charts (e.g., flowcharts, pie charts), maps, plots (e.g., scatterplots), infographics, and other illustrations. Figures may be inserted into the body of your paper or presented after your reference page, with each figure on its own separate page.

Rules for Formatting Figures

• Number: Start by placing the word Figure followed by an identifying number, flush with the left margin of the page. The figure number should be in bold font (e.g., Figure 1). Number figures in the order in which they are mentioned in your paper.
• Title: In addition to a number, each figure should have a brief, descriptive title. The figure title should be placed one double-spaced line below the figure number and flush with the left margin. Figure titles should be italicized and follow title case capitalization.
• Image: The actual image should be place one double-spaced line below the figure title. If you are including text in the image of the figure (e.g., axis labels), use a sans serif font between and 8 and 14 points.
• Legend: If your image is a graph or chart, you might include a figure legend or key, which explains any symbols used in the figure image. A legend or key should be positioned within the borders of the figure. Capitalize words in the legend or key in title case.
• Note: Three types of notes (general, specific, and probability) can appear below the figure to describe contents of the figure that cannot be understood from the figure title, image, and/or legend alone (e.g., definitions of abbreviations, copyright attribution, explanations of asterisks use to indicate p values). Include figure notes only as needed.

Example Figure

Note

An embedded figure may take up an entire page; if the figure is short, however, text may appear on the same page as the figure. In that case, place the figure at either the top or bottom of the page rather than in the middle. Also add one blank double-spaced line between the figure and any text to improve the visual presentation.

APA does not dictate what font you use but offers these examples as legible fonts and appropriate sizes: 11-point Calibri, 12-point Times New Roman, and 11-point Georgia. Use the same font throughout all elements of your paper.

Use double-spacing for all elements of your paper (including references and block quotations). Do not add extra spaces between paragraphs or entries in your references list. Do not add extra spaces after headings or block quotations.

Use 1-inch margins on all sides of the page (top, bottom, left, and right).

Align all paragraphs to the left margin, leaving the right margin ragged. Indent the first line of each paragraph to 0.5 inches from the left margin (one stroke of the tab key).