APA Style Simplified

Bernard C. (Barney) Beins, Ph.D., is professor and chair of psychology at Ithaca College. He is author of about 150 articles, chapters, books, and pedagogical material. He recently received the Charles L. Brewer Distinguished Teaching of Psychology Award from the American Psychological Foundation. He is author with his daughter Agatha of Effective Writing in Psychology: Papers, Posters, and Presentations, 2nd Edition (Wiley-Blackwell, 2012) and Research Methods: A Tool for Life (2008). He is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, the Association for Psychological Science, and the Eastern Psychological Association.

Preface viii Acknowledgments xi 1 Writing Professionally 1 How Does Professional Writing Differ From Other Kinds of Writing? 2 Using APA Style 3 Making a Credible Argument 5 Different Types of Communication 6 Effective Communication 8 Establishing Good Writing Habits 9 Ethical Writing 10 2 Elements of Style 15 Recognizing the Importance of Good Grammar and Style 16 Choosing Effective Wording 17 Using Inclusive and Appropriate Language 19 Deciding on the Use of Technical Language 20 Avoiding Common Problems 21 Verb Forms 24 Spelling 25 Specific Word Use 25 3 The Introduction Section 32 Introducing the Topic 33 Different Approaches to Starting the Introduction 34 How to Begin 38 Reviewing the Literature 38 Introducing Your Research: Generating a Hypothesis 40 4 The Method Section 43 Participants and Subjects 44 Materials and Apparatus 52 Procedure 56 Design 58 5 Communicating Statistics 59 Why Do We Use Statistics? 60 What Point Are You Trying to Make? 61 Understanding Your Numbers 63 Helping Readers Understand Your Statistics 65 Differentiating Results and Interpretations 68 6 The Results Section 69 Your Hypothesis 70 Deciding What to Present 71 APA Style and Presentation of Your Results 74 Creating Tables 77 Creating Figures 82 The Connection Between the Text and the Tables and Figures 87 The Difference Between Results and Discussion Sections 87 Some Final Points About Presenting Results 88 7 The Discussion Section 91 Summarizing Your Results 92 Connecting Different Aspects of Your Results 94 Dealing With Nonsignificant Results 95 Comparing Your Results With Those of Others 96 Stating the Importance and Implications of Your Results 97 Acknowledging the Limitations of Your Study 98 8 References: Citations in the Text and the Reference List 100 Citing References in the Text 101 Order of Citations in the Reference List 105 Using Your Word-Processing Program to Create the Citation 105 Examples of How Different Types of References Should Be Laid Out 106 9 Final Touches: The Abstract and Formatting Details 114 The Abstract 115 Formatting Your Manuscript 116 10 Creating Poster Presentations 135 Differentiating Visual and Written Communication 135 Reducing the Amount of Information 136 Visual Style 137 Your Behavior: The Ethic of a Poster Session 142 Creating Your Poster Using PowerPoint(R) 144 11 Giving Oral Presentations 152 The Difference Between Oral and Written English 152 Adapting APA Style to Oral Presentations 156 Preparing for Your Talk 157 Creating Graphics for Your Presentation 159 Giving the Presentation 160 12 Sharing Your Work Electronically 163 New Capabilities in Electronic Sharing 164 Using a Word Processor to Create Manuscripts for the Internet 165 Advantages of Internet Publishing Software 167 Publishing Your Poster on the Web 169 Uploading Your Manuscript to the Internet 169 Revisiting the Concept of Plagiarism 170 Appendix A: Example of APA-Style Manuscript with Common Errors 171 Appendix B: Corrected APA-Style Manuscript 179 References 188 Name Index 195 Subject Index 198