Creating A Dissertation: APA Formatting Guidelines


The APA formatting guideline is one of the most common and most important that you need to learn about. This is a formatting guideline that is normally recommended for use in the event that you are looking at how to write perfectly for your social sciences paper. Because of this reason, it is important to make sure that you know what to do.

In most cases there are so many students who get failed just because their dissertations have not been formatted appropriately. These are the simple mistakes that students make innocently, and they go a long way in affecting the marks that you get. Bearing that in mind, you have to ensure that you do know the basic guidelines that will assist you in writing one of the best papers you have ever written so far.

In order to learn how to format your dissertation, the following are some of the most important guidelines that you need to think about:

  • Find a really good sample

  • Writing the title of your paper

  • Referencing in the paper

  • Writing the list of references

Find a really good sample

One of the first things that you need to think about when you are writing this paper is how to get a very good sample. A good sample will go a long way in helping you. The reason for this is because it gives you a brilliant overview of what needs to be done, when and how.

Writing the title of your paper

The title that you are writing for this paper is supposed to be in capital letters. It must be aligned to the center. You should choose the appropriate font, font style and size for this too. Make sure that you keep the choice in font constant through the paper.

Referencing in the paper

There are particular instructions that you should look into when you are referencing this paper. Because of the same reason, it is important to make sure that you write your sources in the appropriate manner.

Sources need to be cited with the last name of the author, then the year as shown (Carrey, 2010). If there are two writers, you should have something like this (Carrey & Smith, 2010).

Writing the list of references

When you are writing the list of references for your dissertation, make sure that you have it done in alphabetical order.