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Capstone Form and Style
More apa style guidelines: lists.
When listing three or more items, include a serial comma (also known as an Oxford comma) before the last item and the conjunction “and” or “or.” If one or more clauses contains commas in them, use a semicolon instead of a comma to separate the clauses. (Note that the term "seriation" used in APA 6 does not appear in APA 7 and has been replaced by "lists.”)
You may also list items in three other formats: lettered, numbered, and bulleted.
Lettered Lists (APA 7, Section 6.50)
If you have a series of elements in the body of a paragraph, separate each element with lowercase letters enclosed in parentheses. Although only necessary for more complex elements, here is a simple example: (a) lions, (b) tigers, and (c) bears. Items and phrasing should be parallel.
Numbered Lists (APA 7, Section 6.51)
When ordinal position is important, list items vertically.
The organization’s emergency management protocol consists of seven sequential steps:
- Step 1 involves ...
- Step 2 consists of …
- Step 3 has five components: ...
This would be appropriate when you need to show a specific order of elements, such as in steps in a procedure or conclusions.
List items should be complete sentences or paragraphs in a series (not phrases).
Use Microsoft Word’s numbered list function to create the list; select the option with Arabic numerals (not enclosed within parentheses) followed by a period. Capitalize the first word after the number and the first word of any subsequent sentence. End each sentence with appropriate final punctuation. List items should be double-spaced and indented .5 inch.
Bulleted Lists (APA 7, Section 6.52)
Bulleted lists are appropriate when presenting a list of items in no particular order. Bulleted list items can be complete sentences or phrases or sentence fragments. Use Word’s bulleted list function to create the list. List items should be double-spaced and indented .5 inch.
If complete sentences, begin each list item with a capital letter as you would a regular sentence and insert final punctuation (usually a period) at the end of each list item.
Recommendations for improving patient safety at the facility include the following:
- Install adequate lighting and ventilation in wards, patient rooms, and other areas.
- Incorporate regular training and drills to promote staff awareness of safety procedures.
- Regularly solicit staff and patient and family feedback using an outside firm.
If phrases or sentence fragments, begin each list item with a lowercase letter.
In APA 7, you have two options for punctuating bulleted phrases: to include no punctuation after each list item and after the last list item or to include commas or semicolons, as appropriate, after each list item and final punctuation at the end of the list. (Note that APA 6 only recommended the option to punctuate lists with commas or semicolons.)
The first option may be better for shorter, less complex lists.
- installing adequate lighting and ventilation
- incorporating regular training and drills
- regularly soliciting staff and patient and family feedback
The second option may be better for longer, more complex lists.
- installing adequate lighting and ventilation in wards, patient rooms, and other areas;
- incorporating regular training and drills to promote staff awareness of safety procedures; and
- regularly soliciting staff and patient and family feedback using an outside firm.
Seriation Video
- APA Formatting & Style: Seriation (video transcript)
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APA 7th Edition
Purdue's OWL (Online Writing Lab) provides instruction on how to use APA 7th. Below are a few topics covered by the OWL.
- APA Style Introduction APA 7th
- APA Overview and Workshop APA 7th
- General Formatting APA 7th
- In-Text Citation: Authors APA 7th
- Foot Notes and Appendices APA 7th
- Changes in the 7th Edition APA 7th
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Q. Are bulleted lists allowed in APA Style? How do I format a bulleted or numbered list?
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Answered By: Jonathan Faerber (he/him/his) Last Updated: Nov 04, 2021 Views: 171122
APA Style (7th ed.)
Bulleted and numbered lists are permitted by the APA Style rules; however, if you're unsure if your instructor will permit them in your assignment, please check with your instructor. Keep in mind that because bulleted or numbered lists only provide surface-level information rather than include analysis, and because the focus of academic writing is to demonstrate your critical thinking, these lists are used sparingly in formal academic writing in favor of communicating your ideas in complete sentences and paragraphs. See below for information regarding formatting lists.
Bulleted lists
The capitalization and punctuation for each bulleted item depends on whether the items form sentences or sentence parts. If the bulleted text is a full sentence, capitalize the first letter of the first word and end the paragraph with a period. For example:
- This is a sentence.
- This is another sentence.
- This is the last sentence of the bulleted list.
When a bulleted list separates three or more elements within a sentence, “begin each bulleted item with a lowercase letter” and either punctuate each item in the list as parts of a sentence (e.g., inserting commas), or exclude punctuation after each item (American Psychological Association [APA], 2020, pp. 190-191). For example:
In December 2018, British Columbia had an extreme storm that caused:
- massive damage due to high winds,
- widespread power outages that lasted many days, and
- flooded roads.
This storm affected multiple areas on Vancouver Island, including:
For other examples of bulleted lists, see Bulleted Lists in the APA Style Blog. For an explanation of the difference between a complete sentence and its parts, please see Sentences and Sentence Elements on the Writing Centre website.
Numbered lists
Numbered lists are helpful to identify the organization of information, such as "itemized conclusions” or “steps in a procedure" (APA, 2020, p. 190). Keep the following steps when creating a number list:
- Create the numbered list using the numbered list function on Microsoft Word or similar program.
- Set off Arabic numerals at the beginning of each item with a period rather than parentheses (i.e., “2.” rather than “(2)” or “2)”)
- Begin each item in the numbered list with a capital letter, and follow appropriate sentence punctuation throughout the list, using end marks like periods, exclamation, or question marks where required.
Please keep in mind that "the use of 'numbered lists' may connote an unwanted or unwarranted ordinal position (e.g. chronology, importance, priority) among the items" (APA, 2020, p. 190). To avoid this suggestion of position, use a bulleted list instead. For more information on numbered lists, see Numbered Lists in the APA Style Blog.
Lettered lists within a sentence
Lettered lists within a sentence are a good way to identify elements in a series within a paragraph or sentence without breaking the elements into a numbered or bulleted list. To indicate the list, use lowercase letters in parentheses (American Psychological Association, 2020, p. 189). For example, "students were asked to choose between completing (a) a formal research essay, (b) a documentary-style video, (c) a multi-media experience that involves participants". To punctuate a lettered list within a sentence, use commas between each of three or more items, or use semicolons when separating items that include commas, such as a series of phrases (APA, 2020, p.189). See Lettered Lists from the APA Style Blog for more information and examples.
American Psychological Association. (2020). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (7th ed.). https://doi.org/10.1037/0000165-000
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- Academic Writing / APA 7th Ed
APA Style Formatting in PowerPoint
by Purdue Global Academic Success Center and Writing Center · Published October 9, 2020 · Updated October 9, 2020
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We all know the challenges of following APA Style when writing a paper using Microsoft Word, but those challenges often become greater when applying the formatting guidelines to other software.
In the following video, Purdue Global Learning and Development Specialist, Chrissine Cairns, demonstrates how to format a PowerPoint applying APA Style (7th Edition) to a title slide; body slides using bullet points, figures, tables, and copyright statements; and a reference list with hanging indentations.
Until next week–
Kurtis Clements
Visit the APA Style Formatting in PowerPoint webpage here.
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COMMENTS
Bulleted Lists. To draw visual attention to items in a list without implying that items go in a certain order (e.g., chronology, importance, priority), use a bulleted list. Use a numbered list if you want to display items in a numbered series. Use a lettered list if you want to emphasize separate parallel items within a sentence.
There are 5 heading levels in APA. Regardless of the number of levels, always use the headings in order, beginning with level 1. The format of each level is illustrated below: APA Headings. Level. Format. 1. Centered, Boldface, Title Case Heading. Text starts a new paragraph.
APA Stylistics: Basics. APA Stylistics: Avoiding Bias. Footnotes & Appendices. Numbers & Statistics. Additional Resources. APA Headings and Seriation. APA PowerPoint Slide Presentation. APA Sample Paper. Tables and Figures.
General APA Guidelines. Your essay should be typed and double-spaced on standard-sized paper (8.5" x 11"), with 1" margins on all sides. Include a page header (also known as the "running head") at the top of every page. For a professional paper, this includes your paper title and the page number. For a student paper, this only includes the ...
Crucially, citation practices do not differ between the two styles of paper. However, for your convenience, we have provided two versions of our APA 7 sample paper below: one in student style and one in professional style. Note: For accessibility purposes, we have used "Track Changes" to make comments along the margins of these samples.
When using APA format, follow the author-date method of in-text citation. This means that the author's last name and the year of publication for the source should appear in the text, like, for example, (Jones, 1998). One complete reference for each source should appear in the reference list at the end of the paper.
End each sentence with appropriate final punctuation. List items should be double-spaced and indented .5 inch. Bulleted Lists (APA 7, Section 6.52) Bulleted lists are appropriate when presenting a list of items in no particular order. Bulleted list items can be complete sentences or phrases or sentence fragments.
Lists. Just as heading structure alerts readers to the order of ideas in a paper, lists help readers understand a related set of key points within a sentence or paragraph. When writing a list, ensure all items are syntactically and conceptually parallel. For example, all items might be nouns or all items might be phrases that begin with a verb ...
The Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, Seventh Edition is the official source for APA Style. Purdue's OWL (Online Writing Lab) provides instruction on how to use APA 7th. Below are a few topics covered by the OWL. APA Style Introduction APA 7th.
While the Purdue OWL doesn't currently have resources that pertain to thesis/dissertation writing, you may find it useful to review the website published Professor S. Joseph Levine at Michigan State University. This is a general, non-discipline-specific guide to getting yourself organized and ready to write the dissertation.
Numbered Lists. Use a numbered list to display complete sentences or paragraphs in a series (e.g., itemized conclusions, steps in a procedure). Use a lettered list or bulleted list rather than a numbered list if the items are phrases. To create a numbered list, use the numbered list function of your word-processing program.
Lists, Part 5: Bulleted Lists. by Timothy McAdoo. This is the fifth in a six-part series about lists. Today I'll discuss bulleted lists, which are new to APA Style! As the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association notes (p. 63), creating a list sometimes "helps the reader understand the organization of key points.".
APA Style (7th ed.) Bulleted and numbered lists are permitted by the APA Style rules; however, if you're unsure if your instructor will permit them in your assignment, please check with your instructor. Keep in mind that because bulleted or numbered lists only provide surface-level information rather than include analysis, and because the focus ...
Lettered lists are covered in the seventh edition APA Style manuals in the Publication Manual Section 6.50 and the Concise Guide Section 4.12 This guidance is the same as in the 6th edition. To draw more attention to the items and help readers understand the separate, parallel items in a complex list, use lowercase letters in parentheses before ...
APA Style Guide 7th Edition 1 ... • APA Style • OWL Purdue *Examples for each formatting were taken from these sites. APA Style Guide 7th Edition 2 FONT • 12To improve accessibility, APA now accepts multiple fonts including -point Times New Roman, 11-point Calibri, 11-point Arial, 11-point Georgia, and 10-point Lucida
Here are some guidelines on formatting your table. Place each table on a separate page at the end of your manuscript, after the reference list. If font size and style are not specified by the organization for which you are writing (e.g., publisher, university), the suggested font is 12-point Times New Roman.
To paraphrase means to describe a source's passage completely in your own words, and with your own sentence structure. Changing a source's words here and there, or adding words to a source's sentence, is known as "patchwork" or "mosaic" plagiarism—it is not proper paraphrasing.Paraphrase when a source's passage is complex, or written in a way that doesn't
Watch on. In this video, Purdue Global Learning and Development Specialist, Chrissine Cairns, demonstrates how to format a PowerPoint applying APA Style (7th Edition) to a title slide; body slides using bullet points, figures, tables, and copyright statements; and a reference list with hanging indentations.
In the following video, Purdue Global Learning and Development Specialist, Chrissine Cairns, demonstrates how to format a PowerPoint applying APA Style (7th Edition) to a title slide; body slides using bullet points, figures, tables, and copyright statements; and a reference list with hanging indentations. Until next week-. Kurtis Clements ...
Cite your source automatically in APA. Media File: APA PowerPoint Slide Presentation. This resource is enhanced by a PowerPoint file. If you have a Microsoft Account, you can view this file with PowerPoint Online. Select the APA PowerPoint Presentation link above to download slides that provide a detailed review of the APA citation style.
The Purdue OWL offers global support through online reference materials and services. A Message From the Assistant Director of Content Development The Purdue OWL® is committed to supporting students, instructors, and writers by offering a wide range of resources that are developed and revised with them in mind. To do this, the OWL team is ...
There was a time when bullet point lists were frowned upon in certain forms of writing -- especially academic writing. However, the sixth edition of the "Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association" gives instruction on how to format a bullet list in an essay. ... 1 Purdue, The Owl: APA Headings and Seriation ; About the Author ...
Note: This page reflected the latest version of the APA Publication Manual (i.e., APA 7), which released in October 2019. This equivalent resource for the ancient APA 6 style can be found here. Title. APA Style uses a unique headings system to separate and classify paper sections. Headings are used up help guide the reader through a document.
Note: This print reflects the latest version of the APA Publication Manual (i.e., APA 7), welche shared for October 2019. The equivalent resource for the older APA 6 style can be found come. Headings. APA Select uses a unique headings system into sever and classify photo sections. Headings are used to help direct the reader through a document.