GUIDELINES FOR WRITING YOUR RESEARCH PAPER
Your APA paper should include five major sections: the Title Page, Abstract, Main
Paper, Paper Format and References And Citations. See the timeline handout for
important due dates.
1. TITLE PAGE
• Your paper should begin with a title page that follows APA format. The info
at: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/01/
is great for APA
citation.
• Your title should be interesting and inform the reader of your topic.
2. ABSTRACT
• An abstract page should include the page header. On the first line of the
abstract page, center the word “Abstract” (no bold, formatting, italics,
underlining, or quotation marks).
• Beginning with the next line, write a concise summary of the key points of
your research. (Do not indent.) An abstract should summarize your
research topic, research questions, participants, methods, results, data
analysis, and conclusions.
• Your abstract should be a single paragraph double-spaced. Your abstract
should be between 150 and 250 words.
3. MAIN PAPER (will have four distinct parts):
I. INTRODUCTION
• In general, all papers should begin with an introduction that includes a
thesis statement (see handout on a good/bad thesis).
• The purpose of the introduction is the same as any research paper: in one
to two paragraphs, briefly introduce and state the issue to be examined.
• The introduction always states what you are trying to prove/disprove in
the paper.
II. THESIS STATEMENT
• The most important part of your introduction is this statement.
• The thesis statement is the direction of your paper.
• Your thesis must always be underlined in everything you turn in.
III. BODY
• Each body paragraph should include a topic sentence.
• Your topic sentences must always be underlined in everything you turn in.
• I repeat: Underline each topic sentence of each paragraph.
• Paragraphs have no less than four but no more than six sentences.
• Topic sentences explain/summarize what will be addressed in the
paragraph.
• These topic sentences also act as transitions to create a coherent
argument.