The letters APA in APA citation stand for the American Psychological Association. Thus, APA citation is a method of documenting sources and formatting academic papers in concurrence with the standards of the American Psychological Association. This citing and formatting is known as APA citation. There are many different styles of citations, and these include MLA, AMA, etc.. APA citation, however, is one of the most popular as APA citation is used in most academia. APA citation is essential to an academic paper and therefore, APA citation plays an important role in a dissertation or academic paper.
APA citation has a purpose, and the purpose of APA citation is so others can look up and access all resources cited in a paper. Thus, proper APA citation will allow all information, data and research to be checked and verified. This is most definitely an important feature of dissertations as proper APA citation allows for a dissertation to be pronounced as valid.
Many students struggle with APA citation because many students are not familiar with APA citation. Further, APA citation can seem unimportant as the student and writer of the dissertation is more concerned with the larger aspect of the dissertation, like the research and analysis involved in the dissertation. Thus, APA citation can seem minor in comparison to the larger point the student is making. And yet, the dissertation will not be accepted if it does not have proper APA citation. In other words, proper APA citation can be an annoying task, but proper APA citation is absolutely necessary.
APA citation has two major parts. These two parts of APA citation are in-text citations and the reference list for APA citation. The in-text citations for APA citation occur within the document. In other words, there is a proper way to apply APA citation to text within the document. The second part of APA citation occurs at the end of the document, in the reference list or bibliography part of the paper. There is a very specific way to cite everything in the reference list if the dissertation is to follow proper APA citation.
APA citation also follows many formatting guidelines, most of which are unique to APA citation. Thus, APA citation includes formatting for every aspect of the dissertation. In other words, there is APA citation for the title page, APA citation for the page numbers, APA citation for the running head of a dissertation, APA citation for the abstract, APA citation for the visuals, APA citation for headings, and, as previously mentioned, APA citation for the reference list. Clearly then, APA citation will happen on every single page of the dissertation, be it to properly cite sources, data and research or to diagram charts and graphs.
Because many students are concerned with citation (as well they should be since APA citation plays a major part in the dissertation) APA citation help is available. APA citation help will dramatically cut-down on the time that a student needs to spend on his or her thesis. This is particularly important because often-times students do not know how APA citation works and they wait until the last minute to figure out how APA citation should fit into their dissertations. Thinking that using APA citation will be an easy concept to grasp, students do not plan enough time to fix and edit their paper so that it is has proper APA citation. In other words, many students finish their dissertations, but these “finished” dissertations are not finished at all because they are not in adequate APA citation. Thus, students are under much stress and pressure as they must quickly figure out how to put their paper into proper APA citation. APA citation, however, is not something that can be done so quickly! In fact, entire books have been written on proper APA citation—and because this is the case, many students are overwhelmed with the daunting task of changing, editing and reformatting their paper. APA citation help is available, however, and with the help of an expert in proper APA citation, the student will no-doubt truly finish their dissertation before the ever-looming deadline.
