This is a brief primer on how to format a document in word. I will be using APA style because I am a research psychologist. However, you can use the tips on how to navigate Word for any style. Note that if you are writing a dissertation or thesis, your institution might have specific formatting rules that are not APA style. However, you can set up the document in APA style and then tweak it. The only formatting that can really affect your document (specifically your tables and figures) is the margin. Printed theses often require a much wider inside margin; make sure you check the guidelines before formatting tables and figures for formal theses.

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The Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association

You can find all this information and more in the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association. It’s on its Seventh Edition (buy it on the APA website or on Amazon)*. I have not bought the 7th edition (2020), so this information is from the 6th edition. I am fairly certain I have incorporated the changes (subheadings are different, as are some rules for in-text citations and other things that make life easier: this pdf from the APA lists them all.) However, if you are a graduate student, or just want to be certain you have the latest rules, you should probably purchase the 7th edition.

See my post on Expertise and Risk-taking in Grad School.

Purdue also has an amazing website for moth MLA and APA style: The Purdue Writing Lab. This might be one of the best resources for students on the Internet.

Back to…

This is my Abbreviated Guide on How to Format a document in Word in APA Style

It’s really not difficult to format a document in Word for APA or MLA (you can use these tricks for any style). To demonstrate, I will make a template document that you can download in a link at the bottom of this post. I will also share images of finished documents.

In fact, I always start a writing project by making headings, subheadings, and basic document forms. I use “blah blah blah” as a placeholder. It’s not necessary in theory but it keeps Word from getting wonky. I’ll be using Word 2016; most things transfer easily between Word versions.

Step 1: Open a new document

When you open a new document, it will have the default formatting. I believe Word comes with Calibri now, but not sure. The first thing I do with a new Word application is set the default to APA paragraph style.

Setting default formatting

Click Ctrl-A (select all).

Then start by setting the font on the home tab (left below). I use Times New Roman, size 12, because it’s traditional and I like it. However, anything similar is also fine.

Next, open up the Paragraph formatting tab by clicking on the little arrow box at the bottom right of Paragraph section of the ribbon under your Home tab:

You will want to set it to double space, special indent, don’t add space between paragraphs of same style:

Saving a document template

You can save this formatting for all future APA style documents. You will only use it for the body of your document. For your references section, you will use a hanging indent, and you will need to set each of your headings, but it’s handy to have a template for all APA style documents.

There are two ways to save this formatting. You can right-click “Normal” on your Styles tab and select “Update Normal to match selection. (As long as you have your cursor in a section that is newly formatted this will work. Alternatively you can select a correctly formatted paragraph).

Or (and this is my preferred option), you can create a new style. Select “Create a Style” from your Styles tab (at the bottom. Name it. Click on “Modify.” (See images below.)

By default, the new style will be added to your Styles gallery. If you want to save a document template, you can select Apply to “New documents base don this template.” See below.

To save a template (I have a document template with everything, headings, abstract, references), select “save as” and then “Save as type” –> “Word Template (.dotx) as in the picture below.

It will save in Word’s template folder (“Custom Office Templates”). To open a new file with your saved template, select File –> New (it doesn’t work if you do Ctrl-N). If you have used it recently, it will be beside the blank document image. If not, click on the “Personal” tab, and you will see it.

Before you save a template, though, you might want to set up the entire document.

Step 2: Organize the document in sections (Title page, abstract, intro, method, etc.)

Title page

Place your title about six (double-spaced) lines down. You don’t want to have an indent (because you want it centered), so backspace to get rid of the indent that you set for your paragraph. Then center (Ctrl-E) and type your title.

A few lines below the title, write all the names of the authors as you wish them to appear. (When you submit to a journal, you probably will have a separate document for this. But for a class paper, place your name.)

Add a page break (I usually go a line or two down from my authors).

Abstract

If you’ve done your title page correctly, you will have double-spaced, centered, and no indent. This is how you want your abstract. Write “Abstract” in Bold. This will be your Level 1 heading style (see below).

Hit enter, and left-justify (Ctrl-L).

Write some sort of placeholder for your abstract. (Unless you can see the future, you won’t know what will go in it before writing the rest of your paper.) It should not have an indent.

Abstracts are a summary of your paper, anywhere from 100 to 250 words long, in a single paragraph. The best way to learn to write an abstract is read lots of published papers. Because you will always want to read the abstract of any paper you will read more thoroughly as well as all the ones you will decide you don’t need to read, you should have lots of abstracts under your belt before you finish your first research methods course.

After your abstract, you will write “Keywords:” and up to five keywords (all caps). You might not have to do this for a class paper, but you will if you submit to a journal.

The Introduction

Your introduction should have the title of your paper as a heading (Level 1 heading: bolded, centered (backspace to get rid of indent, title case (capitalize words that are not articles or prepositions). It will include an introductory paragraph, a review of the literature (including definitions of your constructs of interest), and a current research section. The current research section usually has a Level 2 subheading (could be current research/studies), and will summarize the purpose of your research, your hypotheses, and predictions.

Method

“Method” is usually a Level 1 heading. In a multiple study/experiment paper, Method might be a Level 2 heading. Either way, sometimes you will have a short paragraph describing your method, but usually you will have a subheading directly under “Method.” (The method section is where you will use most of your subheadings.) This first subsection is most frequently “Participants and Procedure.”

Participants and Procedure

This will be under a Level 2 subheading (Bolded, flush left, paragraph starts on next line, title case). In some cases, you will have separate sections, but usually you can put participants and procedure together in one section (and usually a single paragraph).

Your description of participants will include frequencies for gender and ethnicity (if relevant and available), mean age, and any other demographic information. Procedure needs to include recruitment, compensation (if any), study design (randomization, etc.), and how you collected your data (e.g., in the lab, Qualtrics).

See my post on how to avoid problems when collecting data in Qualtrics with MTurk.

Materials

Your next section will describe your stimuli/equipment/etc., if any. It’s more common in an experiment, as correlational designs might only have measures described in the Instrumentation section. If you have a lot to say here, you might need further subheadings.

Instrumentation

Here you will describe how you operationalized your constructs: scales/questionnaires. Include source, brief description, number of items and response format, psychometric reliability, and sample items. Each measure can go in a separate paragraph under a Level 3 heading (possibly Level 4 if you have multiple studies and “Method” is Level 2). Level 3 is the same as Level 2, but italicized. (This is new in the 2020 APA Style Guide.) Level 4 is like the old Level 3: Indented, bold, title case, ends with a period. The following paragraph begins on the same line.

Data Analyses

This section needs to include the statistical software and analyses you used to test your hypotheses. If you use complex models (e.g., path analyses, structural equation modelling), you will need to provide all relevant information, including criteria for comparing model fit. You may also include information such as whether one- or two-tailed tests were used (if NHST), alpha levels, and so forth.

Results

Your results section will probably have various subheadings, listed below.

Preliminary Analyses

This will probably be a Level 2 heading, and may include manipulation checks, gender differences, transformations, and so forth. If it is large, you could have subheadings (Level 3, if Preliminary Analyses is Level 2) such as Mean Differences or Gender Differences or Manipulation checks.

Primary Analyses

This is where you will report tests of your a priori hypotheses (hopefully you had them), or main analyses. It could also have various subheadings, depending on your research design (e.g., Indirect Effects, Path Analysis, Model Comparisons…)

Secondary, Exploratory, or Post Hoc Analyses

This is where you report all tests that were not in your original hypotheses, or any follow-up analyses you carried out.

You could in fact have Secondary and Exploratory or post hoc analyses.

Use subheadings when needed.

Do not interpret your results in the results section!

Discussion

Discussion is a Level 1 Heading. This is where you will interpret your results. You can use subheadings such as Limitations, Suggestions for Future Research, Concluding Remarks, etc.

In a multi-study paper, you might have a mini-discussion after each study or experiment, and a final “General Discussion.”

References

Your references start on a new page. Select Page Break under your Insert tab, or Break–>Next page under your Layout tab. I use Page Break because it’s easier and does the job and I am more likely to be on the Insert tab already. However, using the Layout–>Break option inserts a section break, which has the advantage of not carrying over formatting (e.g., page layout) from the previous section. (See below.)

“References” is now a Level 1 heading in APA style (Bolded, Centered). You will have to change the following paragraph to a hanging indent. You can access the Paragraph window on your Home tab as described above, or on the Layout tab (See image below).

Tables and Figures

After your reference section, you will place all of your tables, in order, each on a new page. After all of your tables come your figures, also each on a separate page.

This is where you will want to use the section break function described above (Break –> Next Page under your Layout tab). Some tables will need to be on a horizontal page, others on a vertical one. Placing a section break between tables/figures allows you to change the orientation of each page without affecting the previous or following pages. (To change orientation: Layout –> Orientation.)

At some point, I will post about how to make tables in APA style. In the meantime, you can view the video below.

Above: Video made for my research methods courses on how to make nice tables.

Step 3: set headings and subheadings

I actually do this at this same time I organize the document (Step 2), but for clarity’s sake, I am explaining it in a separate section. There is probably more than one way to do this. Below I will explain how I do it (easy).

Use subheadings whenever it will make reading easier and there are at least two parts in a section.

The way I do it:

1. Format the heading or subheading as per APA (or MLA or whatever you want) style. For example, APA Level 1 is centered, bolded.
2. Select the heading/subheading.
3. Right-click the Heading Style (on your home Tab) you want (e.g., for Level 1, I right-click Heading 1).
4. Select “Update Heading 1 (or whichever) to match selection.

You will need to do this for each type of heading. Once you have the heading set, all you will need to do is type a heading (in your normal paragraph style), select it, and click on the appropriate heading in Styles.

If you have the proper paragraph style following it (and your selection includes the “enter” or return), then you can just hit “enter” from the heading, and you will automatically start the next paragraph in that style (e.g., APA paragraph). If not, you can just right-click the heading style, select modify, and set the style for the following paragraph, as you can see in the image below.

Advantages of setting headings in any Word document

Setting headings is one of the best reasons to know how to format a document in Word. They allow you to jump between sections to the document and to insert a Table of Contents.

Being able to navigate directly to any section of your document with a Level 1 or 2 heading.

This is one of my favorite features of Word, because it makes life a lot easier. Once you made headings, you can click through your document to each section, with the aide of the Navigation Pane. To do so, Click on the View tab, and under “show” select “Navigation Pane.” You will then see the Level 1 and Level 2 headings to the left of your document. Clicking on one will take you straight there. See below.

This is especially useful when dealing with a long document such as a thesis or dissertation. I also use it for annotated bibliographies.

Creating a Table of Contents

Word uses headings to create Tables of Contents. You will probably only need this for a thesis or dissertation, or possibly a book. To insert a table of Contents, go to your References Tab and click on Table of Contents.

Step 4: Page number and Running Head

Finally you will want to add pages numbers and a running head, or abbreviated title. The running head appears on all the pages of your manuscript, unless you create a new section with a different running head (or none).

For APA style, the running head is in the header, to the left, and the page number is in the header, on the right. You can format both at the same time. Go to Insert tab –> Page number. Select the top option.

The number of the page you are on will appear left-justified in the header. De-select it (just hit the left arrow) and type your abbreviated title in all caps. Hit Tab until the page number is as close as possible to the right margin without moving top the next line.

Double-click on the main text to exit the header.

Downloads

Below you will see a sample document. If you would like to purchase the Word template for $5, click here. If not, please buy me a coffee!

(Coming soon: Table templates)

Disclaimer

*As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases, which means I get commissions for purchases made through some links in this post.

FAQ

How do I set up APA margins in Microsoft Word?

Open Layout or Page Layout, choose Margins, and then one of the preset choices or Custom Margins to set your own. The default is 1 inch on all sides.

What line spacing should I use for APA style?

Use double spacing throughout, including title page, headings, body text, block quotes, references, and figure captions. Turn off extra spacing before and after paragraphs.

Do I need a running head for APA Style?

Yes. There should be a running head in the header, flush left. For student papers, check with your professor.

How do I add page numbers to an APA paper in Word?

Insert a header with page numbers at the top right. In Word, go to Insert, Page Number, Top of Page, Plain Number 3. Ensure numbering starts on the title page unless instructed otherwise. If you are using a running head, select Plain Number 3, click to the left of the number and write the running head, then use tab to move the page number to the right.

How do I apply APA headings in Word?

I write out the correct APA-style heading in the document, select it, then right-click the heading level (in Styles on the Home tab), and select “Update heading to match selection. You can also use Word Styles for Level 1–5 headings. Modify each style to match your APA requirements, then apply styles to sections to keep structure consistent and enable automatic TOC generation.

Do student APA papers need an abstract or title page?

Most student papers include a title page and may not require an abstract unless your instructor specifies one. Follow the instructions for the assignment.

How do I format references with a hanging indent?

Select the reference list, open Paragraph settings, set Indentation to Hanging at 0.5 inches, and keep double spacing with no extra space between entries.

How can I build an automatic Table of Contents from my APA headings?

After applying Word’s heading styles to your sections, place the cursor where you want the TOC, then References, Table of Contents, and choose an automatic style. Update the TOC as you edit.

How do I keep different headers on the title page and the rest of the document?

Turn on Different First Page in the Header & Footer tools. Edit the first-page header separately from subsequent pages. Use section breaks only when you need header changes mid-document.

Which fonts are acceptable for APA papers?

Use a legible, widely available serif or sans-serif font allowed by your instructor or venue. Keep one font family and size consistent throughout the paper, including headings and references.