🔹 1. What Is APA Style?

APA (American Psychological Association) format is used in:

Health Science
Medical Research
Psychology
Nursing
Social Sciences

APA emphasizes author + year to show how recent and reliable a source is.

🔹 2. Basics of APA In‑Text Citations

Whenever you use someone else’s ideas—quoted or paraphrased—you must cite them in the sentence AND include a full reference at the end.

A. Parenthetical Citation (most common):

(Smith, 2023)

B. Narrative Citation:

Smith (2023) explains that…

C. Direct Quotes (add page number):

(Smith, 2023, p. 14)

If there is no page number (web page), use a paragraph number if needed:

(CDC, 2024, para. 3)

🔹 3. APA Reference Page Format

Your reference page goes on a new page titled:

References

Everything is:

Alphabetized by author
Double‑spaced
Hanging indent (first line left, the rest indented)

🔹 4. Most Common APA Reference Types

Below are simple templates + student-friendly examples.

A. Website (Most Common for Health Science)

Format

Author or Organization. (Year). Title of page. Website. URL

Example

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2024). Global HIV & AIDS overview. https://www.cdc.gov/hiv/basics

B. Online Article or Web Report

Format

Author, A. A. (Year). Title of article. Website Name. URL

Example

World Health Organization. (2024). Tuberculosis fact sheet. https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/tuberculosis

C. Journal Article

Format

Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Year). Title of article. Title of Journal, volume(issue), pages. https://doi.org/xxxx

Example

Smith, J. A., & Lopez, R. P. (2022). Global challenges in malaria elimination. International Journal of Infectious Diseases, 118, 55–62.

D. Book or Textbook

Format

Author, A. A. (Year). Title of book. Publisher.

Example

Tortora, G. J., Funke, B. R., & Case, C. L. (2020). Microbiology: An introduction. Pearson.

🔹 5. How to Put Everything Together

Sample In‑Text Citation Use:

Malaria continues to affect regions with limited access to mosquito‑control interventions (World Health Organization, 2024).

Sample Reference Page Entry:

World Health Organization. (2024). Malaria fact sheet. https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/malaria

🔹 6. Common Student Mistakes to Avoid

❌ Using the website name as the author
✔ Use WHO, CDC, or the article author

❌ Putting the URL in the in‑text citation
✔ URLs go only in the reference page

❌ Forgetting the year
✔ APA must include the year every time

❌ Capitalizing every word in a title
✔ Use sentence case
Example: Global HIV data report

🔹 7. Quick APA Cheat Sheet

In‑text citation (paraphrase): (Author, Year)
In‑text citation (quote): (Author, Year, p. #)
Organization as author: (CDC, 2024)
No author: Use the title: (“Tuberculosis facts,” 2023)

Reference order:

Author
Year
Title
Source
URL (if online)