The Updated APA Style JARS: Advancing Psychological Research

by David Kofalt

A (Very) Brief History of Journal Article Reporting Standards and APA Style

In one form or another, reporting standards have been a part of the APA Publication Manual. Although reporting standards have continued to develop with each edition of the Publication Manual, APA’s contribution to reporting standards were systematized and clarified in the December 2008 American Psychologist article "Reporting Standards for Research in Psychology: Why Do We Need Them? What Might They Be?" that was adapted as an appendix in the sixth edition of the Publication Manual.

Journal Article Reporting Standards Today: APA Style JARS

"Journal Article Reporting Standards for Quantitative Research in Psychology: The APA Publications and Communications Board Task Force Report" Full-Text HTML | PDF
"Journal Article Reporting Standards for Qualitative Primary, Qualitative Meta-Analytic, and Mixed Methods Research in Psychology: The APA Publications and Communications Board Task Force Report" Full-Text HTML | PDF

 

In January 2018, APA published an update to the reporting standards in two open-access articles in American Psychologist. Collectively referred to as APA Style Journal Article Reporting Standards, or APA Style JARS, the articles provide standards for quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods research in psychology.

Whereas APA’s previous reporting standards focused solely on quantitative research, in response to the growth of qualitative research, the January 2018 update introduced standards for reporting qualitative and mixed methods research in psychology.

The update also involved a broad revision of the quantitative standards, which now include standards for clinical trials, replication studies, longitudinal studies, N-of-1 studies, and studies that use Bayesian statistics or structural equation modeling. In addition, the quantitative standards now separate hypotheses, analyses, and conclusions into primary, secondary, and exploratory groups.

APA Style JARS Tools

Last week APA launched a brand-new companion website for APA Style JARS that provides tools for students, authors, reviewers, and editors. Through this site, users can download the two open-access APA Style JARS articles as well as an editorial introducing the updated standards written by Anne E. Kazak, editor-in-chief of American Psychologist. Users can also find an APA Style JARS informational video, information on the history of reporting standards at the APA, frequently asked questions, and user-friendly printable checklists corresponding to each of the 15 APA Style JARS tables, adapted from the American Psychologist articles.

The APA Style JARS articles and companion site serve as tools to help students, researchers, and educators throughout the research process, enabling authors to more thoroughly and accurately communicate their research, and in turn, providing readers with information that is more accessible and easily understood.

 

The Publication Manual Is Available as an E-book

We are thrilled to announce that the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association^® (6th edition) is available in electronic format from two outlets:

• RedShelf and
• VitalSource.

Introducing APA Style CENTRAL

We are proud to announce the launch of APA Style CENTRAL, a learning, writing, research, and publishing solution developed for academic institutions by the American Psychological Association!

Free trials are available today for institutions. Students and faculty: If you are interested, please contact your institutional library. For more, see this short video!



To learn more, see https://apastyle.org/asc!

Coming Soon: APA Style CENTRAL

Last weekend, we did something fun: At the American Library Association’s midwinter conference, in Boston, we gave librarians a sneak peek at APA Style CENTRAL!

To get a glimpse for yourself, check out the video below!

To receive additional updates about APA Style CENTRAL as they become available, just complete the form at https://apastyle.org/asc.

Kudos to the APA Style Award Winners!

A few weeks ago, Emelie Milnikel and Hunter Zuk achieved landmark status. They were the first recipients of Superior Awards for APA Style, established by Grand Valley State University’s Advertising and Public Relations program to recognize outstanding student work. The Superior Award for APA Style honors exemplary skill in the knowledge and execution of APA Style in student writing.

Emelie’s paper was titled "Effects of a Company’s Professional Sports Sponsorship on Brand Image," and Hunter’s was titled "The Impact of Televised Alcohol Advertisements on Youth's Drinking Behaviors." We found both papers to be engaging and insightful. Congratulations, Emelie and Hunter, on your outstanding work! We are thrilled to learn about this award and to have the opportunity to welcome two new APA Style mavens to the fold.

If your school has a similar APA Style award, we would love to hear from you!

 

Happy Valentine's Day!

   

The word of the day is love. We love helping people write with clarity and concision. We love debating fine points of grammar and usage. And, we love that, more than 5 years later, you continue to ask us new and interesting questions about APA Style points, keeping us current and keeping us on our toes!

Without APA Style, we wouldn’t be here, sharing this forum with you. With that in mind, and in honor of the day, we’ve each written a heartfelt haiku: odes to our favorite aspects of APA Style.

	For Students Who Ask Why      Why APA Style?      Precision and clarity      —for those that follow
Anne Breitenbach

	Author–Date Format      Ideas to text      “From whom and when?” I wonder      Author–date replies
David Becker

	The Header      Oh, running header      Where would I be without you?      Lost amongst pages
Katie Ten Hagen

	Redundancy      They were both alike      Loved as one and the same, but      Cut for concision.
Mary Lynn Skutley

	Reference citations      Author, date, title, and source      Pathways to knowledge
Chelsea Lee

	(a), (b), and (c)      letters in series      help with parallel structure      and readers thank you
Timothy McAdoo

Valentine's Day card image source: Peter-J-Pann, "valentine hat pcard"

2014 National Grammar Day

 

 

Happy National Grammar Day from the APA Style team!

 

For more, see https://nationalgrammarday.com/ (or #GrammarDay on Twitter)!

Happy New Year!

APA Publication Manual Is Now Available on Kindle

by Jeff Hume-Pratuch

 

You read that right: APA has just released the sixth edition of the APA Publication Manual as an e-book from the Amazon Kindle Store! (Sometimes the news is so nice, you have to say it twice.)

Keep reading for more details, or just click on over to Amazon and buy it now (you know you want to).

The manual is available from Amazon’s Kindle store as a Print Replica book. Each page in a Print Replica book looks just like the print version, with the same words and images in the same position, but it includes features such as annotation, highlighting, and zoom functions. Page numbers correspond to the print versions, so you can easily find the information you need. Reading progress is also synced across multiple Kindle apps, so you can “save the page” if you need to switch devices.

Kindle Print Replica books can be read on Kindle Fire tablets, Kindle for PC, Kindle for Android Tablets, Kindle for Mac, or Kindle for iPad reading apps (all available for free download from Amazon), but not on E Ink devices.

The manual’s companion volumes have also been released for the Kindle, so you can put an entire shelf-full of APA Style products on your tablet today!

 

	APA Publication Manual, Sixth Edition
	APA Style Guide to Electronic References, Sixth Edition
	Concise Rules of APA Style, Sixth Edition
	Presenting Your Findings, Sixth Edition
	Displaying Your Findings, Sixth Edition
	Reporting Research in Psychology

 

And now, back to the party!

Best of the APA Style Blog: Fall 2012 Edition

Each fall the APA Style Blog Team puts together a “best of” feature, and this year we continue the tradition with an updated set of posts from the APA Style Blog and our parent site, apastyle.org. We hope it will be helpful as new batches of students set upon the task of learning and implementing APA Style. You can get the full story in our sixth edition Publication Manual and our recently released APA Style Guide to Electronic References, plus more information via the links below.

Getting Started

What is APA Style?
Why is APA Style needed?
Basics of APA Style Tutorial
FAQs about APA Style

Sample Papers

Sample Paper 1
Sample Paper 2
Sample meta-analysis paper
Sample published APA article

General Reference Help

How in-text citations work
How to find the example you need in the Publication Manual 
How to deal with missing reference information

“How-To” Citation Help

E-books
Interviews
Legal references (constitutions, etc.)
Paraphrased work
PsycTESTS test database
Secondary sources (sources you found in another source)
Social media (Twitter, Facebook)
Website material
YouTube videos

Grammar Help

A versus an with acronyms and abbreviations
All versus none
Data is versus data are
Since versus because
That versus which
While versus although and whereas
Who versus that

Formatting Help

Capitalization
Running heads
Headings
Lists (lettered, numbered, or bulleted)
Margins
Spelling
Statistics

Keep in Touch!

We hope that these resources will be helpful to you as you write using APA Style. If you are interested in receiving tips about APA Style as well as general writing advice, we encourage you to follow us on social media. You can find us (and tell your friends) on Facebook, Twitter, and Google Plus.