Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association

I figured that since I was stuck using this fiendish format, I should learn to use it correctly. My school put out a "Users Guide to APA Format", but it is very general and almost totally ignores documenting electronic (internet) sources; thus, I bought this book. I am generously giving this book two stars inasmuch as most (but not all) reasonable situations are addressed in it, but the format of the book is virtually incomprehensible and frequently sends you to multiple different places to answer a simple question. (This shouldn't surprise me given the lack of logic found in APA style in general, I suppose.)

Unfortunately even the latest (fifth) edition is woefully inadequate in answering very basic questions on documentation of internet sources, particularly addressing situations in which quotations from internet sources are included in a paper. The index is, likewise, next to useless, as looking anything up (if it happens to even be in the index, itself and unlikely development) will result in a wild goose chase of referencing around the book. This is but only one reason the entire format may be more useful to psychologists than those in the hard sciences.

What the guide IS full of is useless trivia, for instance a section on the APA "Policy on Metrication" (needless to say APA mandates metric units), and a definition of "HSD" as "Tukey's honestly significant difference (also referred to as the Tukey a procedure)." While I am not saying that metrication or Tukey's honestly significant difference aren't important (though I am inclined to), I am saying that a book that dwells on minutia like that should definitely cover the basics of references, formats and citations first. Like I said, most (but not all) of the information actually is here, but good luck finding it.

Perhaps APA should put out a guide for using this guide. Better yet, perhaps any format so cumbersome to use and needlessly intricate should be dumped altogether for a better format, like MLA. At this point I'm even willing to try Chicago style.


Unhelpful Guide about an Unenlightening Style   May 6, 2004
doomsdayer520 (Pennsylvania)
207 out of 242 found this review helpful

Like some of the other reviewers, I am in a program of advanced study in which APA is the "accepted" style of citation for scholarly research. As we can see, APA is an absolutely dreadful citation style, especially with its prohibition of footnotes, leading to incomprehensible paragraphs in which your prose is murdered by names and dates in parentheses. The lack of required page numbers in your citations also allows you, if you're so inclined, to transform your references into all sorts of unsupported speculation and conjecture, and no reader will be able to prove or disprove what you're saying. I realize that arguing about the merits of APA style is not the same as reviewing the merits of this book. But the weaknesses in the core citation style are so prevalent that it would be impossible to create a book of this nature with any sort of usefulness.

Now let's get to the trouble with this particular book. First, it is unnecessarily humungous, trying to beef up the very thin body of APA citation requirements (which by the way can be found for free all over the internet) with hugely unenlightening chapters on basic writing style and methods. Infinitely better guides on how to actually write and conduct research can be easily found elsewhere. Even when you do want to find instructions on the core requirements of APA citation style, this is an annoyingly difficult task in this atrociously organized and indexed book. A thin and under-compiled index sends you to hard-to-find section numbers rather than page numbers. And finally there is the practice of this book's publishers to promote a "new edition" which is merely the same as before with a couple of new entries, sold with a new cover and of course a new full price. In case you're wondering, about the only new information in this edition concerns how to reference websites and online publications. Once again, this info can be found for free on the internet, while you could also spend a pittance on a used copy of the supposedly "outdated" previous edition.

This book gets two stars because it is nominally useful (at least in theory) if you're stuck with it. But if you find yourself required to use the talent-crushing APA style in your attempts to write something of importance, first try to convince your mentors that APA is inherently anti-intellectual. Then find a way to get out of any requirements to buy this unhelpful book, and find the information on the internet instead. [~doomsdayer520~]


The APA Style and Format Scavenger Hunt   March 20, 1998
73 out of 78 found this review helpful

Problem: You are a student or professional of the Social Sciences; you must write research papers. You are required to follow APA style and format for your writings. Action: You acquire the APA "bible," its Publication Manual, 4h edition. Problem: You now search for answers to your APA style and format questions. You scavenge for hours. Action: You know that the information you need is all there, but where? You experience the Psychological Rite of Passage known as the "Twilight Zone of Altered States of Reference Logic." Problem: The Manual is not intuitive. Solution: Develop your own cognitive cues and frames to make sense of the book's layout. Even though I was familiar with its third edition, I still used lots of post-it stick-em things temporarliy attached to sections. And then get on with it.


Software Help Available   November 9, 1998
70 out of 76 found this review helpful

Hillysun.com offers software compatible with MS Word V6 that automates the formatting of APA papers. The Manual is still handy to have, but the software, FormatEase, saves a lot of time!


Still needed and still valued.   December 11, 1998
57 out of 72 found this review helpful

The fourth edition of the APA *Manual* is, despite some of the flaws others have noted, very useful to those studying or working within the social sciences. While our current breed of word processing programs have indeed been a great benefit to academic writers, we cannot forget the orgins of academic writing linger from long before the computer age. This book offers a complete and varied guide to how to write for a field of disciplines. I would compare it to the *American Medical Association's Style Manual* as I also use this reference quite often in that both books truly offer a great deal of information that is useful in science-related writing. We are lucky to have something that is this complete.