APA Headings: How To Format Them In Academic Writing

By Claude Parsons 5 years ago

Formatting APA headings can be confusing, even if you know a thing or two about the APA style. Generally, headings are important as they create the structure of your paper, separating one part of your text from another.

Headings in APA: general aspects

If you want to write a well-organized paper in APA, you should remember several important things. First of all, the headings should establish flow, and cohesion in your texts. Secondly, there are several levels of headings in the APA style.

When you only start your journey in the world of academic writing, APA first-level headings might be all you need. However, if you write a really long paper, you will need something more. We are talking about the fourth and fifth-level headings. Do you know how (and in what cases) should you use them? In this article, we are going to consider this issue in detail.

Five levels in the APA headings

The APA style offers five levels of headings that should be used in the sequential order, starting with the first level. Here is a brief description of each level in terms of formatting:

  • Level 1: Centred, title case, boldface.
  • Level 2: Flush left, title case, boldface.
  • Level 3: Indented, sentence case, boldface, ends with a period.
  • Level 4: Indented, sentence case, boldface, italicized, ends with a period.
  • Level 5l: Indented, sentence case, italicized, ends with a period.

Overall, every piece of academic writing formatted in the APA style should be divided into sections using all levels of the APA headings. Although you can use as many levels of headings as your text requires, remember one simple recommendation. You are supposed to use different subheadings only when your project consists of at least two subsections in a bigger section.

Headings have a crucial function in academic papers — they organize your text and make it easy to find different pieces of information in it. Plus, headings help readers grasp the key ideas they are going to read. Therefore, you should know how to arrange the APA headings perfectly.

Source: https://wr1ter.com/apa-headings