An APA abstract is a brief, comprehensive summary of the contents of an article, research paper, dissertation, or report. It is written in accordance with the guidelines of the American Psychological Association (APA), which is a widely used format in social and behavioral sciences. The purpose of the current article is to define critical appraisal, identify its benefits, discuss conceptual issues influencing the adequacy of a critical appraisal, and detail procedures to help reviewers undertake critical appraisals. A critical appraisal involves a careful and systematic assessment of a study's trustworthiness or methodological rigour, and contributes to assessing how Placement: The reference list appears at the end of the paper, on its own page(s). If your research paper ends on page 8, your References begin on page 9. Heading: Place the section label References in bold at the top of the page, centered. Arrangement: Alphabetize entries by author's last name. If source has no named author, alphabetize by the Authors submitting qualitative manuscripts to Psychology of Religion and Spirituality ( PRS) should familiarize themselves with the Journal Article Reporting Standards for Qualitative Primary Research (JARS-Qual) and seek to adhere to them as much as possible. Review the Data: Examine the data, ideas, and patterns. Establish a Data Coding System: Generate a set of codes that you can apply to classify your data. Assign Codes to the Data: For qualitative survey analysis, create codes, and add them to your system. Identify Themes: Link the codes together into cohesive themes. Qualitative Psychology ® Recommendations for Designing and Reviewing Qualitative Research in Psychology: Promoting Methodological Integrity (PDF, 166KB) February 2017 Isi8B.

apa format for qualitative research paper