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APA Referencing & Publication Style: Tables or Figures

The American Psychological Association's publication manual provides guidelines for authors on how to format reports, tables, citations and bibliographies. This is the preferred style used at Toronto Public Health.

APA Style

All the information in this guide is based on the 6th edition of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association. Please refer to the original text for complete details. A reference copy is available at the TPH library. 

Have questions? Email hlibrary@toronto.ca

Tips on formatting Tables and Figures

Displaying Results in Tables or Figures

1. Use brief but explanatory titles.

2. Abbreviations can be explained in the table title (e.g. Vaccine Preventable Disease (VPD) reports for Toronto

3. Number all tables and figures in the order in which they are first mentioned in the tet (Table 1, Table 2, Table 3, Table 4).

4. If tables are placed in the appendix label them as Table A1 or Table A2 in  Appendix A.

5. Get permission to reproduce or adapt a table, figure or questionnaire from a copyrighted source and give credit in the table or figure caption.

6. Refer to tables by their number rather than writing "the table above/below" or "the table on page 12" (if the report is published, the position and page on which a table appears may change when the page is typeset). 

7. If there are a large number of data tables or figures, consider placing some in online supplementary materials (if published in a journal etc.).

Note: Adapted from Chapter 5 (p. 126-167) of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association.