Capitalization

menu

APA Style is a “down” style, meaning that words are lowercase unless there is specific guidance to capitalize them. For example, capitalize the first word of a sentence, unless the sentence begins with the name of a person whose name starts with a lowercase letter.

The Publication Manual contains guidance on how to capitalize words beginning a sentence; proper nouns and trade names; job titles and positions; diseases, disorders, therapies, theories, and related terms; titles of works and headings within works; titles of tests and measures; nouns followed by numerals or letters; names of conditions or groups in an experiment; and names of study factors, variables, and effects. Only a subset of the guidance is presented on the website to answers users’ most common questions.

Additional resources

Academic Writer

Master academic writing with APA’s essential teaching and learning resource

<a href=illustration or abstract figure and computer screen" />

Teaching APA Style? Become a course adopter of the 7th edition Publication Manual

Dictionary of Psychology

APA Dictionary of Psychology

Browse more than 25,000 authoritative entries across 90 subfields of psychology