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Report Writing Guide

A Guide to Report Writing Writing Reports The writing of reports is one of the constants in any psychologist's life. From
first year undergraduate level to professional practice and research, writing reports is an essential skill. It is therefore
important that it is a skill that is learned quickly. It is also an important transferable skill, in most professional careers not
just psychology the writing of reports is essential. Over your undergraduate career you will read and produce many
reports. The aim of this guide is to introduce you to the writing of experimental reports in psychology. There is a set of
agreed conventions which dictate the way in which experimental work is reported. These are set by the American
Psychological Association (APA). Most journals in Psychology, although not all, follow the APA format. This Guide
doesn't give a full account of the standard format (links with more information about the APA format are given on the links
section) but will try to give you guidelines which, if you follow, should help you produce a clear and intelligible report. How
to use this Guide This guide is split up into the sections of a report. There are seven sections in all, each section has its
own part of the guide that provides instruction on how to go about writing that section with some examples. There are
various subsections within each main section that you need to look out for. The first subsection is "Common Errors",
these sections outline the mistakes that students make when trying to write reports. They are in no way exhaustive, but
point out the most common errors. Also there are subsections called "Reading Reports". These sections attempt to give
you some ideas about how to go about critically evaluating reports that others have written. Although the main aim of this
guide is to help you write your own reports, it provides an opportunity for you to reflect upon the research papers that you
will be reading. The Examples Throughout the guide the information that is given is illustrated by examples, these, as will
be obvious, are in black indented type. Most of the examples given describe an experiment concerning mnemonics
(strategies that aid memory see page 272-273 of your course text: Gleitman et al. 1999). This is a fictional experiment
created to provide a suitable example for the level at which this guide is pitched. The actual experiment concerns
comparing the recall from memory of a list of words by two groups who are using different mnemonic strategies with a
control group that were told to use no strategy. The aim is to see which of the mnemonic strategies aid memory the best.
It must be stressed that this is a fictional experiment, purely for illustrative purposes.

{mospagebreak title=Links} Links Below are some links to other pages that provide further information on how to write
reports: Psychology with Style:A web page similar to this guide, with a little more detail on how to properly format APA
reports (where to put titles, page breaks etc.). This page was developed by M. Plonsky at The University of Wisconsin,
who provides a wealth of information about statistics and methodology elsewhere on his site. A Guide for Writing
Research Papers: This site has more information about APA format. It is especially good on the format of different types
of references. APA Style Resources: A page on PsychWeb with links to various sites that provide information about APA
format of varying degrees of usefulness. The whole PsychWeb (http://www.psychwww.com/index.html) site itself is an
extremely useful source of Web-based information on Psychology and is a good Bookmark.

{mospagebreak title=Title}The Title The Title should be a concise statement of the report's topic. It should be a clear
indication of what the report is about. A useful piece of advice usually given is to mention the dependent and
independent variables. The title may also mention the subject/participant group, if this group is unusual in any way, e.g.
animals or children. However if the subject group is adult humans (e.g. undergraduate students), then they are not
normally mentioned within the title. Common Errors The two most common mistakes are either making the title too long,
or making the title too short and uninformative. Titles such as: An experiment in Psychophysics or A study of Frontal
Function are poor titles. They don't fully describe the experiment contained within the report. They are too general and
uninformative. Titles such as: The effect of stimulus magnitude on numerical estimation or The Relationship between two
measures of frontal function are better titles. They give a fuller indication of the content of the report. Note that the first
title mentions the IV (stimulus magnitude) and the DV (numerical Estimation). The second title would be appropriate for a
study using correlational techniques. These titles provide just enough information. The following title is weak because it
provides too much information: An experimental study into the effects of different levels of stimulus magnitude (100
points, 200 points, 400 points)1 on the numerical estimations produced by psychology undergraduate students in a
computer lab This title has too much information within it, for example it includes the levels of the independent variable
(see1), which is unnecessary. Also it outlines the subject group and as they are adult humans, who are not unusual in
any way so this is redundant. As can be seen the trick with the title is to be concise and informative. This is not easy but
will come with practice. Similar discipline is needed to produce a good abstract, which is the next section within the report
that will be covered.

{mospagebreak title=Abstract}The Abstract The aim of the abstract is to provide a summary of the whole report, that is a
summary of the introduction, the method, the results and the discussion. It should be around 150 to 200 words long, not
any more. It is perhaps the hardest part of the report to get right and takes considerable practice. There are various
suggestions on how to write the abstract. A good tactic is to be fairly even-handed about the summary of each section,
covering the four main sections equally. An example of the first few lines covering the introduction could be: The
effectiveness of mnemonic strategies in aiding memory is widely acknowledged, however little is known about the relative
effectiveness of different mnemonics. This paper describes a study that attempts to compare two different mnemonics'
ability to enhance verbal memory. These few lines "set the scene" for the summary and state the question that the report
is interested in. The next section to be covered is the method: Three groups of participants were given a simple verbal
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memory task. Two of the groups were told to use different memory strategies: the first group, Counting Mnemonic; the
second, Method of Loci; the third group was not told to use any strategy. As can be seen this is a very brief coverage of
the method, outlining the design (including the IV and the DV) and saying very little about the procedure. After this the
results can be described: It was found that the number of words recalled was greater in the mnemonic conditions than in
the no strategy condition, however no difference was found between the two mnemonic conditions. Here we can see the
basics details of what was found, outlined clearly. The abstract should end with a summary of the discussion: The results
are discussed in relation to different models of verbal memory and future directions for research are suggested. The main
thrust of the discussion is covered outlining the main issues dealt with; how the results relate to other's results and
theories and suggestions for future research. As can be seen a good abstract's virtues are its concise and
comprehensive nature. The example given is not a complete blueprint for an abstract. You may have different issues to
summarize from the discussion but the example does show you the general format. Common Errors A mistake that most
student make is that they provide too much information for some section of the report and too little for others. For
example students usually provide little information about the introduction, too much about the method and results, and
next to nothing about the discussion. It is important to summarize the whole report. {mospagebreak title=Introduction}The
Introduction The role of the introduction is to outline the question that you are asking within the report. It also should
provide the background to the question and a justification for asking the question. Outlined below are a few guidelines
that show how to go about attempting this section. One basic guideline for the structure of the introduction is that it
should start with an outline of the general area of the study; in the example introduced in the last section this would be
strategies for improving memory. There should be a review of the relevant work in the area; you should attempt to outline
the main theories and describe the experimental work in the area. It is not necessary that you cover the whole area in
detail but you should cover the work that is directly related to your study and hypothesis. You must be careful to
reference the sources of your information within the text. This is done in a similar manner to that done within essays (see
the citing sources section in the essay writing guide). The next task for the introduction is to provide a coherent argument
for your hypothesis. It is important that you provide justification for performing the experiment within this section. This is
not done independently of the literature review described above. When you are outlining the research and theory you
should also be making clear the rationale behind your experiment. If we were writing an introduction to the example
experiment we would outline the research concerning memory strategies but also perhaps point out, towards the end,
that there had been no systematic comparison between different types of mnemonics, this being the rationale behind the
experiment. This should all lead logically to the final element in your introduction, which is the hypothesis. This is dealt
with next. The Hypothesis The final function of the introduction is to present the hypothesis. This should be the
culmination of the introduction, as the rest of the introduction provides the background and rationale for the hypothesis.
One hint to check that you have achieved this is to reread your introduction and see if it forms a coherent argument for
the hypothesis. The introduction should go from the general (background) to the specific (the hypothesis). The actual
hypothesis itself has to be carefully worded. Too many hypotheses from student reports are couched in vague terms. The
problems here are similar to problems with report titles; there is a tendency to either provide too little or too
much information. For our example experiment, the hypothesis: (remember we are comparing two mnemonics with a
control) Use of mnemonics will increase memory is too vague. The hypothesis should be more defined, using the terms
of the dependent and independent variables: It is predicted that there will be a difference in number of words recalled by
participants using two different mnemonics and also that both mnemonics conditions will produce greater recall than
when the participants are told to use no strategy. There are two real hypotheses here, both reasonably well outlined.
They provide direct predictions about the data that we will get from our experiment, ones that can be tested by statistical
analysis (comparing the no. of word recalled by the two experimental conditions and comparing these two conditions to
the control condition). It is important to note that the first hypothesis is non-directional this means that the direction of any
difference between the two conditions in the amount of recall is not predicated. However the second is directional, as the
direction of the difference between the experimental conditions and the control condition is predicted. The hypothesis can
be over-egged: The hypothesis is that there will be a difference in number of words recalled by participants using
different mnemonics, due to the way the memory encodes verbal information. The problem here is that this hypothesis
has information about the interpretation of the results and the rationale behind the study. This too much detail. The
hypothesis should just give a prediction about the results and nothing else. The errors outlined above are some of the
common errors associated with the hypothesis, the next page in this section deals with problems associated with the rest
of the introduction. Common Errors The main problem students have is putting too much detail concerning the
methodology of the experiment into the introduction. The introduction concerns the background and the rationale of the
experiment, not the details of how it was run. Information about the subject group, the procedure, the design etc, should
be left to the methods section. This is often difficult especially as it can seem that the rationale and hypothesis need
some detail about the Method to make sense. However it is important for the clarity of the introduction that the
description of the methodology is left to the method Section Another problem is the way in which students structure the
introduction. Students sometimes provide a large amount of background information but do not provide a full rationale for
the experiment, or alternatively provide a rationale for the experiment but do not link it to the background research. Often
what students produce is an essay on the topic with a hypothesis attached, instead of a proper coherent introduction.
The rationale of the experiment has to be part of the introduction and linked in to both the background and the
hypothesis. One of the main functions, if not the main function, of the introduction is to provide a full rationale for the
experiment. The rationale and the background having been described, the next task in writing a report is to outline the
methodology of the experiment. As was pointed out above, this is the role of the method section, which is the topic of
next few pages. {mospagebreak title=Method}The Method Section The Aim and Structure of this Section The aim of the
method section is simple enough; it is to give an outline of the way in which the experiment was run. It needs to be both
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clear and comprehensive. The one maxim that everyone cites is "the method section should provide enough information
so that someone can replicate the your experiment exactly". The method therefore should outline exactly what happened
in the experiment and to whom. One way to improve clarity that has developed is to split the method section in to
different subdivisions: Design, Participants, Materials/Stimuli and Procedure. This is not always done, for example you
can find journal articles that collapse the design and procedure section together. However when you are first writing
reports, it is important that you use these subdivisions. The next few pages outline the detail needed in each subsection.
Reading Reports Another issue about the method section is that it allows the reader to judge how "well formed" an
experiment is. Do the design, participants, etc allow the hypothesis to be fully tested. This is perhaps not so important
when you are writing reports in Level 1 and Level 2 (where the experiments are generally designed for you). But it is
important when you are reading other's reports of their experiments, i.e. journal articles. Design The role of this section is
to give a logical outline of the experiment. It is a description of the structure of the experiment; the type of structure that
was used, what the conditions were (the levels of the independent variable), what was the dependent variable, and what
controls were used. Initially when writing a design, it is important to outline the type of design used within the experiment,
whether it was a within or between subjects experiment: In a between subject design experiment,...

Then the basic structure can be outlined with description of the independent variable, and its various levels. Also the
actual dependent measure should be described: ..participants were split into three conditions 1 and given a verbal
memory task. In condition 12 participants were told to use the counting mnemonic to remember the words, in condition
22 the method of loci mnemonic and in condition 32 the participants were told to use no strategy. The dependent
measure 3was the number of correctly recalled words. 1. The basic structure of the experiment 2. The details of each
condition (levels of independent variable) 3. The dependent variable Any controls, for example counterbalancing, should
also be outlined. This section should be short, it is important that you do not provide too much detail of the procedure
used. This ensures that the design is clear and concise and avoids any unnecessary repetition. Common Errors It is
important that the design section is clear and concise. Students tend to put too much information about the procedure
within this section. The information described above is normally enough to provide a good outline of the design. One
unusual mistake that students make is providing a discussion of possible confounding variables within this section. This
is speculative and belongs in the discussion. It is important to remember with the design and indeed with the whole
method section that you must provide a purely factual description of the experiment, so just provide the facts.
Participants The role of this section is to describe the characteristics of the participants that were used within the
experiment. Perhaps the most important characteristic is the number of participants that were used, the " N ". Another
important factor is the nature of the participants, for example if they were all psychology students, you should state this
along with the age range and the sex/gender ratio. Also how the participants came to do the experiment could be
included. Were they volunteers? Were they paid? Did they do the experiment as part of a course? In short you should
provide any information you think is important about the characteristics of the subject group that was used within the
experiment An example outlines the basic format: The participants were 601 undergraduate psychology students2, of
which 30 were female. They were recruited by a poster campaign3 and were paid 5 pounds sterling for their participation
4 1. The number of participants 2. The nature of the participants 3. How the participants come to do the study 4. Their
payment Common Errors The common error that students make is not providing enough information is this section. You
should think hard about what information you need to provide about the participants that you used. Reading Reports The
information within this section also allows any reader to make a judgment of how generalisable any experimental results
are. The questions to ask are: Are the participants the most appropriate for the experiment? Is there anything about
unusual about the participants? Are there enough participants to provide valid conclusions? It is normally assumed that
psychology students are representative of the general population so generalizing from them is considered reasonably
safe. Materials and Stimuli This section is a list of the materials and stimuli used within the experiment. It should describe
all of the materials, stimuli and apparatus used. It is an important but neglected section, you need to provide a
comprehensive description of the materials used, especially the stimuli. It is also important however that at this stage you
don't include too much information about how the various materials etc. were used within the experiment, as this should
be left to the next section, the procedure section. The stimuli used in the memory test were 30 three and four letter
words. Paper and pen were also provided for the recall test. Common Errors The main error, as outlined above, is
including information about the procedure within this section. It has to be a clear description with no details about the
procedure. Also Students often fail to fully describe the stimulus used. Procedure The procedure is the narrative of the
experiment. This section outlines what actually happened in the experiment from beginning to end. The description must
be a full and comprehensive one. The rule outlined earlier, that the method section must give enough information to allow
someone else to repeat your experiment exactly as you did it, is especially important here. This is best shown by an
example Participants gathered in a large room in groups of 20 at an appointed time (each condition was run at a different
time). They were told that they were taking part in an experiment on verbal memory and that they would first be told
about a memory improving technique (this was missed out on the control condition). The participants were then either
briefed about the mnemonic they were to use, (Method of Loci or Counting depending on the condition they were in),or
were given a brief talk on memory (the control condition)... As can be seen from the short exert above, the procedure
should describe fully how the participants were exposed to the different levels of the independent variable and how the
dependent variable was collected. Common problems The most common problem with this section is the style: many
students write this subsection as if it were the instruction that were given to participants. It isn't, it is an outline of what
happened within the experiment, and should be written from the viewpoint of the experimenter. This having been said the
details of the instructions to participants should be included. Also because this section is what happened in the
experiment, it should be written in the past tense. This seems obvious but 60% of students in second year still write this
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section in present or future tense. {mospagebreak title=Results}The Results Section The Aim and Structure of this
Section The role of the results section is clear enough, it should be an accurate account of the experimental findings. The
following pages will attempt to provide a layout for the results section. They will start with a outline of the reporting of the
descriptive statistic and then move on to the outline of how the results of any analysis should be reported. It is important
to note that the sub-headings on these pages are merely to make the topic clearer, and should not be used when
completing your report. Introduction and Descriptive Statistics The first thing to do within the results section is re-state the
hypothesis, this is not always done but it does help clarify what the results are about. The next step is to report the
descriptive statistics that relate to the hypothesis. You may wish to do this within the text or refer to tables or graphs.
What descriptive statistics you report depends on the nature of your data. You may wish to provide means and standard
deviations or you may wish to provide medians and semi-interquartile ranges. However it is important to report both
measures of central tendency (such as means or medians) and measures of spread (standard deviations or semi-
interquartile ranges), as these two types of statistics provide different information. Tables and Graphs All tables and
graphs must be given clear titles and referred to in the text. An example graph is given below. This graph is titled clearly
and its legends are clear and comprehensive. It is important that the graph's and table's titles should be fully explanatory.
For example for the example given the title: Figure 1: A graph of means provides too little information, compared to the
actual title. Also graphs should show both the measures of central tendency and measures of spread. The example
graph shows how measures of spread can be put on a graph. Notice that the bars extend above and below each column.
They extend for one standard deviation. So if the mean for Condition 1 is 14.6 and the standard deviation is 1.2, the bar
will extend from the top of the column to 15.8 (as above)and below to 13.4. As regards tables, there is a temptation to
use the tables that are produced by Minitab or other statistical software. Do not do this; these tables are often unclear to
those who have not done the analysis, with unusual abbreviations that are not always explained. It is better to produce
your own tables using your word-processor or by hand. Tables also must be clearly titled and what the figures on the
table mean must be clear from the table. Common Errors The first point to make about this section is that it must be
written in continuous prose. The mistake many students make is that they provide tables or graphs of means and do not
provide text that explains the figures. The tables and graphs are there to complement the text, not to replace it. One
further problem students have is with how much information they need to put in this section. Students often provide too
much information, for example graphs of participant's individual scores. It you are looking at only one effect then only one
graph and also perhaps a table are necessary. One of the major sins against format that students commit is including
"Raw Data" in the results section. Raw data is the individual scores for each participant. This information should be put in
an appendix (see the section on Appendices) Description of the Analysis After you have outlined your descriptive results,
the next task is to provide the results of any statistical analysis that have been performed on your data, for example t-
tests. There are distinct conventions concerning how your analysis should be described. The basic pattern is as follows:
firstly the data being analysed is outlined, and then the statistical test that was used should be named. After this the
actual results in figures of the analysis are given, with a short verbal description: The recall scores for condition 1 and
condition 3 were compared using an independent t-test and a significant difference between the two conditions was
found, (t (28) = 17.86, p<0.002). One important issue is how to give the actual statistical results in figures. The main
information that should be given is: the statistic used, the degrees of freedom of the actual analysis, the obtained value of
the statistic (the t-score etc.) and the probability of the results (the p-value). The example above provides a good
illustration: t1(28)2=17.983, p<0.0024
- The statistic used, in this case a t-test
- The degrees of freedom of the analysis
- The actual obtained value of the statistic
- The probability associated with that value Most statistical tests that you will encounter in first and second level
psychology should be reported using the method above. Once the statistics are reported, there should be a short
statement of what the results mean for the hypothesis. Do they provide support for the experimental hypothesis or is the
null hypothesis accepted? The wording here is important as, because of the logic of statistical inference, you can never
fully accept the experimental hypothesis, you can only find support for it. Thus the experimental hypothesis is never
proved. The null hypothesis however can be accepted or rejected Common Errors There are a few common mistakes
that are made within this section. The main problem students have is, as with the descriptive statistics, not providing the
necessary text that explains the numbers. For example some students provide the results of their t-tests, with no
comment on what data was used or even what type of t-test was used. Another more technical problem occurs when
students are reporting the results of t-tests and other inferential statistics using confidence intervals and probabilities.
These are sometimes treated as coming from different types of test, when in fact they are highly related and so it is
important that they are treated as such. If you are unclear of the relation between the two, any psychology statistics
textbook will provide an explanation. Another related error originates from print-outs from computer statistics software
packages such as Minitab. Be careful the how you interpret the information these programs given you. One problem is
that students interpret p=0.0000 which is common on printouts as the probability equals zero. This is not the case and
shows a poor grasp of the essentials of probability. In this situation probability never equals zero. One less common
problem is producing the working for any statistical test within this section. Like raw data this belongs in an appendix.
Only give the detail outlined above when outlining your analysis. {mospagebreak title=Discussion}The Discussion The
aim of the discussion is to outline and explain the results and to relate them to others' theories and results. It also should
include some discussion and perhaps evaluation of the methodology of the experiment and provide suggestions for
further research. The Summary and Discussion of the Results The first task is to provide a verbal summary of the study's
findings. It is important that you do not repeat the results section here; this should be a simple summary of what was
found. Do not include figures from the results (e.g. means, standard deviation etc.), as this should be a purely verbal
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summary. After the brief summary, the findings should be then related to other research findings and theoretical models
in an attempt to explain the results. At this point you should relate what you have found to the research that was outlined
in the introduction. In the simple example we are using the question to be asked are: How does the finding that there is
no difference between the two mnemonics' effectiveness relate to what others have found about the effectiveness of
mnemonics? Do our findings agree with or contradict the published research? How can what we have found be explained
in terms of the theoretical models outlined in the introduction? (For example what do the results tell us about how LTM is
organized?) The Evaluation of the Methodology The next step is to analyse the methodology that was used. Were there
any weaknesses that could have affected the results? What you are considering here is; were your experimental results
due to the manipulation of the independent variable or were they due to some other factor? In our example if we found
no difference amongst the conditions (and thus accepted the null hypothesis), is this because there is no real difference
or are there other explanations? If we had found no difference between the mnemonics and no strategy, was this due to
there being no increase in effectiveness with using mnemonics? Could there be other reasons? For example although
the no strategy group was told not to use any mnemonics, we have no way of checking they did not. It could have been
that all three of the groups were using mnemonics, albeit with one using them surreptitiously. Suggestions for Further
Research The role of the next part of the discussion is to suggest, in light of your results, what further research could be
done. An attempt should be made to move beyond simply saying that there should be more participants or that the
experiment should "be more controlled". While these may be useful suggestions, they don't really indicate a full grasp of
the methodology or the actual area being studied. You should try to give more thought to what the implications of your
results are and how further studies could elaborate on your findings. Finally the discussion should end with a brief
summary, stating what the conclusions of the study were. Common Errors The main error that students make is failing to
provide a comprehensive discussion. It is important that the discussion does not merely repeat the findings but actually
discusses them, compares them to other findings and relates them to important models or theories. Also the other issues
outlined above, evaluation of the methodology and suggestions for further research, should be considered. Another
problem is that of students repeating the results section at the beginning of the discussion. The summary of the findings
should be concise and verbal. This means that the t-score, means and other statistics should not be repeated. Perhaps
the most problematic error is lack of thought and imagination, especially as regards the suggestions for further research.
{mospagebreak title=Reference Section}The Reference Section The last section outlined how to cite or reference
sources within the text. This section shows how to complete the reference section at the end of the essay. The reference
section is the list of all the sources cited or referenced in the essay, and only those that were referenced or cited in the
essay. The list is arranged alphabetically by the first author's surname. There is a format for listing different types of
sources such as books, journal articles and web sources. These are set by the APA and there are numerous sources on
the Web that outline the guidelines, (many can be found in the weblinks section of the portal) which describes the
different formats and also gives more advice on referencing within the essay text. In order to give you some idea how to
format the most common sources, the APA format for each one is given below (note: these are taken from the Report
Writing Guide but copied here to save download time). Journal Article When listing a journal article, you must give the
name of the author(s), the year it was published, the title of the actual journal article, then in italics (or underlined) the
name of the journal and volume number, and lastly the pages the articles is on. An example clarifies this: Tudge, J.R.H.,1
(1989)2. When collaboration leads to regression: some negative consequences of socio-cognitive conflict3. European
Journal Of Social Psychology4 195,123-1386
- The author(s) name(s)
- The year of publication .
- The title of the article
- The journal's name (note italics)
- The volume number of the Journal (again note italics)
- The articles page numbers If there is more that one author, merely give the authors' names in the order they are on the
article: Tudge, J.R.H., and Winterhoff, P.A.(1989) etc... Or for more than two authors: Tudge, J.R.H., Winterhoff, P.A. and
Hogan, D.M.(1996) etc.. Books The format for books is a little different. The author(s) name(s) come first, then in italics
the title of the Book, then where the book was published, and who it was published by: Piaget, J.1 (1928)2. Judgement
and reasoning in the child3.London4:Routledge and Kegan Paul5
- The Author(s) name(s)
- The year of publication
- The title of the book
- Where the book was published
- The publishers If the book you are listing is an edited book, then you merely put the editors name where the authors'
names are normally put, and put (Eds) before the year of publication. If there is more than one author or editor then
follow the format for authors outlined for journal articles. Chapters in an Edited Book The format is similar to the book
format; first the names of the authors of the chapter, the title of the chapter, the name of the editors of the whole book,
the title of the Book (in italics),and finally the place of publication and the publisher: Glachan, M., and
Light,P.1(1982)2Peer interaction and learning3. In G. Butterworth and P. Light (Eds) 4 Social Cognition5 Brighton:
Harvester.6
- The authors of the chapter
- The year of publication
- The title of the chapter
- The editors of the book the chapter was in, (note the initials come before the surname)
- The title of the book
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- The place of publication and publisher Electronic Sources Electronic sources refer to sources that have been found or
retrieved through computer. These can be CD-Roms, telnet sites, or Web pages. The format for most types of electronic
source can be found at the APA's own site (http://www.apastyle.org/elecref.html). The example provided here is of a web
page, which is the most common used type of electronic source. It is important to note that the APA make a distinction
between citing a whole web site and citing individual pages within a web site. If you cite a whole web site then you merely
need to give the URL (the web address) within the text and no corresponding entry in the reference section is needed. If
you are citing a page within a site then a entry within the reference section is needed: Memory and dementia (1998)1.
London: The Royal College of Psychiatrists2. Retrieved January 25, 19963, from the World Wide Web:
http://www.rcpsych.ac.uk/public/help/memory/memory.htm4
- The title of the page and date of publication
- Which organisation was responsible for the page
- When you looked at the page
- The URL or web address If the page has an obvious author, his/her name goes before the title in the manner of a
Journal Article. If you have any problems with reference formatting then check out the websites included on the Links
section within the Report Writing Guide. The next page outlines a few of the errors made by students in referencing a
text. Common Errors The major error that students make with this section is listing sources that are not referenced or
cited in the text. If you have not cited a source then do not put it in the references section. Even if you use a book for
background reading, if you did not cite it within the text then do not list it in the reference section. The reference section is
there to allow people who have read your essay to find the sources of information that you have cited, not to show how
much you have read. The other main error is not following the rules outlined on the previous page. The rules are easy
enough to follow and if you get into the habit of following them, they become second nature. It is important that you follow
the format that has been outlined; you will lose marks if you don't. Appendices The appendices are where ancillary
information for the report goes, such as: Raw data Workings of statistical analyses Full texts of instructions to subjects
Full lists of stimuli Do not put graphs or tables in this section, they belong with the results section. The appendices are
merely where you put information that does not have a place within the other sections of the report.

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