There are various formatting styles acceptable in both academic and professional circles. The format developed by the American Psychological Association, or APA, is widely used for reports or papers in the social sciences. The style dictates the format of citations, headers, footers, tables, and other references throughout the document. One of the features of APA style is a "running head".
A running head is simply an abbreviated version of the title of the document (APA papers tend to have long, somewhat convoluted titles), followed by the page number.
The reason it’s a "running" head is this header shows up on every page (it "runs" with the document) and the page number, of course, changes with every page. The running head needs to be right justified, meaning that it needs to butt up against the right side of your page.
To set up a running head in Microsoft Word, just click on View, then Header and Footer. You’ll get a box with a dotted line around it. Anything you insert here will be your header. To make your header right justified, hold down the Alt key on your keyboard, then type an R. You should see the cursor in the header box jump to the right side of the box. Alternately, you can click the Align Right icon in the Formatting toolbar to accomplish the same thing. Now, type your abbreviated title header, in ALL CAPS. For instance, if the full title of your paper is "Rates of Osteopenia Conversion to Osteoporosis in Post-Menopausal Women, Comparing Various Treatment Modalities" your abbreviated header might be, "RATES OF OSTEOPENIA CONVERSION", followed by the page number.
To insert the page number, type five spaces after the abbreviated title, then find the button on the Header and Footer Toolbar that looks like a page of paper with a # on it. This is the "Insert Page Number" button. Click that, and on the next page double-check that top of page, right-hand side shows as the format. Once that’s set, click OK, and your running head is set to go.
A running head is simply an abbreviated version of the title of the document (APA papers tend to have long, somewhat convoluted titles), followed by the page number.
The reason it’s a "running" head is this header shows up on every page (it "runs" with the document) and the page number, of course, changes with every page. The running head needs to be right justified, meaning that it needs to butt up against the right side of your page.
To set up a running head in Microsoft Word, just click on View, then Header and Footer. You’ll get a box with a dotted line around it. Anything you insert here will be your header. To make your header right justified, hold down the Alt key on your keyboard, then type an R. You should see the cursor in the header box jump to the right side of the box. Alternately, you can click the Align Right icon in the Formatting toolbar to accomplish the same thing. Now, type your abbreviated title header, in ALL CAPS. For instance, if the full title of your paper is "Rates of Osteopenia Conversion to Osteoporosis in Post-Menopausal Women, Comparing Various Treatment Modalities" your abbreviated header might be, "RATES OF OSTEOPENIA CONVERSION", followed by the page number.
To insert the page number, type five spaces after the abbreviated title, then find the button on the Header and Footer Toolbar that looks like a page of paper with a # on it. This is the "Insert Page Number" button. Click that, and on the next page double-check that top of page, right-hand side shows as the format. Once that’s set, click OK, and your running head is set to go.
