Template Options

Options are set in the metadata section at the top of the .qmd file. Quarto metadata uses YAML, a format that allows us to store data in a format that is easy to write and easy to read. In its simplest form, it has a key and a value:

key: value

If the value is simple, it does not need any quotes. If it has any characters that have special meaning in yaml (e.g., :), you will need to put the value in quotes.

title: "This title needs quotes: Because there is a colon in it."

Any optional key you do not use can be deleted or commented out. If you would prefer to keep the key visible but empty, you can make the value NULL with the tilde symbol ~ like so:

key: ~

If you want the null value to be easier to understand, you can specify a null value explicitly:

key: null

Here is a minimal example of what the YAML metadata might look like:

---
title: "My Paper's Title: A Full Analysis of Everything"
shorttitle: "My Paper's Title"
author:
  - name: W. Joel Schneider
    corresponding: true
    orcid: 0000-0002-8393-5316
    email: schneider@temple.edu
    affiliations:
      - name: Temple University
        department: College of Education and Human Development
        address: 358 Ritter Hall
        city: Philadelphia
        region: PA
        postal-code: 19122-6091
abstract: "This is my abstract."
keywords: [keyword1, keyword2]
author-note:
  disclosures:
    conflict of interest: The author has no conflict of interest to declare.
bibliography: mybibfile.bib     
format:
  apaquarto-docx: default
  apaquarto-html: default
  apaquarto-pdf: default
  apaquarto-typst: default
---

General Options

title

Sets the title.

Titles with no special characters can be raw text.

title: My title

If your title has a colon in it, it will need to be quoted:

title: "My Title: My Subtitle"

You can list your title and subtitle separately, and they will be combined with a colon in the document:

title: My Title
subtitle: My Subtitle
shorttitle

A short version of the title that appears in the running header for .pdf and .docx formats. If omitted or null (~), the running header will take its value from the title field (and will omit the subtitle).

abstract

The abstract paragraph.

If the abstract is a single paragraph, put it on a single line like most of the other fields:

abstract: This is a single-paragraph abstract.

If the abstract has multiple paragraphs, separate them like so:

abstract: |
  | This is the first paragraph.
  | This is the second paragraph.
  | This the third paragraph.

The abstract can be written in the document instead, as a section called Abstract. It is taken out of the body and set on the title page as though it had been written here. Handy for a long abstract, which a yaml field makes awkward to write and to spell check:

# Abstract

This is the first paragraph.

This is the second paragraph.
keywords

A list of topics your paper relates to. Can be single words or short phrases. There are two ways to format key words.

Comma-separated list with square brackets:

keywords: [First keyword, Second keyword, Third keyword]

Multiline list with indented hyphens :

keywords:
  - First keyword
  - Second keyword
  - Third keyword
floatsintext

Specifies where floats (i.e., figures and tables) appear.

  • If true, figures and tables will be intermingled in text.
  • If false, figures and tables will appear at the end of the document.
  • If omitted, defaults to false.

The floatsintext field does not apply when a .pdf output is in journal mode.

table-spacing

Default: double, or single in journal and doc modes

The line spacing of a table’s rows: single, onehalf or double (or 1, 1.5 or 2). APA lets a table body be single, one-and-a-half or double spaced. By default a table’s rows take the body’s double spacing, except in journal and doc modes, whose body and tables are single spaced.

In .pdf and typst the rows of a single-spaced table stand 14.5pt apart and of a double-spaced one 24pt, the body’s double spacing; in .docx they stand one of Word’s lines apart, 13.8pt single and 27.6pt double, and the lines of a cell that wraps stay single spaced; in .html they are 1.2, 1.5 or 2 lines high.

It applies to the tables pandoc writes, markdown tables and knitr::kable tables among them. A table a package such as flextable or gt writes keeps the spacing that package gives it.

table-spacing: single
numbered-lines

Numbered lines (every format but .html, which has no pages to number lines down) | Default: false |

linenumber-font

The font of the numbers numbered-lines puts in the margin, in apaquarto-typst.

Typst bundles one sans face, DejaVu Sans Mono, and warns once for every family it is asked for and cannot find. So the default names only that one, which is silent on every machine. Name another if you know the machine has it:

linenumber-font: Helvetica

A list is tried in turn:

linenumber-font: [Helvetica, Arial]

Default: DejaVu Sans Mono

bibliography

File(s) with references.

If you have a single file, you can list it like so:

bibliography: mybibliography.bib

If you have multiple files, you can make an array:

bibliography: [mybibliography.bib, myotherbibliography.bib]
mask

For anonymous peer review, removes identifying information: author names, author affiliations, author notes, correspondence information, and references listed in the masked-citations field.

If true, identifying information is removed.

If false or omitted, all information is left as is.

masked-citations

A list of citation keys that should be masked if the mask field is true. For example:

mask: true
masked-citations:
  - mypublication2020
  - mypublication2024

The citation keys should be as they appear in the bibliography file(s).

suppress-title-page

Suppress the title page if true

meta-analysis

By default, all studies listed in the nocite field will be marked with asterisks in the References section. If this behavior is unwanted, set meta-analysis to false.

no-ampersand-parenthetical

APA style uses ampersands in parenthetical citations (e.g., Schneider & McGrew, 2018) but not in narrative (i.e., in-text) citations: Schneider and McGrew (2018). You can replace ampersands with “and” in parenthetical citations (e.g., Schneider and McGrew, 2018) by setting the no-ampersand-parenthetical option to true. A different replacement word other than “and” can be set in the citation-last-author-separator field in the language options.

impact-statement

A paragraph below the Abstract that describes the theoretical/practical importance of the work. The heading of the impact statement is “Impact Statement” by default but can be overridden using the title-impact-statement field in the language field.

Like the abstract, it can be written in the document instead, as a section called Impact Statement:

# Impact Statement

This is the statement.
supplemental-materials

A line below the keywords pointing readers to supplemental materials (a repository, an archive, an OSF page). The prefix is “Supplemental materials” by default but can be overridden using the title-supplemental-materials field in the language field.

word-count

word-count: true puts the document’s word count on the title page, after the keywords and the supplemental materials. Every word of the body is counted, along with code, math, notes and one word for each citation. The label is “Word Count” by default and can be changed with title-word-count in the language field.

draft-date

A date under the author’s name on the title page, for marking a draft. draft-date: true gives the date of the render (as in October 4, 2026); any other text is used as written:

draft-date: "Second draft, May 2027"
mainfont

Set font family for headings and body font. Default is Times New Roman

monofont

Set font family for code output. Default is Consolas.

papersize

Set the paper size. Default is us-letter. Other options include a3, a4, a5, b5, executive, legal, letter, tabloid

margin

Default: 1in all round (journal mode: 0.75in at the sides and top, 1in at the foot)

The margins, in the .pdf, the .docx and typst alike: one length, or any of x (left and right), y (top and bottom), left, right, top and bottom, in in, cm, mm or pt. A side left out keeps the mode’s margin.

margin:
  x: 1.25in
  top: 1in
geometry

.pdf only, and seldom needed: LaTeX’s geometry options, for anything the geometry package can do that margin cannot (includehead, footskip). Written after margin, so where both name a side, geometry wins: geometry: left=1.5in, or a list such as [left=1.5in, includehead].

Authors

The apaquarto uses the standard Quarto schema for authors. It has a lot of options, some of which are not needed for the apaquarto extension (e.g., fax, phone, degrees, note, acknowledgements).

The author field contains author names, author affiliations, and author roles. Where possible, specify each author’s orcid for easy, unambiguous identification.

The corresponding author is specified by setting the author’s corresponding field to true (i.e., corresponding: true). This author needs to list an email and list a mailing address in the affiliation data. Only one author can be the corresponding author. Other authors do not need to list their addresses.

author:
  - name: W. Joel Schneider
    corresponding: true
    orcid: 0000-0002-8393-5316
    email: schneider@temple.edu
    affiliations:
      - name: Temple University
        department: College of Education and Human Development
        address: 1301 Cecil B. Moore Ave.
        city: Philadelphia
        region: PA
        postal-code: 19122-6091
    role:
      - writing
      - conceptualization
  - name: Fulano Zutano Mengano
    affiliations: Universidad de Dondequiera
    orcid: 0000-0000-0000-0001
    role:
      - formal analysis
      - visualization
      - editing
  - name: Thomas Richard Harris
    affiliations: 
      - name: Generic State University
        department: Department of Scholarly Studies
    orcid: 0000-0000-0000-0002
    role:
      - editing
      - funding acquisition
  - name: Wut C. Whosis
    affiliations: Whatchama College
    orcid: 0000-0000-0000-0003
    role:
      - software
      - methodology
      - editing

Affiliations

The apaquarto extension uses the standard Quarto schema for affiliations.

id

A unique identifier for the affiliation. The id can be useful for specifying an affiliation shared by multiple authors:

author:
  - name: William Joel Schneider
    affiliations:
      - name: Temple University
        department: College of Education and Human Development
        address: 1301 Cecil B. Moore Ave.
        city: Philadelphia
        region: PA
        postal-code: 19122-6091
        id: temple
  - name: Renée M. Tobin
    affiliations:
      - ref: temple
name

The name of the organization.

author:
  - name: Fred Jones
    affiliation:
      - name: Generic State University

If the author is unaffiliated, list the author’s city and region/state instead:

author:
  - name: Fred Jones
    affiliation:
      - city: San Francisco
        region: CA
department

A specific division within the organization.

group

A subdivision within the department

author:
  - name: Fred Jones
    affiliation:
      - name: Generic State University
        department: Department of Psychology
        group: Counseling Psychology
address

The street address

city

City

region

The region, state, or province.

You may specify state instead, if you prefer.

country

Country

postal-code

Postal code (zip code in the U.S.)

Multiple Affiliations

If an author has more than one affiliation:

author:
  - name: William Joel Schneider
    affiliations:
      - name: Temple University
        department: College of Education and Human Development
        address: 1301 Cecil B. Moore Ave.
        city: Philadelphia
        region: PA
        postal-code: 19122-6091
      - name: My Second Affiliation

Shared Affiliations

If two authors have the same affiliation, you can type the same affiliation twice. If you do this, make sure the affiliations are EXACTLY the same in every detail. Otherwise they will be listed as different. To make sure they are listed as the same affiliation, it is safer to use a reference id to make sure that there are no accidental differences that creep in to the editing process. In this example, the affiliation information was entered once, and the id was specified. For the second author with the same affiliation, the ref field is used to reference the previously specified id.

author:
  - name: William Joel Schneider
    affiliations:
      - name: Temple University
        department: College of Education and Human Development
        address: 1301 Cecil B. Moore Ave.
        city: Philadelphia
        region: PA
        postal-code: 19122-6091
        id: temple
  - name: Renée M. Tobin
    affiliations:
      - ref: temple

Listing Authors and Affiliations Separately

If there are a lot of authors with shared affiliations, it might be easier to list the affiliations separately and specify each affiliation’s id, which can be looked up with the ref field:

author: 
  - name: Fred Jones
    affiliation: 
      - ref: temple
      - ref: tamu
  - name: Wanda James
    affiliation:
      - ref: temple
      - ref: ucb
affiliations:
  - id: temple
    name: Temple University
  - id: tamu
    name: "Texas A&M University"
  - id: ucb
    name: University of California, Berkeley

Author Roles

APA Style encourages but does not require papers with multiple authors to describe author roles using the Contributor Roles Taxonomy (CRediT). There are 14 contributor roles:

conceptualization

Ideas; formulation or evolution of overarching research goals and aims.

data curation

Management activities to annotate (produce metadata), scrub data and maintain research data (including software code, where it is necessary for interpreting the data itself) for initial use and later re-use.

formal analysis

Application of statistical, mathematical, computational, or other formal techniques to analyse or synthesize study data.

funding acquisition

Acquisition of the financial support for the project leading to this publication.

investigation

Conducting a research and investigation process, specifically performing the experiments, or data/evidence collection.

methodology

Development or design of methodology; creation of models.

project administration

Management and coordination responsibility for the research activity planning and execution.

resources

Provision of study materials, reagents, materials, patients, laboratory samples, animals, instrumentation, computing resources, or other analysis tools.

software

Programming, software development; designing computer programs; implementation of the computer code and supporting algorithms; testing of existing code components.

supervision

Oversight and leadership responsibility for the research activity planning and execution, including mentorship external to the core team.

validation

Verification, whether as a part of the activity or separate, of the overall replication/reproducibility of results/experiments and other research outputs.

visualization

Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work, specifically visualization/data presentation.

writing

Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work, specifically writing the initial draft (including substantive translation).

editing

Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work by those from the original research group, specifically critical review, commentary or revision – including pre- or post-publication stages.

It is possible to list the roles for each author:

author: 
  - name: Fred Jones
    role: 
      - conceptualization
      - funding acquisition
      - writing
  - name: Wanda James
    role:
      - conceptualization
      - formal analysis
      - visualization
      - editing

When 2 or more authors have the same role, one may specify the degree of contribution (lead, equal, supporting):

author: 
  - name: Fred Jones
    role: 
      - conceptualization: lead
      - visualization: supporting
      - investigation: equal
      - funding acquisition
      - writing
  - name: Wanda James
    role:
      - conceptualization: supporting
      - visualization: lead
      - investigation: equal
      - formal analysis
      - editing

Author Notes

The first paragraph of the Author Note will be populated with all the ORCID IDs that have been specified.

The second paragraph consists of status changes:

affiliation-change

Describe author affiliation changes.

Example:

author-note:
  status-changes:
    affiliation-change: Fred Jones is now at Generic State University
deceased

Disclose names of authors who are now deceased.

Example:

author-note:
  status-changes:
    deceased: Fred Jones is deceased.

The third paragraph consists of study details and author disclosures:

study-registration

Describe where the study was registered.

Example:

author-note:
  disclosures:
    study-registration: "This study was registered at ClinicalTrials.gov (Identifier NTC998877)."
data-sharing

Data/materials that have been shared

Example:

author-note:
  disclosures:
    data-sharing: "Data from this study can be accessed at https://academicdata.org/jones2024."
related-report

Acknowledge and cite data/materials that were used previously

Example:

author-note:
  disclosures:
    related-report: "This article is based on the dissertation completed by Graham (2018)"
conflict-of-interest

Disclose author conflicts of interest

Example:

author-note:
  disclosures:
    conflict-of-interest: "Fred Jones has been a paid consultant for Corporation X, which funded this study."
financial-support

Acknowledge funding sources

Example:

author-note:
  disclosures:
    financial-support: "This study was supported by Grant 123 from Academic Funders United."
gratitude

Authors can express gratitude.

Example:

author-note:
  disclosures:
    gratitude: "The authors are grateful to Sidney Fiero for thoughtful comments on an early draft of this paper."
authorship-agreements

Authors can disclose any agreements they entered into regarding the paper.

Example:

author-note:
  disclosures:
    authorship-agreements: "Because the authors are equal contributors, order of authorship was determined by a fair coin toss."

The fourth paragraph of the Author Note consists of the correspondence information. It will created automatically from the contact information from the author marked as the corresponding author. If you wish to override this paragraph with one entirely of your own, you can set it via the correspondence-note subfield in the author-note field.

author-note:
  correspondence-note: This will override the correspondence note that would otherwise be generated.

Options for .docx and typst

blank-lines-above-title

Number of blank lines above the title.

If omitted, defaults to 2 double-spaced lines.

APA style requests that you put your title 3 to 4 lines (i.e., 1.5 to 2 double-spaced lines) down from the top of the title page.

blank-lines-above-author-note

Number of double-spaced lines between author affiliations and author note.

APA style wants the note to start around the middle of the page. You can play with the number. It defaults to 2 if omitted.

author-note-columns

In typst journal mode, how many columns the author note spans at the foot of the first page. 1 keeps it in one column however long it runs, 2 sets it across both columns however short it is, and auto, the default, decides by the length of the note. It can also be written inside author-note. The other document modes do not float the author note, so they ignore it.

leading

Default: 16pt (man, stu), 18pt (thesis), 14pt (doc), 5.5pt (jou)

apaquarto-typst only. The space between the lines of a paragraph, and between one paragraph and the next, as Typst measures it: from the bottom of one line to the top of the next rather than baseline to baseline, so the 16pt manuscript mode sets is 24pt on the page, double spacing for 12pt type. Any Typst length works (pt, em, in, cm, mm), and it replaces the mode’s own. Block quotations and the space around headings follow it unless the mode sets its own.

leading: 0.65em
spacing

Default: 16pt (man, stu), 18pt (thesis), 8pt (doc), 5pt (jou)

apaquarto-typst only. The space above and below a block: a block quotation, a list, a figure or table, a code block. The space between two paragraphs is leading, so that the text is evenly spaced. Any Typst length works. When leading is set and spacing is not, it takes the value of leading.

cols

Default: 1 (2 in jou)

apaquarto-typst only. How many columns the body is set in. cols: 1 sets a journal article in a single column; the masthead and the title block span the page either way.

Options for .pdf

As of 6.0.0 the .pdf is set in plain \(\LaTeX\) rather than with the apa7 class, so these are apaquarto’s own options and no longer those of apa7. Four fields that belonged to that class — donotrepeattitle, draftfirst, draftall and nocorrespondence — no longer do anything; the first has become suppress-title-introduction and the last suppress-corresponding-paragraph, both of which work in every format. A document’s own yaml is otherwise unchanged.

documentmode

Alter the overall style of the document. Options include:

  • manscript Manuscript: Similar to .docx format
  • journal Journal: A polished two-column format similar to many APA journals.
  • document Document: Similar to default \(\LaTeX\) articles.
  • student Student: Formatted for student papers
  • thesis Thesis/Dissertation: Formatted according to Temple University’s Dissertation & Thesis Handbook

Each mode may also be abbreviated: jou, man, doc, and stu.

course professor duedate note

Fields that are used only for student papers (stu mode).

Example:

course: Introduction to Statistics (EDUC 5101)
professor: W. Joel Schneider
duedate: 12/22/2024
note: |
  Student ID: 123456
journal volume copyrightnotice copyrighttext

Fields that are used only for journal articles (jou mode).

Example:

journal:
  title: Psychological Review
volume: 2024, Vol. 131, No. 2, 10--60
copyrightnotice: 2024
copyrighttext: All rights reserved
fontsize

Size of font.

Options include 10pt, 11pt, and 12pt

papersize

The paper size, letter by default. a4 and the other sizes Quarto knows are accepted, and reach the .docx as well.

Replaces apa7’s a4paper, which no longer does anything.

first-page

The number the first page carries, and the number the pages count on from. Useful for a chapter or an article that begins partway into a volume. Defaults to 1.

Document modes in pdf and typst

The documentmode field works in apaquarto-typst as well as apaquarto-pdf. All four modes are supported: man (manuscript), jou (journal, two columns), doc (a plain continuous document), and stu (student paper). In both formats each mode may also be named in full: journal, manuscript, document, and student are accepted as aliases for jou, man, doc, and stu.

In stu mode the student-paper fields course, professor, duedate, and note are placed on the title page.

In jou mode the journal metadata is set as a masthead at the head of the first page, the way the journals set one: the journal’s name at the right with its logo opposite, a rule under both, and the issue on the right beneath it with the copyright on the left. All of it goes under journal, which Quarto reserves as an object:

journal:
  title: "Journal of Educational Psychology"
  logo: apa-logo.png
  year: 2026
  volume: 118
  issue: 6
  pages: 869--888
  url: "https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000976"
  issn: 0022-0663
  copyrightnotice: 2025
  copyrighttext: "The Author(s)"

which is set as

logo Journal of Educational Psychology
© 2025 The Author(s) 2026, Vol. 118, No. 6, 869–888
ISSN: 0022-0663 https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000976

logo is a path to an image file, read the same way a path in the document is. Writing logo: default instead of a path uses the apaquarto logo, which the extension ships with, so that a masthead can be seen without one having to be found first.

Every field is optional, and anything left out is simply left out: a journal with nothing but a title gives the name and the rule and no more. The words “Vol.” and “No.” can be changed with journal-volume and journal-issue in the language field.

Dissertations and Theses

documentmode: thesis sets a dissertation or thesis for the Temple University Graduate School, following its Dissertation and Thesis Handbook. It is manuscript mode with a front matter of its own, and it works in all four formats. dissertation is accepted as an alias.

The front matter is built for you, in the order the handbook sets it: title, copyright, abstract, dedication, acknowledgments, table of contents, and a list for each kind of float the document holds. Each page is left out when the document gives it nothing to set, and the numbering runs on over whatever is there.

The page takes its fields from a thesis block:

documentmode: thesis
thesis:
  type: Dissertation
  submitted-to: the Temple University Graduate Board
  degree: Doctor of Philosophy
  date: May 2027
  committee:
    - name: Mentor's Name
      role: Advisory Chair
      affiliation: TU Department
    - name: Committee Member's Name
      affiliation: TU Department
    - name: Committee Member's Name
      role: External Member
      affiliation: Another University
type

What the work is: Dissertation or Thesis. The page reads “A Dissertation”.

submitted-to

Who it is submitted to. Defaults to “the Temple University Graduate Board”.

degree

The degree it answers to, as Student Services Banner names it.

date

The diploma date, not the date of the defence.

copyright

The year on the copyright page. Taken from the year in date when it is not written. false leaves the page out.

dedication

The dedication, centred on a page of its own with no heading. May also be written as a top-level dedication, beside abstract.

acknowledgments

The acknowledgments, under a heading of their own. acknowledgements is read too, and either may be written at the top level instead.

committee

The examining committee, in order. Each entry takes name, an optional role (Advisory Chair, External Member) and an optional affiliation, and is set as one line with commas between them.

title-margin

Default: 1in all round

The title page’s margins, in the same shape as margin: one length, or any of x, y, left, right, top and bottom. A side left out keeps its inch. The title is broken into its inverted pyramid against the measure these leave, and the rules under its blocks are 5.5in or the whole measure, whichever is narrower. The other pages take the document’s own margins (see Margins, above).

thesis:
  title-margin:
    x: 1.25in

Every field is optional: a block left out leaves its part of the page out, and the rule that sets it off goes with it.

The author is the document’s own author, and the title its own title.

The shape of the title

The Graduate School asks for the title in capitals, and for an inverted pyramid when it runs to more than one line: the first line longest, each line after it shorter. apaquarto works the lines out for you. It measures the words and tries every arrangement from two lines up to eight, aiming each line at a straight taper — for a title of four lines, the full measure, three quarters of it, half, a quarter — and takes the arrangement that sits nearest. That settles how many lines the title wants without anyone having to say.

The lines are worked out once, in Lua, and handed to all four formats, so the title page has the same shape in the .pdf, the .docx, the typst and the .html.

To break the title yourself instead, write it as a block and end each line with a backslash:

title: |
  This is the First Line of My Title \
  And This is the Second Line

Those are then the lines, and nothing is worked out.

Margins

The handbook asks for 1.5” at the left, where the work is bound, and 1” elsewhere, and says the margins are “the same for the entire manuscript, including front matter”. documentmode: thesis sets them in the .pdf, the typst and the .docx.

A margin the document names with margin replaces the handbook’s on every page but the title page, the front matter as well as the body, so the whole work moves together, in all three formats. A side left out keeps the handbook’s.

margin:
  left: 1.25in

The title page is the exception: it is set on 1” all round, so that the block of it stands at the centre of the paper rather than at the centre of a text block pushed right by the binding margin. That is what the dissertations Temple publishes do, and what the Graduate School’s own template draws. The title is broken against the measure that page has, not the body’s. title-margin under thesis gives it margins of its own.

Confirm with the Graduate School before submitting on margins other than the handbook’s.

The abstract, the dedication and the acknowledgments

The abstract is the document’s own abstract, and the acknowledgments are acknowledgments (or acknowledgements). Each is set under a heading of its own, in capitals and centred, with the prose flush at the margin, no first line indented, and double spaced, as the handbook asks. Either runs as long as it runs and takes a second page if it needs one.

The dedication is dedication. It carries no heading and is centred, double spaced, well down its own page.

All three may be written at the top level, beside abstract, or inside the thesis block.

abstract: "What the work found."
dedication: |
  For everyone who wondered whether this would ever be finished.
acknowledgments: |
  Thanks to my committee, and to everyone who read a draft.

The Graduate School’s own template sets its abstract and its acknowledgments differently from one another — one begins at the margin and the other is indented, and the air under the heading is not the same on both. apaquarto sets them alike.

The table of contents

The contents lists the front matter in capitals — the abstract, the dedication, the acknowledgments — then the chapters under a column label reading CHAPTER, each with its arabic number and its title in capitals, and then the back matter: the references, and the appendices, lettered in the order they are mentioned. Page stands at the right margin under the heading, and leader dots run out to the page numbers.

Neither the copyright page nor the contents itself is listed, which is what the handbook asks. CHAPTER and APPENDICES are column labels rather than entries: they carry no leader and no page, and the chapters and appendices under them carry both.

The entries are black. They are links, and a link would otherwise take linkcolor and leave the contents reading as a page of cross references rather than as a list; toccolor says what they take instead, in the lists of tables and figures as well.

How deep it goes is quarto’s own toc-depth, counting levels of heading: 1 lists the chapters and nothing under them, 4 adds the three levels of subheading the handbook allows, and anything deeper is cut back to four. Quarto’s default is 3.

toc-depth: 1

The handbook asks that a level listed for one chapter be listed for every chapter that has it, which is worth a look before you go deeper than the chapters.

Chapters

A chapter is a level-one heading in the body. In thesis mode a heading reading Introduction at the head of the body is kept rather than taken out — a dissertation’s chapters are named, and that heading is the first chapter’s name.

Every level-one heading is set in capitals, and over each chapter stands the word CHAPTER and its number, on a line of its own and set like the heading under it.

Every major division begins a page of its own, which is what the handbook asks: each chapter, the references, and each appendix.

A level-one heading with a part of its own to play — the references, an appendix, the label over an appendix — is not a chapter. It is set in capitals like the rest but carries no CHAPTER line and is not counted in the numbering.

The CHAPTER lines are not listed in the table of contents, which names a chapter by its own heading. The word can be changed with thesis-chapter-label in the language field.

In the .pdf and in typst the page numbers are worked out as the document is set. In .docx they are fields, as the lists of figures and tables are, and they are blank until something makes Word paginate: select all and press F9, or print, or export to PDF. .html has no pages, so an entry there is the words and a link to them.

The lists of tables, figures and illustrations

A dissertation carries a table of contents and a list for each kind of float unless it says otherwise, which is the other way round from apaquarto’s other modes: list-of-contents, list-of-tables, list-of-figures and list-of-illustrations are all true here, and the field says what to leave out rather than what to put in.

list-of-illustrations: false

A list with nothing in it is left out whatever the field says, and the contents does not name it: a heading reading LIST OF TABLES over an empty page helps nobody, and the Graduate School’s own template says as much — “if no tables, delete this page”.

A list is built for every kind of float the document holds — tables first, then figures, then anything the document declared for itself under crossref.custom. Each stands under a heading of its own, LIST OF TABLES and the rest, with two column labels over the entries: what the list is of at the left margin and Page at the right. An entry is the float’s number, its caption, leader dots and the page.

An illustration is a figure with a word and a count of its own, so it is numbered from one rather than continuing after the figures, and its caption is set the way a figure’s is: the number on a line of its own with the caption under it. apa-note works on it as it does on a figure, written either on the image or on the div that holds it, and in .docx it is given the same styles a figure has, which hold the note on the page with the illustration it belongs to. The same goes for any other kind of float a document declares.

format:
  apaquarto-pdf:
    crossref:
      custom:
        - kind: float
          reference-prefix: Illustration
          key: ill
          latex-env: illustration

Declare a custom float in each format block rather than once for all of them. Quarto drops latex-env on the way through an extension’s shared options, and its own LaTeX code then stops on the missing field.

The lists are listed in the table of contents, as the handbook asks, and are numbered in the same lower-case roman as the rest of the front matter.

Line spacing

The handbook sets the line spacing part by part, and documentmode: thesis follows it in all four formats.

The body is double spaced, and so are the abstract, the dedication, the acknowledgments and the preface.

A block quotation is single spaced and indented half an inch from the left margin and half an inch from the right, which is what marks it out as quoted.

The entries of the reference list are single spaced within an entry, with a double space between one entry and the next, hanging half an inch. The table of contents and the lists of tables, figures and illustrations are set the same way: a title of two or more lines is single spaced and turns over under its own first word, and a double space stands between one entry and the next.

Notes are single spaced within a note, with a double space between one note and the next and the first line indented half an inch, which is where the note’s number sits. In .html the number belongs to the list the browser draws and is left where it is; the line spacing is the same.

Widows and orphans are avoided, so no page breaks after the first line of a paragraph or before its last. The .pdf is the one that has to be told; .docx and typst avoid them already, and .html has no pages to break.

Each format takes its own single spacing — what Word, LaTeX and typst each call a single-spaced line differs by a point or so — and its own double, which is what every other documentmode does too.

Page numbering

The handbook asks for lower-case roman numerals through the front matter and arabic numerals from the first page of the body, and says that “the Title Page is page i, but does not show a page number”. That is what documentmode: thesis sets: the title page is counted and carries nothing, the copyright page is ii, and the body begins again at 1.

There is no running head. The number sits at the centre of the foot, which is where the dissertations Temple publishes put it.

Confirm the current requirements with the Graduate School before submitting: apaquarto follows the 2024–2025 handbook, and a handbook is revised.

The words of the front matter

Every word the front matter sets can be changed under language, for a dissertation written in another language or a degree that words things differently. A word left out keeps its English default.

language:
  thesis-committee: "Dissertation Committee:"
  thesis-list-of-illustrations: "LIST OF PLATES"
thesis-article

Default: A

The article before the kind of work on the title page: A Dissertation.

thesis-submitted-to

Default: Submitted to

The line between the kind of work and who it is submitted to.

thesis-fulfillment

Default: In Partial Fulfillment

The first line above the degree on the title page.

thesis-requirements

Default: of the Requirements for the Degree

The second line above the degree on the title page.

thesis-by

Default: by

The line above the author’s name on the title page.

thesis-committee

Default: Examining Committee Members:

The heading over the examining committee at the foot of the title page.

thesis-copyright

Default: Copyright

The word after © on the copyright page: © Copyright 2027 by A. Author.

thesis-copyright-by

Default: by

The word before the author’s name on the copyright page.

thesis-rights-reserved

Default: All Rights Reserved

The line under the copyright notice.

thesis-abstract

Default: ABSTRACT

The heading of the abstract page, and its entry in the table of contents.

thesis-dedication

Default: DEDICATION

The dedication’s entry in the table of contents. The page itself carries no heading.

thesis-acknowledgments

Default: ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The heading of the acknowledgments page, and its entry in the table of contents.

thesis-contents

Default: TABLE OF CONTENTS

The heading of the table of contents.

thesis-page-column

Default: Page

The label over the page numbers in the table of contents and in each list.

thesis-chapter-column

Default: CHAPTER

The label over the chapters in the table of contents.

thesis-chapter-label

Default: CHAPTER

The word over each chapter’s heading in the body, before its number: CHAPTER 1.

thesis-appendices

Default: section-title-appendices in capitals: APPENDICES

The label over the appendices in the table of contents.

thesis-list-of-tables thesis-list-of-figures thesis-list-of-illustrations

Default: LIST OF TABLES, LIST OF FIGURES, …

The heading of each list of floats, and its entry in the table of contents. The key is thesis- and the field that asks for the list: thesis-list-of-tables names the list list-of-tables sets. A kind declared under crossref.custom gets one of its own, as thesis-list-of-illustrations does for Illustration; give it here when its plural is not the word and an s.

Tables of contents, figures, and tables

Each of these stands on a page of its own, after the abstract, the impact statement, the keywords and the supplemental materials, and before the body of the paper.

list-of-contents

A table of contents, in every format.

How many levels of heading it lists is quarto’s toc-depth, which is three unless a document says otherwise. Nothing read that field before 6.0.1: .html and .docx counted three levels, the .pdf three, and typst listed every level there was.

Each format reaches it differently: typst has an outline of its own, the .pdf has LaTeX’s, the .docx is built by hand, and .html has neither pages nor fields, so an entry there is the heading and a link to it.

toc: true also works in typst. In .html it puts Quarto’s own contents in the margin, which is where a reader of a web page looks, so this field adds none of its own while that one is there. The .html format sets toc: true itself, so a contents in the body of a web page is asked for with both fields:

format:
  apaquarto-html:
    toc: false
    list-of-contents: true

In .docx toc: true is Pandoc’s, and writes a contents at the very top of the file, ahead of the title page, where nothing can move it.

Only the headings that belong in a contents are listed: the title page’s headings and anything marked {.unlisted} are left out.

list-of-figures

A list of figures, in .docx, typst and .pdf.

list-of-tables

A list of tables, in .docx, typst and .pdf.

list-of-figures and list-of-tables are for .docx, typst and the .pdf; an entry in either reads Figure 1. The Figure Caption, with a leader out to the page number. Neither is built for .html, which has no pages to find.

In .docx those page numbers are fields, since nothing before Word lays the pages out knows what they are. They are blank when the file is opened and fill in correctly as soon as anything makes Word paginate: select all and press F9, or print, or export to pdf. Rendering says as much.

format:
  apaquarto-docx:
    list-of-contents: true
    list-of-figures: true
    list-of-tables: true

Options for .html

With one exception, everything that works for .docx should work for .html. For .html, there is no benefit to having line numbers in the text because the text wrapping differs depending on the device and size of the window the document is being viewed.

The Introduction Heading

APA does not label the introduction. The title of the paper stands at the top of the first page of text and the introduction runs on underneath it, so a heading reading Introduction is one heading too many.

apaquarto takes such a heading out for you. If the first heading in the body is a level-one heading whose text is Introduction, it is removed and the text under it is left where it is. A heading called Introduction anywhere else — inside an appendix, say — is left alone, as is one at any other level.

This matters most when the abstract is written as a section of the document, since something has to mark where the abstract ends and a heading is the obvious thing to reach for:

# Abstract

The abstract goes here.

# Introduction

The body of the paper starts here, and the heading above it does not
appear in the output.

The word it looks for is section-title-introduction in the language field, so a paper written in another language is matched too. To keep the heading, set keep-introduction-heading: true.

Suppress Elements

Any of the elements below can be selectively suppressed from the document by setting the field to true.

suppress-title-page

Suppress the entire title page

suppress-title

Suppress the title on the title page

suppress-short-title

Suppress the short title in the running header

suppress-author

Suppresses the author names below the title. Does not suppress author names in the author note.

suppress-affiliation

Suppress affiliations below the author names. Does not suppress the affiliation in the correspondence note.

suppress-author-note

Suppress the entire author note

suppress-orcid

Suppress the author ORCID numbers

suppress-status-change-paragraph

Suppress the paragraph about status changes (affiliation changes and deceased authors)

suppress-disclosures-paragraph

Suppress the paragraph about disclosures (study registration, data sharing, related reports, conflicts of interest, financial support, statements of gratitude, and authorship agreements)

suppress-credit-statement

Suppress the credit statement

suppress-corresponding-paragraph

Suppress the entire correspondence paragraph

suppress-corresponding-group

Suppress the group in the correspondence address

suppress-corresponding-department

Suppress the department in the correspondence address

suppress-corresponding-affiliation-name

Suppress the name of the organization in the correspondence address

suppress-corresponding-address

Suppress the street address in the correspondence address

suppress-corresponding-city

Suppress the city in the correspondence address

suppress-corresponding-region

Suppress the region/state in the correspondence address

suppress-corresponding-postal-code

Suppress the postal code in the correspondence address

suppress-corresponding-country

Suppress the country in the correspondence address

suppress-corresponding-email

Suppress the email address in the correspondence address

suppress-abstract

Suppress the abstract. In the .pdf document, this will also suppress the keywords.

suppress-impact-statement

Suppress the impact statement

suppress-keywords

Suppress the keywords below the abstract

suppress-supplemental-materials

Suppress the supplemental materials line below the keywords

suppress-title-introduction

Suppress the title in the introduction

Language Options

You can alter the names of Abstract, Figures, Tables, and References by setting the lang field to one of these languages:

Code Language
en English
zh Chinese
es Spanish
fr French
ja Japanese
de German
pt Portuguese
ru Russian
cs Czech
fi Finnish
nl Dutch
it Italian
pl Polish
ko Korean

However, there are a few options that are specific to apaquarto and thus were not anticipated by Quarto.

citation-last-author-separator

Default: and

APA-style in-text citations with multiple authors are separated by commas with the appropriate translation of the word and before the last author.

citation-masked-author

Default: Masked Author

The phrase to replace author names in masked citations.

citation-masked-date

Default: n.d.

The abbreviated translation for “no date” in masked citations

email

Default: Email

The translation for “Email” in correspondence note

citation-masked-title

Default: Masked Title

The abbreviated translation for “Masked Title” in masked citations

figure-table-note

Default: Note

The translation for “Note” in table and figure notes. If not set, Quarto’s translation of callout-note-title for lang is used.

title-block-author-note

Default: Author Note

The heading of the author note

title-block-correspondence-note

Default: Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to

The phrase introducing the correspondence note.

title-block-role-introduction

Default: Author roles were classified using the Contributor Role Taxonomy (CRediT; https://credit.niso.org/) as follows:

The phrase introducing the author roles.

title-impact-statement

Default: Impact Statement

The heading for the impact statement

title-supplemental-materials

Default: Supplemental materials

The phrase before the value of supplemental-materials

title-word-count

Default: Word Count

The phrase before the word count when word-count: true

references-meta-analysis

Default: References marked with an asterisk indicate studies included in the meta-analysis.

The sentence explaining that citations marked with an asterisk were studies in the meta-analysis.

figure-panel

Default: Panel

The word before the letter of each panel of a figure with sub-figures: Panel A, Panel B.

journal-volume

Default: Vol.

The abbreviation before the volume number in a journal masthead (journal mode).

journal-issue

Default: No.

The abbreviation before the issue number in a journal masthead (journal mode).

section-title-introduction

Default: Introduction

The heading apaquarto takes out when it opens the body, since APA does not label the introduction. Set it to the word your paper uses so that a heading in another language is recognised too.

All these options must be listed under the language field . For example, if we set the lang field to es (Spanish), the remaining options can also be set:

lang: es
language: 
  citation-last-author-separator: "y"
  citation-masked-author: "Cita Enmascarada"
  citation-masked-title: "Título Enmascarado"
  citation-masked-date: "n.f."
  title-block-author-note: "Nota de Autores"
  title-block-correspondence-note: "La correspondencia relativa a este artículo debe dirigirse a"
  title-block-role-introduction: "Los roles de autor se clasificaron utilizando la taxonomía de roles de colaborador (CRediT; https://credit.niso.org/) de la siguiente manera:"
  references-meta-analysis: "Las referencias marcadas con un asterisco indican estudios incluidos en el metanálisis."
  title-impact-statement: "Declaración de Impacto"
  title-word-count: "Recuento de Palabras"

In addition, many terms that are translated automatically can be overridden. The full list is here. For example, if I wanted “Figure” in figure captions to be “Plot” instead, I would specify the change like so:

language: 
  crossref-fig-title: "Plot"

Here are the language terms most likely to be used in apaquarto:

section-title-abstract

Default: Abstract

Abstract title

section-title-references

Default: References

References title

title-block-keywords

Default: Keywords

Keywords

crossref-fig-title

Default: Figure

Figure title prefix

crossref-tbl-title

Default: Table

Table title prefix

crossref-apx-prefix

Default: Appendix

Appendix title prefix

crossref-eq-prefix

Default: Equation

Equation title prefix

section-title-appendices

Default: Appendices

The word for the appendices as a group. In a dissertation it is the label over the appendices in the table of contents, in capitals, unless thesis-appendices says otherwise. apaquarto once spelled it section-title-appendixes, which still works.

crossref-lof-title

Default: List of Figures

The heading of the list of figures (list-of-figures).

crossref-lot-title

Default: List of Tables

The heading of the list of tables (list-of-tables).

toc-title-document

Default: Table of Contents

The heading of the table of contents (list-of-contents). Quarto’s English is “Table of contents”; apaquarto sets it in title case unless the document gives its own.