Every report, dissertation, thesis requires proper formatting and editing. Not just for the cause of getting published or obtaining better grades, proper formatting is required to make the customers more involved in reading and proper citations to help the reader. There are many reference styles that are used but there are few which are prominently used. Some of them are American Psychological Association (APA) style, Chicago Manual of Style, Modern Language Association of America (MLA) style and Harvard style. Apart from these there are many other styles like American Chemical Society (ACS) style, American Medical Association (AMA) style, Australian Guide to Legal Citation etc. Different report requires different standard styles based on the requirement and particular school the report is being submitted. Different journals require different formatting styles and that can be checked with the editor or on the journals’ website.
The APA style is being used by people who work in the areas of psychology, education, and other social sciences. Literature, arts, and humanities scholars and students use MLA style for their reports. AMA style is used for medicine, health, and biological sciences reports, articles and thesis. A Turabian style is most commonly used by students for their research papers. Non scholarly publications like magazines, books, newspapers and other publications. There is no mandatory rule that everyone has to follow one style or the other. It all depends on the journal that the writer is targeting or trying get his report published. Different countries have different styles. Some of the major countries having their own citation styles are Australia, Canada, United States and United Kingdom.
Formatting is followed to maintain consistency and attract the reader and make him/her involved in the report. By providing citations, quotes confusion among the readers can be eliminated and right sources of information can be provided.