ASA Format in Google Docs: Complete 2026 Guide

ASA format trips up sociology students for a specific reason: it looks almost like APA at a glance, but the differences — in how you cite sources, how you format the title page, and how entries appear on the References page — are exactly where instructors look first. A paper that feels almost right is still wrong, and most of those errors are invisible until someone grades the submission.

This guide walks through every part of the American Sociological Association format inside Google Docs, from the blank page to a submission-ready PDF. Each step explains what to click and why the rule exists, so you can catch your own mistakes without re-reading the ASA Style Guide every time you open the document.

1. Document Foundation: Font, Margins, and Spacing

Start with a blank Google Doc. Using an existing template or copying from a previous paper drags in hidden formatting that causes problems later — a font that looks right but is one size off, or paragraph spacing that seems fine until you print.

Font and size

1. Press Ctrl+A (Windows) or Cmd+A (Mac) to select all text.
2. Open the font dropdown and choose Times New Roman.
3. Set the size to 12 pt.

Times New Roman 12 pt is the ASA standard. The style guide permits other readable serif fonts, but Times New Roman is what sociology instructors and journal editors expect. Deviating from it invites questions about whether you read the formatting requirements at all.

Margins

1. Go to File > Page setup.
2. Set all four margins — top, bottom, left, right — to 1.25 inches.
3. Click OK.

ASA specifies 1.25-inch margins on all sides, which is wider than APA's 1-inch standard. This is the most common margin mistake. If your default is 1 inch, change it now before writing anything.

Line spacing

1. Go to Format > Line & paragraph spacing > Double.
2. From the same menu, click Remove space after paragraph.

That second step is essential. Google Docs adds extra space between paragraphs by default, which makes an ASA paper look like a business email rather than an academic submission. Double-spacing should be the only spacing at work.

2. Title Page and Running Header

ASA requires a separate title page. Unlike MLA — where the heading block lives at the top of page one — ASA puts all author and course information on a standalone first page and starts the body on page two.

Build the title page

In the body of the document (not the header), center-align and add these elements, each on its own line, double-spaced:

Keep the title in plain 12 pt Times New Roman — no bold, no larger size. The word count line is optional but often required by instructors. After the last line, insert a page break (Ctrl+Enter / Cmd+Enter) to push the abstract onto page two.

Add the running header

1. Go to Insert > Headers & footers > Header.
2. Check Different first page in the header options panel that appears on the right.
3. On page two and beyond, right-align the header and type a short version of your title in all caps: SOCIAL MEDIA AND POLITICAL POLARIZATION.
4. Add a tab space and then go to Insert > Page numbers to insert an automatic page number.
5. Verify the number updates automatically when you scroll to page three.

The short title in the running header should be 50 characters or fewer. Never type page numbers manually — they don't update when text shifts and will mismatch after any editing.

3. The Abstract

The abstract sits on its own page, between the title page and the body. It summarizes the paper in 150–200 words and gives the reader enough to decide whether the full paper is relevant to their research.

Set up the abstract page

1. After the title page break, center-align and type Abstract in plain 12 pt Times New Roman — no bold, no colon.
2. Drop one line and return to left alignment.
3. Write the abstract as a single unindented paragraph (ASA does not indent the abstract).
4. Keep it to 150–200 words. Many instructors treat 201 words as an immediate deduction.
5. Add a page break after the abstract before the body begins.

A strong ASA abstract covers four things in order: the research question, the data or method, the key findings, and the broader significance. Write it last, after the paper is complete, so the summary matches what's actually in the body.

4. The Body and In-Text Citations

Paragraph formatting

Indent the first line of every body paragraph by 0.5 inches. Press Tab at the start of each paragraph — Google Docs defaults to a 0.5-inch tab stop. Never use the spacebar to create an indent; it looks wrong in print and breaks when anyone edits the doc.

Section headings are allowed in longer ASA papers. First-level headings go centered and bold. Second-level headings go left-aligned and bold. Third-level headings go indented, bold, and followed by a period before the text begins on the same line. Do not number your headings.

In-text citations

ASA uses an author–year system. The citation appears inside parentheses, with no comma between the author name and the year:

• One author: (Smith 2019)
• Two authors: (Smith and Jones 2019)
• Three or more authors: (Smith et al. 2019)
• Direct quote — include page: (Smith 2019:45) — note the colon before the page number, no space
• Author named in the sentence: According to Smith (2019), social capital declines when . . .
• Multiple sources in one citation: (Adams 2017; Baker 2020; Chen 2021) — alphabetical, separated by semicolons

The most common ASA citation error is using a comma between the author and the year, which is the APA style. ASA drops the comma entirely: (Smith 2019), not (Smith, 2019). Every in-text citation must have a matching full entry on the References page.

Quotations

Short quotes (fewer than 50 words) go inside double quotation marks within the running text, with the citation immediately after the closing quote mark before the period: “Social norms shape behavior in ways that individuals rarely notice” (Collins 2020:88).

Longer quotes (50 words or more) become block quotes. Start on a new line, indent the entire block 0.5 inches from the left margin, keep the text double-spaced, and omit the quotation marks. The citation goes after the closing punctuation: . . . end of quoted text. (Collins 2020:88)

5. The References Page

The References page comes at the end of the paper, on its own page. It lists every source cited in the body — nothing more, nothing less. Sources you read but didn't cite do not appear here.

Set up the References page

1. After the last paragraph of the body, insert a page break (Ctrl+Enter / Cmd+Enter).
2. Center-align and type References in plain 12 pt — no bold, no colon, no italics.
3. Return to left alignment and type or paste your entries.
4. Highlight all entries, go to Format > Align & indent > Indentation options, choose Hanging under Special indent, and set the value to 0.5 inch.
5. Alphabetize by the first author's last name.

ASA reference formats

The three formats you will use most often:

Book:

Journal article:

Website:

Notice three things across all formats: the year comes immediately after the author name (before the title), book and journal titles go in italics, and article titles go in quotation marks without italics. The page range for journal articles uses an en dash (–), not a hyphen.

6. Tables, Figures, and Appendices

Sociology papers often include data tables. ASA has specific rules for these that differ from the general body formatting.

• Tables are numbered consecutively (Table 1, Table 2) and placed as close as possible to the text that refers to them. The table number and a descriptive title appear above the table, left-aligned, in plain text.
• Figures (charts, graphs, diagrams) are also numbered consecutively but with their title below the figure, not above.
• Notes appear below tables and figures, labeled “Note:” in italics, followed by a non-italicized explanation.
• Appendices come after the References page, labeled Appendix A, Appendix B, etc., each starting on a new page.

Never paste an image of a table from another source. Recreate it in Google Docs using the built-in table tool so the formatting stays consistent with the rest of the paper. If you're pulling data from a report or dataset, cite the source in a note below the table.

7. Final Review and Submission

Group work and last-minute edits are where ASA formatting unravels. One person pastes text from a Word document and introduces a different font. Another accepts a suggested revision that resets the paragraph spacing. Do a formatting pass as the final step, after all the content is final.

• Select all (Ctrl+A / Cmd+A) and re-apply Times New Roman 12 pt to catch any stray fonts.
• When pasting any content, use Ctrl+Shift+V / Cmd+Shift+V to paste without formatting.
• Switch to Print layout (View > Print layout) and scroll through the whole paper looking for unexpected spacing, broken headers, or pages that start in the wrong place.
• Confirm the running header appears on every page except the title page.
• Check the References page: hanging indents intact, alphabetical order correct, page break holding.

Final submission checklist

• 1.25-inch margins on all sides
• Times New Roman, 12 pt throughout
• Double-spaced, no extra space between paragraphs
• Separate title page with all required elements
• Abstract on its own page, 150–200 words, no indent
• Short title + page number in the running header (not on title page)
• 0.5-inch first-line indent on every body paragraph
• No comma between author and year in in-text citations
• References on a new page with hanging indents and alphabetical order
• Every in-text citation matched to a References entry, and vice versa

Submit as a PDF unless your instructor asks for .docx. Go to File > Download > PDF Document (.pdf). Open the downloaded PDF and skim the title page, the first body page, and the References page. If anything shifted during export, fix it in the Doc and re-download.

Make the Writing Sound Like Yours

Clean ASA formatting can't compensate for writing that reads like it came from a language model. Sociology instructors review a lot of student papers and can usually tell when a section was drafted by AI — the phrasing is too even, the sentences vary less than human writing does, and the discipline-specific vocabulary gets deployed a little too smoothly.

AuraWrite AI rewrites AI-drafted text so it reads like your own voice — preserving your argument, your citations, and your structure — while reducing the patterns that AI detectors flag. Run the draft through the humanizer after writing, before you do the final formatting pass in Google Docs. The ASA setup stays exactly the same; the difference is the writing underneath.

Conclusion

ASA formatting in Google Docs is straightforward once you know the handful of ways it differs from APA. The 1.25-inch margins, the standalone title page, the no-comma citation style, and the colon-before-page-number pattern are the four things that catch students off guard. Get those right, apply the hanging indents on the References page, and keep the abstract under 200 words. Everything else follows from the standard double-spaced 12 pt Times New Roman setup.

Formatting is the frame. Once it's right, the analysis and the argument are all that's left between your draft and the grade.

Last updated: June 28, 2026