APA Guide

APA Sample Paper Plain Text

Header: For the paper, you'll want to have page numbers in the Header for the entire document that show in the upper-right corner of each page. To insert page numbers in Word, click on “Insert” tab, then click on “Page Number”. Choose “Top of Page” and then “Plain Number 3”. 

The First Page of Your Paper

A common characteristic of APA style papers is to include a title page. This will be the first page of your paper, and the comments below pertain to the title page. Center-align the title page information, beginning with the title of the paper. Each piece of information on the title page is on its own line. Unless otherwise noted, there are no additional spaces between lines.

Title: In APA, you typically don't put the title on the first line of the Title page. Instead, you will leave 3-4 blank lines before typing your title; however you still want the title in the upper half of the page. Capitalize all major words in the title. Bold the title. For example: Sample Paper in APA Format: Brendan Dassey Wrongly Convicted. Note: Title also appears centered at the top of the second page (first page of the body of your paper). 

Space Before Student/Author's Name: After the title, include 1 blank double-spaced line before typing the student or author's name who wrote the paper.

College information: After the student/author's name, for student papers, the next line lists the department and the college, separated by a comma. For example: Humanities & Languages Department, Spartanburg Community College

Course number & title: On the line after the name of the department and college, list the course number and title. Center-align this information. For example: ENG 101: English Composition

Instructor's name: On the line after the course number and title, list the instructor with credentials if known (Dr., PhD, MS, MA, RN, etc.). For example: Ms. Patricia Weeks, MA

Due Date: On the line after the instructor's name, list the due date as month (don't abbreviate) then day, followed by a comma and the year. For example: October 23, 2024.This is the final line of the title page.

After the due date, move to the second page of your paper.

The Second Page of Your Paper:

The body of your essay will begin on the second page after the Title page.

Title: Begin the page following the title page with the essay’s title. The title should be center-aligned and in bold font.

Essay format: On the very next line after the title, begin typing your essay. Indent the first line of each paragraph. There are no blank lines between paragraphs.

Section Headings: Use section headings as needed. Section headings appear on a line by themselves with no additional blank lines above or below. They are center-aligned and in bold font. Just like title, section headings capitalize all the major words. In the Sample Paper example, the student uses a heading after the introductory paragraph.

Thesis: This is an example of a thesis statement. The thesis statement often appears as the last sentence in your first paragraph and states the stance the student has taken and provides the reasons for the stance that will be discussed in the body of the paper.

For example: Brendan Dassey was one of these young people with intellectual challenges, who was unjustly found guilty of murder after a false confession was coerced and fed to him even though there was no physical evidence linking him to the crime.

Formatting titles: When you include titles in the text of your essay or in an in-text citation, follow the rules on our Formatting Titles guide. This example uses the title of a journal and therefore should be italicized and written in "Title Case." This is also an example of a narrative in-text citation with a single author and no page numbers.

For example: In the Berkeley Journal of International Law, Megan Annitto (2018) shared evidence from an expert on false confession and police questioning tactics who testified in Dassey’s defense.

References: Include a list of references or sources used on a separate page at the end of your paper. The sources should be in APA format, listed alphabetically with a hanging indent.

When you include information from outside sources, you will either paraphrase or quote the information. See examples of both below.

Paraphrase example: you must use citations for paraphrases as well as direct quotes in the body of your paper. The following sentence is a paraphrase and includes an in-text citation for a source with 2 authors & no page numbers where the student uses paragraph numbers instead.

For example: Police interrogation tactics can lead to false confessions, and young people with intellectual disabilities are especially vulnerable to this tactic (LaVigne & Miles, 2019, para. 22)

Direct Quote example: This is an example of using a direct quote from your source word-for-word, where you have to put quotation marks around the quote and use brackets around any words you have made a small changes to to make the sentence make sense (in this example the original quote had the word 'give' which we changed to 'gave' so that the grammar is correct. This is also an example of an in-text citation with a single author, a copyright range for the date, and no page numbers where paragraph numbers have been used instead.

For example: Unfortunately, this is too common an occurrence. In a similar scenario, a psychologist testified that 17-year-old Jesse Misskelley “[gave] police a ‘false statement’ when he could ‘no longer stand the strain of the interrogation’” (Linder, 1995-2024, paras. 8-10).

In APA there are two ways to include in-text citations: parenthetical in-text citations at the end of a sentence and narrative citations which are worked into the sentence. See examples of both below.

Parenthetical in-text citation: When the author/title is not mentioned in the sentence, include the author’s last name(s)/organization name, year, and (when applicable) page or paragraph numbers in parenthesis before the period at the end of the sentence. This in-text citation example has a one author and page numbers.

For example: Dassey’s lawyer failed to defend him adequately against his false confession (Annitto, 2018, pp. 190-191).

Narrative in-text citation: When the author or title is mentioned in the sentence, place the publication year in parenthesis directly after the author's name or the title. For narrative citations, you'll include any page numbers or paragraph numbers at the end of the sentence in parenthesis using the abbreviated p. for page or pp. for a range. In the below example, the source has one author and page numbers (it's the same source as the parenthetical example above).

For example: In the Berkeley Journal of International Law, Megan Annitto (2018) shared evidence from an expert on false confession and police questioning tactics who testified in Dassey’s defense. The expert testified that the confession was coerced, citing a lot of inaccuracies in the statement and calling it “highly contaminated” (p. 194).

Your in-text citations will differ depending on how many authors you have, if you have a group author, if you have page numbers or paragraph numbers, and if you have a publication date. See examples below. 

1 Author: This in-text citation example has a one author and page numbers.

For example: Dassey’s lawyer failed to defend him adequately against his false confession (Annitto, 2018, pp. 190-191).

2 Authors: This example includes an in-text citation for a source with 2 authors & no page numbers where the student uses paragraph numbers instead.

For example: Police interrogation tactics can lead to false confessions, and young people with intellectual disabilities are especially vulnerable to this tactic (LaVigne & Miles, 2019, para. 22)

3 or more authors: If you have 3 or more authors, for the in-text citation, you will use last name of first author followed by 'et al.' in the format (Last Name et al., Year, p. Pages). The et al. takes the place of the other authors so that you do not have to list them all. The example below also has an odd page number, e1314, but you still include it. 

For example: The National Registry of Exonerations reported in 2020 that “of over 3000 exonerations, estimates… suggest that 12% of all known wrongful convictions involved a false confession” (Catlin et al., 2023, p. e1314).

Group author: This is an example with a group author, such as an organization or company. Additionally, it shows how to cite a source without a clear publication date.

For example: In part because of the widespread evidence that his confession was false, Brendan Dassey’s case has been taken up by several innocence projects, including one at the Northwestern Pritzker School of Law (Bluhm Legal Clinic, n.d.).

No Page Numbers Needed: This is an example of a narrative in-text citation with a single author where no page numbers were needed. Visit our In-text Citation guide for more information on when to include page and paragraph numbers, and when they are not needed.

For example: In the Berkeley Journal of International Law, Megan Annitto (2018) shared evidence from an expert on false confession and police questioning tactics who testified in Dassey’s defense.

Paragraph Numbers instead of Page Numbers: When your citation needs page numbers, but they aren't available, use paragraph numbers. Visit our In-text Citation guide for more information on when to include page and paragraph numbers, and when they are not needed. The example below is of an in-text citation for a source with a single author & no page number where paragraph numbers have been used instead. Also note that some instructors require students to count and add paragraphs when there are no page numbers. Note - this example also has one author and a date range for the years.

For example: Unfortunately, this is too common an occurrence. In a similar scenario, a psychologist testified that 17-year-old Jesse Misskelley “[gave] police a ‘false statement’ when he could ‘no longer stand the strain of the interrogation’” (Linder, 1995-2024, paras. 8-10).

No Date: This is an example without a clear publication date. Use the abbreviation n.d. instead of the date. This is also an example with a group author, such as an organization or company.

For example: In part because of the widespread evidence that his confession was false, Brendan Dassey’s case has been taken up by several innocence projects, including one at the Northwestern Pritzker School of Law (Bluhm Legal Clinic, n.d.).