APA Format Example: Sample Paper, Title Page & References
This guide is a worked APA format example: a full pass through the parts of an APA 7 paper — title page, headings, in-text citations, and references — with each piece shown the way the Publication Manual (American Psychological Association, 2020) actually prescribes. It is meant as a model you can hold your own draft against. For the rule-by-rule explanations behind each example, see the full APA citation guide; this page stays focused on showing rather than telling.
The shortest version: a bold-title page, double spacing everywhere, 0.5-inch first-line indents, author–date in the text, and an alphabetized References page with a hanging indent.
The title page
APA 7 has two title-page formats. The student version is the one most coursework uses; the professional version adds a running head for manuscripts headed to a journal.
A student title page carries six stacked, centered elements in the upper-middle of the page, all double-spaced:
| Element | Example |
|---|---|
| Paper title (bold, title case) | Working Memory and Reading Comprehension in Adolescents |
| Author name | Maria S. Chen |
| Affiliation | Department of Psychology, University of Michigan |
| Course | PSY 305: Cognitive Development |
| Instructor | Dr. Helena Ruiz |
| Due date | October 14, 2025 |
The only thing in the header is the page number, flush right, starting at 1 on the title page. Student papers do not need a running head in APA 7 — that requirement was dropped. A professional paper adds a running head: a shortened title in all capitals, left-aligned in the header opposite the page number (for example, WORKING MEMORY AND READING). For a step-by-step build of every title-page element, see the dedicated APA title page guide.
Headings
APA 7 defines five heading levels, distinguished by placement and type style rather than by number. The most common in a short paper are the first two or three.
| Level | Format |
|---|---|
| 1 | Centered, Bold, Title Case |
| 2 | Flush Left, Bold, Title Case |
| 3 | Flush Left, Bold Italic, Title Case |
Do not label a heading “Introduction” — the opening section after the title is understood to be the introduction and simply begins with the paper title repeated in bold at the top of the first body page. Headings never get numbered, and every level uses title case.
In-text citations
APA’s in-text citations are author–date. The same source can appear two ways: parenthetical, with the author and year in parentheses, or narrative, with the author in the sentence and the year in parentheses right after the name.
One author, parenthetical: Working memory capacity correlates with reading comprehension across age groups (Chen, 2021).
One author, narrative: Chen (2021) found that working memory capacity correlates with reading comprehension across age groups.
Two authors, narrative: Lin and Patel (2022) argue that cross-modal attention emerges earlier than previously believed.
Three or more authors, parenthetical: The effect held across every grade tested (Goldstein et al., 2024).
Direct quote (page number required): Working memory is “a flexible mental workspace, not a fixed bin of slots” (Chen, 2021, p. 47).
Note the small differences: a parenthetical two-author citation uses an ampersand (Lin & Patel, 2022), while the narrative form spells out and. Page numbers are required only for direct quotes; a paraphrase needs just the author and year.
The references list
The References page starts on its own page with the word References centered and bold at the top. Entries are alphabetized by the first author’s surname, the whole page is double-spaced, and each entry uses a 0.5-inch hanging indent so continuation lines sit indented under the first.
The references below cover the source types you are most likely to need, each formatted exactly as APA 7 prescribes:
| Source type | Reference list entry |
|---|---|
| Book (single author) | Chen, M. S. (2021). The architecture of working memory. Cambridge University Press. |
| Chapter in edited book | Lin, D. K., & Patel, H. J. (2022). Cross-modal attention in early development. In R. T. Morrison (Ed.), Handbook of developmental cognition (pp. 142–168). Routledge. |
| Journal article with DOI | Goldstein, A., Ramanathan, P., & O’Connor, L. (2024). Sleep consolidation effects on procedural learning in adolescents. Journal of Cognitive Development, 19(2), 87–104. https://doi.org/10.1037/cogdev0000412 |
| Web article (no DOI) | Alvarez, S. (2023, March 12). How working memory predicts reading comprehension. Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/working-memory-reading-comprehension |
| Government report | U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences. (2023). Reading proficiency and learning loss in U.S. fourth-graders, 2019–2022 (NCES 2023-145). National Center for Education Statistics. https://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=2023145 |
A few details to copy. Article and chapter titles use sentence case — only the first word, the first word after a colon, and proper nouns are capitalized — and are not italicized. Book titles are also sentence case but are italicized, while the journal name uses title case and is italicized. The journal volume is italicized but the issue number in parentheses is not. Page ranges use an en dash (87–104), not a hyphen. DOIs appear as full https://doi.org/... links with no “Retrieved from” prefix. Publishers carry no city or state in APA 7. For the reasoning behind each of these, and for the journal-article rules in depth, see the main APA guide.
Putting it together
A finished APA 7 paper reads, in order: title page, optional abstract, body with bold level-1 headings, then the References page. Every page is double-spaced in a legible font — 12-point Times New Roman or 11-point Calibri are both fine — with 1-inch margins and a page number in the top-right header throughout.
If you would rather not assemble the brackets, hanging indents, and en dashes by hand, paste a URL or DOI into the generator and it will produce APA 7 references in this exact format, ready to drop onto your References page.