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Just refer to this appendix the first time you quote from it, e.g. You don’t need to include a citation when quoting your research participants, but the transcript or responses you’re quoting from should usually be included in an appendix. Quotes from your research participants, such as interviewees and survey respondents, are treated slightly differently from personal communications. Richards, comment in a private Facebook group, April 25, 2018). Members of the online community followed the controversy closely, with one user referring to it as a “media circus” (G.
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Other social media content should also be cited as personal communication if it is not public – that is, if it can only be accessed by members of a specific group or friends of a specific user:
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Private messages on social media are always personal communications. Johnson, email, March 5, 2019).ĭuring the performance, the term “Anthropocene” was used repeatedly (J. When contacted for comment, Johnson stated that the controversy was “absurd” (H. If it’s relevant or important to the reader’s understanding, you can specify the type of communication involved: Davidson, personal communication, January 12, 2017) When citing a personal communication in your text, you only need to give the person’s initials and last name, the words “personal communication,” and the date of the communication in parentheses: Private conversations, emails, letters and messages Some common examples of sources that should be treated as personal communications include: The point of a reference list is to allow the reader to find your sources, so inaccessible sources do not belong there. members of a particular institution or online community).īecause the reader cannot look up these sources independently, APA Style states that it is not appropriate to include them in a reference list. Smith, personal communication, July 15, 2015).Ī personal communication is any source you refer to that the reader will not be able to access-either because it was not recorded, is deliberately kept private for reasons of confidentiality, or is accessible only to a specific group (e.g.
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Personal communications are cited in the text, but not included in the reference list.Īnother researcher stated that the results so far looked “very promising” (A. In APA Style, a personal communication is any source that is not accessible to your readers. Citing personal communications in APA Style
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