APA Referencing: Webpages, Blog Post, Social Media

If you are referencing information on a specific page of a website, you cite what you sight - you reference what you are looking at  (an individual webpage). If you use multiple webpages from a website, you have a separate entry for each webpage in your reference list.

In-text citation

• If directly quoting from a webpage with no page numbers, use a paragraph number, a section heading or both. Use para. short for paragraph
• If a group author is well-known, long or appears at least 3 times, abbreviate it for the 2nd and subesquent time. With the first in-text citation, the group author is spelled out in full followed by the abbreviation. The 2nd and subsequent times, use the abbreviation only

Reference list entry

• The author can be an individual or group author. If unsure, check the About us to find out more. Use the full name of a group author in the reference list
• Use the most specific date possible. If the date has "last updated", use that date 
• If no date is visible, use n.d. which stands for no date
• Do not use the copyright date from the webpage or website footer as this does not reflect when the information was published
• The title is in italics and uses sentence case where the first word of the main title, the first word of the subtitle and any proper nouns have a capital letter. Everything else is in lowercase
• The source is the website name followed by the URL. If the author and website name are the same, omit the site name from the source field to avoid repetition
• There is no full stop after the URL. The URL is hyperlinked. Use the full and direct URL to link to the website
• Most URLs do not include a retrieval date. Only include the date that you accessed the information if the content changes over time or is not archived e.g. Maps generated online, e.g. Retrieved May 31, 2021 from URL

In-Text citation

Reference list entry

• Reference list entries are arranged alphabetically by author
• If the same author writes multiple works in the same year, you move to the title and arrange the reference list entries alphabetically by the title (disregarding "A", "An" and "The" at the beginning of the title)
• You add a lowercase letter e.g. a, b, c, etc immediately after the year in your reference list
• It is the alphabetical order of titles in the reference list that determines which lowercase letter is next to the date in your in-text citation
• When there is no date, use n.d. and add a hyphen before the lowercase letters

New Zealand government departments/organisations are known by both their English and Māori names. You can either use one name (i.e. Manatū Hauora) or the other (i.e. Ministry of Health) or use both, separated by an en dash to denote equal weighting e.g. Manatū Hauora-Ministry of Health.  

Which ever name you use, it is important to be consistent throughout your assignment and use the same format for your in-text citation and the reference list entry.

In-text citation

Reference list entry

In-text citation

Reference list entry

• Blog posts follow the same format as newspapers or magazine articles e.g. Author. (Most specific date possible). Title of blog post. Name of blog site. URL
• The name of the blog site is in italics.

Use social media (FaceBook, X, Instagram, Reddit etc) as a source only when the content was originally published there (see examples below).

If you used social media to discover content e.g. you found a link to a blog post on Pinterest or X, and you want to cite the content, cite it directly i.e. you cite the original blog, not Pinterest or X. It is not necesssary to mention that you found the information through a link on social media.

Facebook post

In-text citation

Reference list entry

• The author is the name associated with the account
• Use the specific date of the post
• Provide the first 20 words of the Facebook post as the title. Count and include links, hastags and emojis as a word
• If images, videos, thumbnail links etc are included in the post, place this information in square brackets after the title
• Place a description of the format in square brackets e.g [Post] [Status update] etc
• The site name is Facebook and is placed in the source field followed by the URL of the post
• If the content is from a private or friend-only page, reference as personal communication with an in-text citation and no entry in the reference list

Facebook page

In-text citation

Reference list entry

• Use the most specific date possible.  If not available, use n.d. for no date
• Use the title of the page (Home, About etc) followed by [Facebook page]
• The site name is Facebook and is placed in the source field followed by the URL of the post
• If the content is likely to change, include the date the information was accessed e.g. Retrieved May 10, 2021, from https://www.facebook.com/helenclarknz/about

In-text citation

Reference list entry

• The twitter handle follows the author information. It has an @ and is in square brackets 
• Have the most specific date possible
• The title is the content of the post up to the first 20 words.  Indicate in brackets if there are thumbnail links, videos, images etc
• Follow the title with a description of the format [Tweet]
• Social media posts can contain hashtags, links, emojis, etc. Replicate the emoji or give a description in square brackets e.g. [Smiling face emoji]
• The site name is Twitter followed by the URL of the tweet

LinkedIn post

In-text citation

Reference list entry

• Author is the name associated with the account
• Use the date provided on the post
• Provide the first 20 words of the post as the title. Count and include links, hastags and emojis as a word
• If images, videos, thumbnail links etc are included in the post, place this information in square brackets after the title
• Place a description of the format in square brackets [Post].
• The site name is LinkedIn and is placed in the source field followed by the URL

LinkedIn profile

In-text citation

Reference list entry

• If the profile is private or friend-only, the content is not accessible to everyone. Therefore, reference as personal communication with an in-text citation and no entry in the reference list
• If the profile is public, provide the date the content was accessed as it will change overtime and is not archived, followed by the URL of the page

Instagram photo or video, painting

In-text citation

Reference list entry

• The author can be an individual or a group, followed by @ the instagram handle and is in square brackets 
• Have the most specific date possible
• The title is the content of the post up to the first 20 words
• Follow the title with a description of the format [Video] [Photograph] [Painting]
• Social media posts can contain hashtags, links, emojis, etc. Replicate the emoji or give a description in square brackets e.g. [Smiling face emoji]
• The site name is Instagram followed by the URL 

Instagram highlight

In-text citation

Reference list entry

• Use n.d. for the date; although each story within a highlight is dated, the highlight is not dated and may include stories with many different dates
• Highlights can change over time so include a date it was accessed i.e. Retrieved January 6, 2020, from https://www...
• Shorten the URL if long and complex

• If the real name is known use it followed by the username in square brackets. Do not include u/ before the username
• The title is the content of the post up to the first 20 words
• Follow the title with a description of the format [Online forum post]
• The site name is included in the source field followed by the URL

TikTok video

In-text citation

Reference list entry

• The TikTok handle follows the author information. It has an @ and is in square brackets 
• Have the most specific date possible
• The title is the content of the post up to the first 20 words.  Indicate in brackets if there are thumbnail links, videos, images etc
• Follow the title with a description of the format [Video]
• The site name is TikTok followed by the URL of the video

TikTok profile

In-text citation

Reference list entry

• TikTok has no homepage so use the first 20 words of the description for the title
• Follow the title with a description of the format [TikTok profile]
• The site name is TikTok followed by the URL of the page
• Include the retrieval date as the content will change over time and is not archived 

Key Changes between APA 6th and APA 7th edition (University of Auckland)

Paraphrasing Author(s) Multiple Times in a Paragraph 

Whitireia/WelTec Learning Support Guides

Assignment Writing - Covers plagiarism, paraphrasing

Tūāpapa Online Study Hub Modules. To access go to Moodle:

Click here if you are a Whitireia student. 

Click here if you are a Weltec student. 

• Log in if prompted
• Click Academic Communication, then Introduction to APA and Plagiarism & Academic Integrity

Referencing Tools 

APA Interactive, Massey University

APA Style Blog

Referencite, University of Auckland

Referencing software

Mendeley 

Zotero

Plagiarism

Avoiding plagiarism guide 

Hill, D. J. (2015). A beginners' guide to plagiarism: What is plagiarism and how can you avoid it? Ako Aotearoa.  https://ako.ac.nz/assets/Knowledge-centre/RHPF-c57-A-beginners-guide-to-plagiarism/PRACTICAL-GUIDE-BOOK-A-Beginners-Guide-to-Plagiarism.pdf