Smallbone Library: Citing and Referencing (APA): Social media

In general, the rules for citing social media sources in APA format are:

To cite a public post from social media, use the first 20 words of the post as a title, include the date it was posted and a URL, and mention the author’s username if they have one:

Dorsey, J. [@jack]. (2018, March 1). We’re committing Twitter to help increase the collective health, openness, and civility of public conversation, and to hold ourselves publicly [Tweet]. Twitter. https://twitter.com/jack/status/969234275420655616

To cite content from social media that is not publicly accessible (e.g. direct messages, posts from private groups or user profiles), cite it as a personal communication in the text, but do not include it in the reference list:

When contacted online, the minister stated that the project was proceeding “according to plan” (R. James, Twitter direct message, March 25, 2017).

Details above from www.scribbr.com. If you need to cite a source that you don't think fits this, please contact Mrs Breag who will investigate further.

IB students must make sure they refer to the "Documentation Checklist" (p.14) and "Elements to be Included in a Reference" (p.16-17) in Effective Citing and Referencing (IBO, 2020) throughout the writing process, and when proofreading their work. This supersedes any requirements of APA (but any major differences will be clearly noted in this LibGuide).