How do you write an interview in apa format

As a social scientist, interviews can transform your writing and research projects from merely current to cutting edge. The American Psychological Association citation format is the most commonly accepted writing style guide for the social sciences and involves concise in-text citations accompanied by full reference list at your paper's conclusion. Knowing how to introduce and to cite these personal or published exchanges can help you ensure you are both properly crediting your sources and reinforcing the validity of your claims.

Interview Introduction

Including an interview in your writing begins with stating the reasons for its inclusion. You can outline, for example, why you chose certain interviewees and how your questions relate to the overall research problem you are attempting to answer in your writing. It is important to be precise in your recounting of an interview, including such information as the number of questions asked, the duration of your interview, whether you communicated by phone, email or other method, and how your interviewee’s responses impacted your own analysis.

Quoting Interview Excerpts

You can both paraphrase and extract direct quotations from your interviews to support your written arguments. Direct citations under 40 words in length can be enclosed in a paragraph with quotation marks. However, the APA manual mandates that any quotes over 40 words in length must be formatted as a block quote. These extended quotes must commence on a new line, omit quotation marks and be set apart from the paragraph with a half-inch indent.

Citing Published Interviews

Referencing an interview already transcribed in a magazine or journal or one published online as an audio file requires you to cite it as you would an article from one of those sources. For example, citing a interview in a print magazine would require an in-text citation of the author’s name, followed by the date of publication. The corresponding reference list inclusion would read as follows: Author’s Last Name, First Name. (Year, Month Day Published). Interview title. Magazine title (in italics), page number(s). When citing an interview audio file, the reference page listing would read as follows: Author’s Last Name, First Name (Year, Month Day Published), Interview title (in italics) [audio file type]. Retrieved from www.nameofwebsite.com.

Citing Self-Conducted or Unpublished Interviews

Interviews you conduct yourself and others that remain unpublished are considered "not recoverable," meaning you cannot retrieve this data as you would any other published source. This means that, while you need to reference your interview with an in-text citation, you should not include it in your reference list. Your in-text citation for unpublished interviews should include the name of the person interviewed, the mode of communication -- such as personal, phone or email communication -- and the date that the interview was conducted.

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How to Reference an Interview in APA

Use the following template to cite an interview using the APA citation format. We also provide style guides for the MLA and Chicago styles. To have your bibliography or works cited list automatically made for you, check out our free APA citation maker.

Once you’re finished with your citations, we can also help you with creating an APA title page.

Important Note on Personal Interviews:

• A personal interview should NOT be included in a reference list in APA. They are not considered recoverable data (they cannot be found by a researcher). You should reference personal interviews as in-text citations instead.
• Example: (J. Doe, personal communication, December 12, 2004)

That being said, there is a general structure if you want to cite a personal interview as part of your APA works cited list:

Author, A. (Year, Month Date). Interview type.

APA format example:

Marino, B. (2014, October 18). Personal Interview.

For more information on how to cite in APA, check out the APA Style Guide.

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“Half of my life is an act of revision.” – John Irving

How do I format an in-text citation for a personal interview in APA style?

As per Sections 8.7 and 8.9 of the APA Publication Manual, 7th edition, personal interviews are treated as personal communication. Since personal communication cannot be recovered by readers, APA recommends using personal communication only when a recoverable source of communication is not available.

And since personal communications cannot be recovered by readers, they are also not included in the reference list. Instead, the in-text citation for personal communication, including personal interviews, is much more detailed than other APA in-text citations.

When citing a personal interview in an in-text citation, include the first initial and surname of the person interviewed, “personal communication,” and the full date of the interview, rather than just the year.

The following templates and examples show how to cite a personal interview in an in-text citation in APA style.

Templates:

Narrative citation: Interviewee’s First Initial Surname (personal communication, Month Day Year)

Parenthetical citation: (Interviewee’s First Initial Surname, personal communication, Month Day Year)

Examples:

Narrative citation: A.J. Forrester (personal communication, May 9, 2014)

Parenthetical citation: (A.J. Forrester, personal communication, May 9, 2014)

How do I format a reference list entry for a personal interview in APA style?

Personal interviews should be treated the same way as personal communications, since neither can be recovered by readers. Since these sources cannot be retrieved, there is no need to provide an entry for them in the reference list. A personal interview should just have an in-text citation and NOT an accompanying reference list entry.

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