Citing personal communication

If we have obtained material from having interviewed someone, from having had an email conversation, or having recorded a conversation or an incident, generally that material we have gathered ourselves is considered to be not 'discoverable'. This is because - unless we make something public by uploading it - say, to social media - No one else can hear or watch that material we have collected. 

This list of undiscoverable materials could include any of the following: "emails, text messages, online chats or direct messages, personal interviews, telephone conversations, live speeches, nonarchived social media livestreams (e.g., Instagram Live, Twitter Spaces), unrecorded webinars, unrecorded classroom lectures, memos, letters, messages from nonarchived discussion groups or online bulletin boards," or a "lecture [which] contained original content not published elsewhere" (APA Style Blog, 2022).

However, if we use that material in an assignment, in a conference presentation, or want to include it in a paper, we still need to show where our information has come from: we need to provide a map back to our source. 

For example, if we wrote (and honouring the theorists whose work we are drawing on, by providing a map back to those sources as we go):

The inheritance metaphor (Inkson et al., 2015) appears to have steered many of J's broader family career choices, with an apparent family pattern in seeking to make a difference in people's lives. Considering J's career, inherited values appear to have shaped their career trajectory, with public service training and roles such as medic, nursing and firefighting forming three key career phases. 

...,we have no idea where this information about 'J' comes from. As the reader we wouldn't know if this is the writer's opinion, or if J actually said these things. So we flag our sources, by showing where J said things:

The inheritance metaphor (Inkson et al., 2015) appears to have steered many of J's broader family career choices, with an apparent family pattern in seeking to make a difference in people's lives (J, personal communication, 20 March 2024). Considering J's career, inherited values appear to have shaped their career trajectory, with public service training and roles such as medic, nursing and firefighting (J, personal communication, 20 March, 27 March 2024) forming three key career phases. 

Please note from the example above that there are two dates cited. If we have met with our source more than once, we cite each meeting separately - for example: (J, Personal Communication, 20 March 2024) and (J, Personal Communication, 27 March 2024). 

While we will paraphrase anyone we get information from more than 90% of the time, we can also quote our personal communication source, just as we would normally do: by using double quote marks. Their actual words may add a clearer flavour of who they are, or what their thinking is. If we are using a sound or video file, we could add a time stamp in the American fashion for time notation, using a full colon (J, Personal Communication, 20 March 2024, 15:46).

Personal communication is not added to our reference list, as we said at the outset of this post, the material is not discoverable by anyone else.

I hope that helps!

Sam

References:

APA Style Blog. (2014, January 17). Timestamps for Audiovisual Materials in APA Style. https://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/2014/01/timestamps-for-audiovisual-materials-in-apa-style.html

APA Style Blog. (2022, November 7). Personal Communication. https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/personal-communications

Inkson, K., Dries, N., & Arnold, J. (2015). Understanding Careers (2nd ed.). SAGE Publications Ltd.