APA Style Guide for Citations and Student Papers: Online Resources

Online article

Wu, J. (2020, January 16). Does social media cause depression? Scientific American. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/does-social-media-cause-depression/

Online government publication

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2019). Alcohol use and your health. https://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/fact-sheets/alcohol-use.htm

Online video

Bozeman Science. (2019, July 16). Asking scientific questions [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-VbOOlR52w

Online book

Fitzgerald, F. S. (1920). This side of paradise. http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/805

Article with no publication date

Remembering the 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire. (n.d.). http://trianglefire.ilr.cornell.edu/story/introduction.html

Example for an Occupational Outlook Handbook citation

U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2020). High school teachers. In Occupational outlook handbook. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/education-training-and-library/high-school-teachers.htm  

Example of Texas Reality Check citation

Texas Workforce Commission Labor Market & Career Information Department. (2016). Total expenses [Personalized expenses results]. https://texasrealitycheck.com/TotalExpenses

Example of O*Net citation

U. S. Department of Labor. (2019). Accountants. O*Net Online. https://www.onetonline.org/link/summary/13-2011.01

Example of CareerOneStop citation

U. S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration. (n.d.) Registered nurses. Careeronestop. Retrieved on March 5, 2021 from https://www.careeronestop.org/Toolkit/Careers/Occupations/occupation-profile.aspxkeyword=Registered%20Nurses&onetcode=29114100&location=Houston,%20TX

Example of VolunteerMatch citation

RSVP of Southeast Texas. (2020, February 4). Helping a young mind. VolunteerMatch. https://www.volunteermatch.org/search/opp1698386.jsp

Example of CNN Money Cost of Living Comparison

CNN Money. (2021, January). Cost of living: How far will my salary go in another city? [Cost of living comparison]. https://money.cnn.com/calculator/pf/cost-of-living/index.html

APA provides detailed guidance on citing use of generative AI such as ChatGPT or Gemini. There are a few things you should consider when using AI tools:

• Always cite any information, images, or ideas you use in your work that are generated by AI.
• Be sure to talk with your professor about using AI tools and understand their policies on their use.
• Be open about your use of AI tools and provide details about how you used them. Consider including notes in parts of your paper detailing how used used AI.
• If the AI tool cites its sources or provides citations, always check those sources for validity.

The APA citation on a references page (featured below) does not include information specific to the prompt you entered into the AI tool. Ideally, you will work the prompt and AI generated content into the body of your paper and conclude it with an in-text citation. See "How to cite ChatGPT" on the APA website for examples.

Suggested basic format

AI Company Name. (year, month day). Title of prompt in italics [Description of source]. Tool Name/Model. URL.

Examples of AI citation

OpenAI. (2025, October 5). Summarize the book Seven Habits of Highly Effective People [Generative AI chat]. ChatGPT. https://chatgpt.com/share/68a77b60-0ee4-800c-9acc-cd3fd573c311

Creating citations for web articles or webpages can be challenging. This is because there are far fewer standards for putting information on the internet, than there are for works that go through traditional publishing channels.

You may find that articles you find online are often missing authors and publication dates. Here is what to do.

• If there are no individuals listed as the author, and the website belongs to an organization or government agency, the organization or government agency might be appropriate to include in the author field.
• If there is not a clear author, leave the field blank. Your citation will start with the work's title.
• If there is no publication date, put n.d.

There is a connection between lack of information about a resource and the quality of that resource. If you find that you are missing more than one piece of information, go back and evaluate your resource for quality.