Hi Karl,

An interesting question - and one that I have not thought about until now - so thanks for that.

I agree that a blog source is just as credible as a web-page source - assuming that it has the same credentials and scrutiny as a 'professional' site and source that has been through some sort of internal auditing process. This can be done with blogs, vlogs etc and could count as 'peer review'.

I think that the 'form' of peer review has to be rationalised and justified. A personal blog that is just a single-source 'lay' opinion forum is probably not considered peer-reviewed - especially if few people access it and comment. If it has more robust credentials, as I suspect yours would, then it could be presented as peer review. The fact that it isn't 'official' journal peer-review shouldn't matter too much - in that official peer-review ranges from the outright dodgy to the extreme anally retentive. It is highly variable from source to source.

On your last point - I would not mind a student citing your blog in an assignment/thesis - but there is a caveat or two to that. Firstly, I would question if they were 'over-referring' to such sources if there was already existing and current 'primary' journal sources. Secondly, that they cited the source correctly according to the citation format used i.e. personal communication perhaps in this case?

Blog is source of information one can cite this ...

Hi Karl

This is an interesting and important question. I think Dean Whitehead gives you some sound advice, which demonstrates how much more acceptable blogs have become for use in academic texts. However, Kate Williams and I were more cautious in our advice in our study skills guide (Referencing and Understanding Plagiarism 2nd ed https://www.macmillanihe.com/page/detail/Referencing-and-Understanding-Plagiarism/?K=9781137530714). We suggest that for a few reasons: they are commonly seen as personal views and experiences, open online conversations between bloggers and anyone who reads them, postings can be removed or changed, and there is no formal peer review, thus evidence in blogs is not as strong as in a peer-reviewed journal. Having said that, they are a great way to instantly get your work out there, and I am sure they will continue to become more acceptable and credible.

One problem is that it could be difficult to look up for references to your work later on (for one, I fail to see how you could get a DOI or other persistent identifier for your blog posts).

And no, comments on a blog are not really a substitute for the peer review.

If you are concern with APA citation style 6th edition follow APA website for blog citation rules or go to the citation machine portal through Google...