Weird References in Student Papers

I have seen students do some odd things in their bibliographies with such frequency that I am sure it cannot be a coincidence. But I am not sure where they are getting these practices from.

The strangest part is the tendency, when citing online sources, to repeat the title of the article, web page, or blog post a second time in italics, as though it were the title of a book or journal from which the article was taken.

But there are other oddities – for instance, the tendency to add “n.d.” (not dated), often even if the article or blog post has a date.

Any idea where students are picking up these very odd bad habits?

Perhaps it is the same place they learned to say “based off of” instead of “based on”…