Seven Steps to Effective Research

Step 6: Evaluate Your Materials

Evaluating Books

Evaluating Periodical Articles (magazines, journals & newspapers)

Evaluating Internet Resources

Evaluating a resource can begin even before you have it in hand. You can initially appraise a source by first examining the bibliographic citation, an abstract of its contents, even the makeup of a URL if using a web resource. A bibliographic citation is a written reference to a work (book, journal article, media clip, etc.) and or some other published material. Bibliographic citations characteristically have three main components: author, title, and publication information. The publication information in citations you obtain through your researching (no matter the kind of citation format - MLA, APA, vendor specific, etc.) indicates what type of resource you have in hand.

-a single year date suggests the work is most likely a book
-volume and issue numbers indicate a periodical resource
-Internet addresses state the item was obtained electronically
(free website, library online subscription, fee based electronic journal, etc.)

These components also help you determine the usefulness of this source for your paper. Is the author recognized by others in his/her field? Given the date of publication for a source, is the information it contains current enough for research on a newly discovered phenomenon? These are some of the questions necessary to consider as you evaluate research sources?

Tip: - View this clip explaining the Information Cycle to learn more about how the type of resource impacts the nature of the information it contains.

Evaluating Books:

Information about authors may be found in both print and online literature and biography Reference resources. The set Current Biography Yearbook, is a print Reference source, which must be located using the library's online catalog. Try Basic 'Subject keyword' searches in the library's catalog to identify additional sources that will help you evaluate a specific book, writing genre or an author's body of work.

Examples:

grapes of wrath and literature
short story and criticism
Melville and criticism

Titles such as Biography Resources Center (BioRC), and Literature Resource Center (LRC) are both electronic Reference tools.

Reviews of books and other literary works may be found through searching electronic resources under the General or Newspaper sections. Library print reference works are especially valuable for locating reviews and critical essays about books, movies, plays, poems, etc. (e.g. Poetry for students, Short story criticism, Twentieth-century literary criticism).

Evaluating Periodical articles (magazines, journals & newspapers):

Periodicals provide more current information than books may provide, because they are published quarterly, monthly, weekly or even daily. A great deal of biographical information is also available from periodical articles. In addition to looking at the author of the article, consider the quality of the publication in which it appears. Is it a recognized journal or is it a magazine?

When using information from any source, particularly those that are published without rigorous evaluation, (i.e.peer review process used in scholarly publishing), it is especially important to evaluate your source thoroughly. How does one do this? A researcher should use the set of critical thinking skills that are acquired through formal education. Questions such as 'Who, What, Where, When, Why and How" are often suggested to young writers as essential for writing intelligently. When evaluating information obtained for scholarly research it is important to consider the information's:

Accuracy, Authoritativeness, Objectivity, Currency and Completeness

Some specific questions to ask that help assess these aspects of information are:

• When was the article published?
• What are the qualifications of the author?
• Does the article reference any other work?
• Are there any identifiable biases?
• Is there any advertising that may be influencing the publication?

The Meriam Library at California State University, Chico suggests users evaluate if their information sources can pass the CRAAP test before they rely on them for scholarly work.

Evaluating Internet Resources:

There is a great deal of information available on the Internet. Keep in mind, however, that anyone can put up a web site. Because so many web resources are self published or promotional, the scholarly researcher must be especially diligent in evaluating websites. In the same way that bibliographic citations from library catalogs and databases can help you determine the kind of information source located, the Internet address (URL) for a website can indicate if you are using a document created to 'sell' (intended to persuade) or 'tell' (intended to inform).

While at Southwest State University Jim Kapoun developed a very effective set of Five Criteria for Evaluating Web Pages. In it he addresses the 5 classic areas of information evaluation:

Accuracy, Authoritativeness, Objectivity, Currency and Completeness

while also considering how web page design features help users assess the source.

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Rev 2/08

On to Step 7