Module 3 Evaluating Information

Week 4 & 5 Discussion 1 & 2
Module 3 Evaluating Information

Learning Outcomes

? Describe what the CRAAP test is and how it is used to evaluate information.

? Identify the criteria used to evaluate the currency of information.

? Identify the criteria used to evaluate the relevance of information.

? Identify the criteria used to evaluate the authority of information.

? Identify the criteria used to evaluate the accuracy of information.

? Identify the purpose behind the creation of information.

? Identify the criteria used to evaluate multimedia found on the Web.

Jacob Ammentorp Lund/iStock/Thinkstock

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Introduction Now that you have learned about the first two steps in the research processesidentifying an information need and locating and accessing informationits time to explore the third step in the process, which is evaluating information. The process you employ for selecting infor- mation should follow a list of criteria that ensure youre choosing only the best sources. These criteria are currency, relevance, authority, accuracy, and purpose. They are collectivelyand humorouslyknown as the CRAAP test.

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Your Roadmap to Success: Section 3.1 Learning Outcome: Describe what the CRAAP test is and how it is used to evaluate information.

Why is this important?

Understanding the CRAAP test will help you sort through vast amounts of information so that you can find the information thats important to you. Consider Crystal, for example. Crystal was looking for a new job. She found many job ads online and spent a lot of time applying to them. However, she didnt get many responses and was feeling frustrated. The few responses she did receive turned out to be not what they seemed. After learning the CRAAP test, she realized that many of the job ads were likely scams or outdated. She now uses the CRAAP test to evaluate job ads and has had much better results conducting a tar- geted job search.

How does this relate to your success in this course?

This sections learning outcome is associated with the following course learning outcome: Determine the best search strategy for a given information need. Mastering this learning out- come will enable you to save time in your busy life so that you can balance the needs of school, work, family, and other commitments.

3.1 What Is the CRAAP Test?

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3.1 What Is the CRAAP Test?

The explosive growth and use of the Internet in the 21st century has had a profound effect on how people access, interpret, and use information. In 2014, almost 3 billion people used the Internet worldwide (International Telecommunication Union, 2014). People turn to the Internet to help them find information for everything from the location of restaurants to instructions on starting their own business to possible reasons for that curious rash on their big toe. In addition, of course, students turn to the Internet to find resources for their academic papers (Head, 2013). The International Reading Association states, . . . networked communication technologies such as the Internet provide the most powerful capabilities for information and communication we have ever seen, permitting access to people and informa- tion in ways and at speeds never before possible (2009).

Just as people are able to explore and discover overwhelming amounts of data and infor- mation on the Internet, they are also able to create new information quickly and easily by publishing their work on the Web. This ease of publishing by anyone, while good for self- expression and the sharing of ideas, has implications for the reliability of what can be found on the Internet. When anyone can publish anything on the Internet, a great deal of unreliable and subjective information is created.

To review the course learning outcomes and their relevance to you, see the Your Roadmap to Success feature at the beginning of this book. Best of luck on your journey to success!

Ashford Student Profile: Natasha

Natasha has just submitted her final paper for her Health & Wellness Promotion class, and shes feeling confident. She was able to find several scholarly articles and e-books in the AU Library as well as plenty of resources she found on the Internet to back up her claims about the best approaches to teaching healthy nutrition habits to college freshmen. When her graded paper came back, she was surprised to see she had earned only a C, when she had felt so strongly that she was surely getting an A. After further inspecting her paper, she saw that the instructor had deducted points for the resources she found on the Internet and the arguments she had based off those sources.

Natasha was confused; the instructor clearly stated that resources found on the Internet were permitted for this assignment in addition to scholarly material. Why was she docked points? When she read through her instructors comments, she found comments such as this teaching method is not used by health promotion professionals because recent research has shown it encourages disordered eating behavior in college freshmen and more comments such as according to who? or please back up with facts, not opinions. When Natasha scrolled to the end of her paper, she saw that the instructor had written a final comment saying that if she was going to use resources from the Internet, she should make sure she was using the most updated information from credible, authoritative entities. For example, sources might include the American College Health Association, the Centers for Disease Control, scholarly articles from PubMed, or other open source scholarly resources. Instead, Natasha had used information from websites such as nutrition blogs by unknown, self-proclaimed health experts, promoting and selling diet foods, and an article written by a registered dietitian in 1991. As a result, the claims she made based on those sources were biased, outdated, and probably inaccurate. Because Natasha had found so much information on her topic on the Internet, it was difficult to know what to choose, so she had gone with what came up on her first page of results, as so many of us do.

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Currency: The timeliness of the information.

When was the information published or posted?

Has the information been revised or updated?

Is the information current or out-of date for your topic?

Are the links functional?

Relevance: The importance of the information for your needs.

Does the information relate to your topic or answer your question?

Who is the intended audience?

Is the information at an appropriate level (i.e., not too elementary or advanced for your needs)?

Have you looked at a variety of resources before determining this is one you will use?

Would you be comfortable using this resource for a research paper?

Authority: The source of the information.

Who is the author/publisher/source/sponsor?

Are the authors credentials or organizational affiliations given?

What are the authors credentials or organizational affiliations?

What are the authors qualifications to write on the topic?

Is there contact information, such as a publisher or email address?

Does the URL reveal anything about the author or source (e.g., .com, .edu, .gov, .org, .net)?

Accuracy: The reliability, truthfulness, and correctness of the informational content.

Where does the information come from?

Is the information supported by evidence?

3.1 What Is the CRAAP Test?

By the same token, more and more entities (professional organizations, academic journals, and government departments) that are considered highly authoritative are publishing on the Web. How do you know whether the information is sound? Many have claimed that new lit- eracy skills are needed to effectively navigate and use this new information landscape. Being able to evaluate information found on the Web is absolutely critical not only for your aca- demic life, but also for your workplace and personal life (International Reading Association, 2009; Leu, et al., 2011).

The CRAAP test is a method that you can use to help evaluate information from both print and digital sources while in search for the truth. Developed by the Meriam Library at California State University in Chico, the CRAAP test is a list of questions that you can use to evaluate a sources currency, reliability, authority, accuracy, and purpose (Figure 3.1). When used in conjunction with your critical thinking skills, the CRAAP test can be an effective method for determining the validity of a resource.

Figure 3.1 The CRAAP test

(Continued)

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Has the information been reviewed or refereed?

Can you verify any of the information in another source or from personal knowledge?

Does the language or tone seem biased and free of emotion?

Are there spelling, grammar, or other typographical errors?

Purpose: The reason the information exists.

What is the purpose of the information? To inform? Teach? Sell? Entertain? Persuade?

Do the authors/sponsors make their intentions or purpose clear?

Is the information fact? Opinion? Propaganda? Does the point of view appear objective and impartial?

Are there political, ideological, cultural, religious, institutional, or personal biases?

3.1 What Is the CRAAP Test?

While the CRAAP test can be applied to evaluate both print and digital resources, the remain- der of this module focuses on exploring how you can apply the CRAAP test to evaluate digital information you find on the Internet outside the AU Library. Remember from Module 2 that the gold standard for quality information is scholarly/peer-reviewed research, some of which you can find on the Internet. Also keep in mind that conducting good research means that the search for knowledge should not be to reinforce what you already know, but to locate many perspectives in search of the truth.

Before exploring the CRAAP test, lets check back in with Irwin, as he begins his quest for information online. When we left him, he had collected a few scholarly articles from the AU Library on the topic of social networking in the workplace, and was gathering information from them through note taking. He decides to look over his assignment instructions and

Quick Tip!

Locating Stable Information Information you locate on the Internet may not be stable. That is, it can move or disappear without warning, making any links you use to cite your information invalid. Information you find on websites owned by the United States government, large business or nonprofit organizations, or educational institutions is usually more stable and therefore less likely to disappear. Additionally, these sites often archive their information, so even if their information has been updated or moved, it may still be accessible.

Figure 3.1 The CRAAP test (Continued)

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3.1 What Is the CRAAP Test?

starts checking off the resource requirements he has fulfilled. Irwins assignment requires that he use his course textbook, two scholarly sources, and one source of his choice in the development of his paper. Irwin has already extracted the information he needs from his textbook, and he has the scholarly articles he found in the AU Library. The last resource he needs can be in the format of his choice. On his KWHL chart, Irwin listed that he would like to try locating information for his research paper from podcasts and websites about social networking (see Table 3.1).

Table 3.1: Irwins updated KWHL chart

K What do I know?

W What do I want to know?

H How do I find out?

L What have I learned?

Social networking has been around for at least 10 years.

Its useful for staying in touch with friends and family.

It helps me keep up with groups and orga- nizations Im interested in.

Some of the gaming systems I use have social networks built in.

How do others use social networking?

Has it been around for longer than 10 years?

Does it impact my life the same way as it does oth- ers in society?

What are popular social networking tools?

Has social networking evolved with society?

What are popular social networking tools in the workplace?

How are companies using social networks to enhance their organizations?

Background research: Wikipedia & Google

Scholarly sources from the library/ FindIt@AU: 1 e-book, 3 scholarly articles

Internet sources: websites, podcasts

SNs have been around since the late 1800s.

Currently, many SNs exist for a wide range of purposes.

Irwin knows that he needs to be careful when using the Internet to search for resources for his paper. He has an idea of how to evaluate the validity of a resource, but he would like to learn more. In the following sections, we take a closer look at how the CRAAP test can help Irwin locate solid resources for his paper.

Section 3.1 Knowledge Check Quiz 1. What does the C stand for in CRAAP test?

A. Credentials B. Currency C. Citation

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June 1, 2015

series_id

CES3000000001

year

1990

1991

period

M01

M02

M03

M04

M02

value

17797

17897

17868

17845

17211

Employment, Hours, and Earnings – National (Current Employment Statistics – CES)

U N

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3.1 What Is the CRAAP Test?

June 1, 2015

series_id

CES3000000001

year

1990

1991

period

M01

M02

M03

M04

M02

value

17797

17897

17868

17845

17211

Employment, Hours, and Earnings – National (Current Employment Statistics – CES)

U N

ITED STATES OF A

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D EP

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ENT OF LABO R

2. Which of the following encircled elements depicts what authority means in the CRAAP test?

Answers: 1 (B), 2 (A)

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Your Roadmap to Success: Section 3.2 Learning Outcome: Identify the criteria used to evaluate the currency of information.

Why is this important?

Being able to determine the currency of information will prevent you from making deci- sions that are based on outdated information. Consider Ron, for example. Ron wants to eat healthier and has been using a health book he found in his closet to help him plan meals. However, after he learned the importance of having current information, he checked the copyright and realized the book had been published over 20 years ago and thus might have outdated information that might deter him in his quest to eat healthier.

How does this relate to your success in this course?

This sections learning outcome is associated with the following course learning outcome: Evaluate information sources for authority, bias, accuracy, and currency. Mastering this learn- ing outcome will help you identify threats and misleading or outdated information that could jeopardize your schoolwork, as well as your personal life.

To review the course learning outcomes and their relevance to you, see the Your Roadmap to Success feature at the beginning of this book. Best of luck on your journey to success!

3.2 How Do I Evaluate a Sources Currency?

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3.2 How Do I Evaluate a Sources Currency?

The Internet can be an excellent place to find the most cutting-edge, up-to-date information, as new content is constantly being published. This is especially true for information on cur- rent events, such as news, stock market activity, weather, and traffic conditions. The Internet is also an excellent place to find archival and historical documents, rare books, or other spe- cial collections that once were available only as print sources in libraries. In short, you can find all kinds of information created or posted at different times on the Internet, so how do you know if what you find is current enough for your topic? Determining the currency of information will depend on the subject you are researching.

Decide Between Older and Newer Sources When setting out to find information on the Web or when evaluating results from a search, you should determine whether it is necessary to get the most up-to-date material based on your information need. For certain subjects, such as history or the humanities, documents created hundreds of years ago can be valuable to your research today. They include old let- ters, legal documents such as birth and marriage certificates and court and military records, and contemporary newspaper accounts of relevant events.

In contrast, timeliness of the information is critical in fields in which new knowledge is being built up rapidly, such as science and technology. If you are trying to find the latest informa- tion on breast cancer treatment in the United States, for instance, you wouldnt want to use information from a 2001 journal article or from a website that was last updated in 2005. Treatments might have changed dramatically since then because the healthcare field evolves so rapidly.

Depending on the purpose for which youre seeking information, you may need to use both older and current sources for the same project. For instance, consider the field of anthropol- ogy, the study of human culture of the past and present. You would use historical resources when you are discussing human cultures of the past and current resources when you are dis- cussing contemporary cultures. Or you might refer to centuries-old documents as samples of a cultures written language, along with new sources discussing computer analyses of those samples.

The following topics usually warrant using newer sources; the list also includes topics for which currency of the information may not be as important. The list is not exhaustive and is only meant to give you some examples. There can be exceptions depending on your particular information need.

Currency of information is usually important when researching

current events and news. stock market activity. laws and regulations. research in the field of information and communication technologies (ICTs). medical/health information. sciences.

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3.2 How Do I Evaluate a Sources Currency?

Check the Publication Date Once youve determined that your topic does require up-to-date information, you need to find out when the information youre considering using was published (or posted). To determine the publication date of information you find in print, begin with the copyright date for books, which is found on the copyright page at the beginning of the book, or with the date of issue of a newspaper, journal, or magazine. Be aware, though, that the information referred to within the publication might be considerably older than the publication itself. For example, an article in a nutrition journal might synthesize data from several research studies conducted over the past decade. If you include that data, then you need to cite the original sources of those studies.

One method to determine the currency of the information displayed on a website is to look at the date the information was added to the site. Keep in mind that a publication date on a website can mean a few different things, such as

when the material was first written, not the date it was posted to the site. when the material was first posted to the site. when the material was last revised or updated. Updated and revised information can

mean something simple like an error in spelling was corrected or some other minor change was made. It can also mean that substantial updating to the information presented on the site occurred.

When searching for the publication date, first identify the title of the resource and then determine how much of it you plan to use. In the case of a website, ask yourself: Am I using the entire website? Just one page of the website? A specific article or post within a website? Determining the specific information you are using from a resource will help you locate when it was published and ensure you are citing the correct resource.

weather and traffic conditions. statistics (unless you are looking for historical statistics). reviews on products, restaurants, and so on. information about companies/organizations/institutionsnews, data, operations,

personnel, practices, and so on.

Currency of information is usually not important when researching

historical information.* topics within the humanities.* cooking, cleaning, gardening, and home repair. many hobbies such as painting, knitting, and working on old cars.

* Primary sources, such as census records and legal documents, can be valuable artifacts containing important data relevant to your study even though they were created many years ago. However, researching historical information and humanities topics can be tricky because new evidence is often discovered that changes the way historians view events in the past. If you are researching historical events or topics within the humanities, make sure the information comes from an authoritative source, something we discuss later in this module.

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3.2 How Do I Evaluate a Sources Currency?

Sometimes, especially for news articles and blog posts, the publication date is located near the title of the resource, so be sure to first look for the publication date near the title or authors name. Another place to look for the publication date is at the bottom of the web page, at the end of an article, often centered. Sometimes you will see only the copyright date for the entire website, which is not the same thing as the publication date. The copyright date usually has a small c in front of the date or simply says copyright next to the date.

If the publication date was not provided, one possible strategy for finding it involves read- ing the URL of the web page youd like to use. The websites address, or Uniform Resource Locator (URL), can tell you a lot about the information contained on that page. For instance, sites that contain articles, blogs, or some form of published content may include a date in the URL. For example, in the URL h?t?tp://w?w?w.homepage.org/2014/02/name-of-article, you can clearly see the date the content was published is 2014 for the year and 02 for the month of February. This is just one way to read a URL. We explore more information on reading URLs and understanding the information they contain later in the module.

Use Revisions or Updates Often when you need to find out when a web page was last updated, you can follow many of the same steps as you would to find the publication date. Sometimes, websites list the date the page was last revised at the bottom of the page. Often, you will see Page last updated: or Page last reviewed: followed by the date.

One possible technique for locating the most recent modification date of a website uses a short line of JavaScript code to pull this information from the site. Some web brows- ers, such as Mozilla Firefox and Internet Explorer, allow you to locate the publication date by requesting it in your browsers address bar. After navigating to a web page, try typing javascript:alert(document.lastModified) into the address bar. This code tells the browser you are requesting the most recent publication information for that particular site.

Aside from checking the publication date and dates that a web page was last revised or updated, you should pay attention to whether the links on the web page are functional. Web- sites that stay current have authors and editors who regularly check the functionality and content of the website. Therefore, broken links can mean that no one is regularly maintaining the site and that the information is outdated.

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3.2 How Do I Evaluate a Sources Currency?

Additionally, its important to keep in mind that the format of the information can dictate the currency of that information. A newspaper article or a YouTube video can be created and uploaded incredibly quickly compared to a book, which takes considerable time for the author to research and write, and still more time to edit and print. Scholarly journal articles also take time and are often subject to a rigorous peer review process by experts in the aca- demic field. Therefore, you can often guess that certain information, such as data on motor vehicle accidents from an annual government report, will probably be more current than data on motor vehicle accidents from a book. In summary, the process by which an informational work is created and made available to others (in print or online) varies greatly and should be taken into account when you are conducting research.

As Irwin reflects on the information he still needs for his paper, he decides that he does need to search for current information since his research question is technology focused. He makes a note of this on his research plan and begins searching for information on the Internet. Since he is using Google as his search engine, he already knows how to limit his results to those published within the past year or how to customize his dates if needed.

General Media

ERRONLIGHT: Address:

Type:

Render Mode:

Text Encoding:

Size:

Referring URL:

Modi?ed:

http://www.erronlight.com/

text/html

Standards compliance mode

UTF-8

11.93 KB (12,215 bytes)

http://www.erronlight.com/?page_id=146

July 17, 2015 at 11:53:18 AM

Feeds Permissions

Websites that have automatically updated content will display the exact date and time as when you check the

site. This is not a publication date and it should not be used.

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3.2 How Do I Evaluate a Sources Currency?

Section 3.2 Knowledge Check Quiz 1. The best source for descriptions of Civil War battles would be

A. personal accounts of the time. B. current military records. C. a 50-year-old almanac.

2. For which subject is the currency of information typically most important? A. Stock market activity B. Home repair C. The history of computers

Answers: 1 (A), 2 (A)

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Your Roadmap to Success: Section 3.3 Learning Outcome: Identify the criteria used to evaluate the relevance of information.

Why is this important?

Being able to evaluate the relevance of information will help you stay focused on your goals by eliminating unnecessary information. Consider Cecilia, for example. Cecilia always assumed that, when it comes to sources for your research paper, the more you have, the bet- ter your paper will be. But after learning about the importance of relevant information, she realized that quality is more important than quantity when it comes to sources.

How does this relate to your success in this course?

To review the course

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