Biology

Not all sources are created equal! Information is plentiful, and anyone on the Internet can make any claim. Therefore, it is important to check your sources -- because your conclusions are only as good as the sources you use!  Your experimental design is only as good as the data you build it on!

Happily, there are strategies to help you determine if a piece of information you are reading is credible and reliable. 

Information will come to you in a variety of formats. Different types of resources have different authority and credibility cues. It is important to know the differences between resource types so that you can make good decisions about which ones to trust and use in your own work.

Check out this beautifully done Infographic (with contextualizing data visualizations!) on some important differences between resource types, such as how much scrutiny they receive before publication, or how long they take to publish.

More detail and more types of sources are described in this table comparing the characteristics, both visible and hidden, of several different resource types: 

Adapted from the Resource Table by Rebecca Reznik-Zellan: https://guides.library.umass.edu/compsci/evaluate

Resource Type	E.g.	Content	Authority	Audience	Uses	Scrutiny	Find Them
Scholarly Journals, Conference Proceedings*		Original research conducted by experts in a field;meta-analyses/review articles. Content is advanced and technical	Peer-reviewed, author's credentials, edited by experts in the field	Scholars, academics, professionals in a field.	Primary research; present research findings, conduct research on a topic	Months; 3 – 4 reviewers†	Library databases - Web of Science - PubMed - ScienceDirect Google Scholar (some)
Trade Magazines*		Industry developments, news, and standards	Author’s credentials, affiliation of the publisher	Professionals working in a field	Identify trends and stay current in a field	Weeks; 1 – 2 reviewers†	Library databases - Academic Search Premier Google (some)
Reference Books* (Encyclopedias, Wikipedia)		Historical and/or technical overview information on a topic	Author’s credentials, publisher’s credentials	Everyone	Gather background information, topical overviews	Years; 3-5 reviewers†	Library databases - Access Science - Encyclopedia of Life Sciences Wikipedia (some)
Reports* (Government, Industry, NGOs)		Summaries of research initiatives or public policy  issues; recommendations	Author’s credentials, gov’t or industry affiliation	Professionals and public officials	Inform development of public policy	Months; 1-2 reviewers	Government databases - Congressional and Research Service Reports Company websites
Newspapers*		News and opinion on current and local/regional events	Written and edited by professional journalists	General public	Follow development of issues, link to other sources, gather background information	Hours - Days; 1 – 2 reviewers†	Library databases - Academic Search Premier - Lexis Nexis Uni Google (some)
Popular Magazines*		Common interest stories and issues, commentary	Author’s credentials, affiliation of the publisher	General public	Identify popular opinion and trending topics	Hours - Days; 1 – 2 reviewers†	Internet, print magazines
Social Media		Shared information, opinion	None	Everyone	Social engagement, information sharing	Seconds; 0 reviewers†	Internet, apps
Data Repositories		Individual or scientific  research data or publicly-funded data	Variable	Researchers, professionals, general public	Verify or build on studies, develop tools, share projects	Variable	- ICPSR - Data.gov - figshare - R3Data.org (registry of repositories)

*Accessible through the Libraries    †from Know Your Sources, Portland Community College

A study has shown that factcheckers are REALLY GOOD at determining credibility from clickbait. How do they do it? 

When looking at resources online, such as blogs or videos or news articles, use lateral reading to quickly establish if the source is credible and accurate.

The four moves of SIFT are essentially about RECONTEXTUALIZING what you read online. In doing so, you give yourself enough information to absorb digital content effectively and make informed decisions.

1. Stop: Do you know the resource or the website it came from? If you aren't familiar with a source and its reputation, this is your cue stop reading and start investigating. Don't share or use a story, until you've learned more about it. 
2. Investigate the source: Know what you are reading before you read it. Knowing who is writing the work and why they are writing it is critical to your ability to interpret it. Take 60 seconds to determine where the source is coming from before reading further.   
3. Find Better Coverage: The claim being made is often important than the specific article or video you are using. To verify the claim, step outside of the story you found and look for additional, trusted reporting about the claim from another source(s). 
4. Trace Claims, Quotes, and Media: Very often information online is taken out of context. Find the original source of any claims, quotes, and media for their original context. 

Source: SIFT (The Four Moves), by Mike Caulfield. June 19, 2019.  

Most sources you're going to be using as researchers are scholarly, peer-reviewed articles.  You've had experience with scientific articles, you know that they're different from other types of articles out there - and the table above has laid out many checkable characteristics if you need reminders.  But how does applying SIFT to an academic article work? 

Here is a rubric for aspects to investigate: Substance, Currency, Authority, Relevance, Accuracy, and Bias (SCARAB).
How does the source you're evaluating rank?

Rubric from the McHenry County College Library Education Research Guide: Evaluating Sources/SCARAB: https://libguides.mchenry.edu/edu/evaluating

For a deeper dive on evaluating sources and detecting misinformation, below are a selection of brief videos and interactive tutorials that discuss strategies for evaluating resources. Check them out!

These sources can help you verify the truth or falsity of specific claims.

Once you've evaluated these aspects of the source, there's still the content.  Most of the above steps can take only a few minutes once you get practiced at it.  If a source passes those checks, your next step is the close reading of the source itself.  This is yet another opportunity to evaluate the information you are consuming. 

Remember, original research - even peer-reviewed research - is by definition brand-new information.  How strong is the evidence for the conclusions the researchers draw?  This is an evaluation experienced researchers perform every time they read a source.  You, as students, need to practice to develop this skill.  Try these steps:

• Method
  • Is it an appropriate choice to answer the research question?
  • Is it a method used in the discipline? 
  • Are you familiar with it or do you need to do some background reading to deeply understand how it works?
• Figures
  • Are they understandable without also reading paragraphs of the text?
  • Are they in the best scale to convey the information or has that been adjusted to make it look more impressive?
  • Is the format or type of graph a good one to convey this information?  
• Results = Conclusion?
  • This is one to watch for under Bias.  The methods and analysis can both be strong but be paired with weakly-supported conclusions. 
• Limitations of study clearly stated
  • No one has enough time or funding to do everything they would like.  Are the authors upfront about the limitations of their study?

Content on this Evaluate Your Sources page is adapted with thanks from the Evaluate Your Sources page of the Information and Computer Sciences research guide by Rebecca Reznik-Zellen at UMass Amherst.