DISCUSSION 300 WORDS

Content Author: Judy Bailey, Ph.D.

More Information on Evaluating Sources

While the video above gives you some excellent information on evaluating internet sites as to acceptability for academic & business research, this lecture below will give you some specifics and practical examples. There are really two main criteria you should be using to determine if a site is acceptable:

In other words, is the person or persons who wrote an article or provided information knowledgeable in the topic? Are they recognized experts or "amateurs" that are just posting their opinions?

Individual authority: The author has the appropriate academic degrees or has conducted peer-reviewed research on this topic.

Publishing body or organizational authority: The organization reviews the information it publishes for authority and accepts for publication only documents that have been reviewed by expert peers.

Is the author or the organization presenting the information an objective source? Do they present their point of view or a political affiliation? Do they have a reputation for objectivity? Do they publish opinion or substantiated facts? Do they have a mission that is political or commercial?

Unacceptable Sources

· This organization says about itself, "Wikipedia is written collaboratively by an international group of volunteers. Anyone with internet access can write and make changes to Wikipedia articles."

· In its user agreement, this site says, "The Service and the Sites contain information, facts and opinions from various individuals and organizations. THE SERVICE AND THE SITES ARE PROVIDED ON AN "AS IS" BASIS WITHOUT WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF TITLE OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, OTHER THAN THOSE WARRANTIES WHICH ARE IMPOSED BY AND INCAPABLE OF EXCLUSION, RESTRICTION OR MODIFICATION UNDER THE LAWS APPLICABLE TO THIS AGREEMENT. NEITHER ABOUT.COM NOR ITS AFFILIATES ENDORSE OR ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE ACCURACY OR RELIABILITY OF ANY OPINION, ADVICE OR STATEMENT ON THE SERVICE OR THE SITES."

· These are also unacceptable sources because information is contributed by readers, and we know nothing about their qualifications and how they are screened.

· Any other sites where information is provided by readers, including blogs and social media sites, such as Mashable. Anyone can contribute to a blog, so we cannot accept these as authoritative sources.

· Note: Do not be tricked into thinking that because something comes from a university website, it must be written by professors or doctoral students.  Sometimes, the Internet pulls up sources that are actually student papers, which are obviously unacceptable.  For example, this URL contains a clue that this is written by students as a project for a class:  http://public.csusm.edu/fangfang/Teaching/HTMmaterial/StudentProjectFall2011/Team7.pdf. 

Other unacceptable sources include online news presentations. These sometimes present accurate and objective information, but they also sometimes present opinion and analysis as fact. For this reason, you should not use them in research reports. These include CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, and other such networks.

Generally Acceptable Sources

Some examples of acceptable internet sources are U.S. Government organizations such as:

In addition, most non-profit professional associations are acceptable sources of information. Examples of such associations would be the following:

You do need to be aware, however, that some non-profit associations are trade associations whose purpose is to promote an industry or group of people through public relations activities such as advertising, political donations, lobbying, and publishing. Obviously these organizations are biased and their information cannot be trusted.

There are some well-respected newspapers and journals that have online sites that are generally acceptable as sources of valid information. These include:

However, you need to verify with your instructor whether those sources are acceptable for a particular assignment.

Possibly Acceptable Sources

There are some company web sites that can be used on a limited basis, depending on what information you are using them for. For example, you can find a copy of the annual report on many company websites, however, you need to remember that while these documents mostly present accurate facts to stockholders, they do not tell you everything about what is happening at that company. This means financial figures are probably accurate, but glowing reports of wonderful things the company is doing may not be so accurate. You will want to verify these things with more objective articles from the library online databases.

You can also obtain accurate technical specifications and suggested retail prices on products from a company website. However, you would not want to take their evaluations on their own products without further verification from more objective sources.