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Potomac State College

ENGL 102 Research Guide: Evaluating Sources

Tips and tricks from librarians! Contains videos, tutorials, and other resources to help you write a great research paper.

Why Evaluate Sources?

Not all sources are correct. Not all sources are equal. You want to use only correct information and quality sources in your project.

As librarians, we want you to carefully check each source as if it were April Fools Day, the one day of the year when everyone carefully checks everything because it might be an April Fools joke.

Listed below are a few different tools you can use to help you decide if your source is good or not.

The 5 Ws (Dig Deeper!)

The 5 Ws are questions to you ask about each source you find:

Who? Who created this source and why should you trust him?
Why? Why was the page created?
Where? Where did the information come from? Can you verify it?
When? When was the source created? When was it updated? How much does currency matter?
What? What are the aesthetics of the source? Are the photos related to the topic? How many ads are there? Are there grammar and spelling mistakes?

Consider all the elements and balance the positives against the negatives and decide if the source is useful.

Take a look at Mrs. Kline's Dig Deeper handout.

The CRAAP Test

The CRAAP Test was developed by librarians at Meriam Library at California State University, Chico.

C = Currency: How timely is the information and does it matter for your topic?
R = Relevance: Is the information relevant to your information needs?
A = Authority: Who created the source? Why should you trust her?
A = Accuracy: Where did the information come from? Can you verify it through other sources?
P = Purpose: Why was the source created? Does the creator want to sell you something? Persuade you? Inform you? Educate you? Deceive you?

Consider all the elements and balance the positives against the negatives and decide if the source passes the CRAAP Test.

The SMELL Test

The SMELL Test was created by John H. McManus for journalists and citizens to use.

S = Source = Who is providing the information?
M = Motivation = Why are they telling me this?
E = Evidence = What evidence is provided for generalizations?
L = Logic = Do the facts logically compel the conclusions?
L = Left out = What’s missing that might change our interpretation of the information?

If you would like to know more about it, read his article:

McManus, J. (2013, February 7). Don’t be

fooled: Use the SMELL Test to separate fact from fiction online. In MediaShift. Retrieved from http://mediashift.org/2013/02/dont-be-fooled-use-the-smell-test-to-separate-fact-from-fiction-online038/

RADCAB

RADCAB was designed by Karen M. Christensson for elementary through high school students.

R = Relevancy: Is the information relevant to my needs?
A = Appropriateness = Is the information appropriate for my age/experience and my core values?
D = Detail = Does the source give me enough detail to answer my questions?
C = Currency = How current is the information? When was it last updated?
A = Authority = Who wrote it? What are his qualifications?
B = Bias = Why was this source created? To persuade? To sell? To inform? To entertain?