Credibility Rules
These are the credibility rules taken from the Google Education lesson on "Research and Develop a Topic" (https://applieddigitalskills.withgoogle.com/applied-digital-skills/en/research-and-develop-a-topic/overview.html)
- Does it make believable claims?
- Does it avoid overly persuasive language?
- Are the facts supported?
- Is the source author authoritative and trustworthy?
- Does it contradict a known fact?
- Does it sound like a sales pitch,does it want you to do something or buy something?
EAsybib Tips on checking credibility
The following information is quoted from: www.easybib.com/guides/students/writing-guide/ii-research/c-evaluating-sources-for-credibility/
Ask yourself the following questions to help you determine if a source is reliable:
Author
Keep in mind that everything is written from a particular social, cultural, and political perspective. Realize that some publications tend to be ‘slanted’ towards a certain viewpoint. For example, the CATO Institute is known for being libertarian, while The Nation is known to lean left. Keep these slants in mind when you are researching.
Primary vs. Secondary Sources
Effectively evaluating information is a skill that you can use for the rest of your life no matter what you do. Always be smart about the information you read and refer to.
Ask yourself the following questions to help you determine if a source is reliable:
Author
- Who is providing the information?
- What do you know about the author and their credentials?
- Are they an expert?
- Can you find out more and contact them?
- Search for author or publisher in search engine. Has the author written several publications on the topic?
- Have other credible people referenced this source?
- Is there a sponsor or affiliation?
- Who is linking to the page?
- Do they take responsibility for the content?
- Websites: Are credible sites linking to this page?
- Is the language free of emotion?
- Does the organization or author suggest there may be bias? Does bias make sense in relations to your argument?
- Is the purpose of the website to inform or to persuade towards a certain agenda?
- Are there ads? Are they trying to make money?
- Why did they write the article?
- Websites: Is the site a content farm? A content farm is a site whose content has been generated by teams of freelancers who write large amounts of low-quality text to raise the site’s search engine rankings.
- Copy and paste a sentence into Google to see if the text can be found elsewhere.
- (Website) Are there links to related sites? Are they organized?
- Are there citations or a bibliography provided? Do they cite their sources?
- Is the data verifiable and accurate?
- Is the source comprehensive?
- When was the source last updated?
- Does the source have a date?
- Does the source appear professional?
- Does it seem like current design?
- Was it reproduced? If so, from where? Type a sentence in Google to verify.
- If it was reproduced, was it done so with permission? Copyright/disclaimer included?
Keep in mind that everything is written from a particular social, cultural, and political perspective. Realize that some publications tend to be ‘slanted’ towards a certain viewpoint. For example, the CATO Institute is known for being libertarian, while The Nation is known to lean left. Keep these slants in mind when you are researching.
Primary vs. Secondary Sources
- Primary sources: are first-hand accounts of an event or time-period. They can also be results of experiments or research. Primary sources must be factual not interpretive.Here are some examples of primary sources:
- Diaries, journals, letters
- Works of art
- Newspaper or magazine accounts from the time period
- Photographs, maps, postcards
- Songs, plays
- Secondary sources: analyze and interpret primary sources. These can be second-hand accounts of events, or interpretations of sources. Here are some examples of secondary sources:
- Biographies
- Literary criticisms, book reviews
- Interpretive newspaper articles
- Analysis of scientific experiments
Effectively evaluating information is a skill that you can use for the rest of your life no matter what you do. Always be smart about the information you read and refer to.