Why do I need to evaluate information?
When you search for information, you're going to find lots of it. But is it accurate and reliable? You will have to determine this for yourself, and there are a number of tools that can help on our guide to evaluating information.
One way to begin evaluating a source is to look at these five criteria in relation to the source:
- Currency: The timeliness of the information
- Relevance: The importance of the information for your needs
- Authority: The source of the information
- Accuracy: The reliability, truthfulness, and correctness of the informational content
- Purpose: The reason the information exists
Evaluating news sources can be especially tricky--our guide on this can help! You may also want to take a look at this Media Bias Chart (static version can be found here.)
Reliability of Sources
Reliability of Sources discusses what makes information reliable and explores one model for evaluating reliability (CRAAP). You'll learn to point out and apply criteria that can be used to judge the reliability of information.
Ask a Librarian
First Year Experience & Children's Literature Librarian
Sarah Fabian
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Contact:
Please feel free to email me at sfabian@emich.edu to get help over email or find a time to meet if my available appointment times don't work with your schedule.