CORE 172: Religion and Politics: Evaluating Information

C - Currency

The timeliness of the information:

• When was the information published or posted?
• Has the information been revised or updated?
• Does your topic require current information, or will older sources work as well?
• Are the links functional?

R - Relevance

The importance of the information for your needs:

• Does the information relate to your topic or answer your question?
• Who is the intended audience?
• Is the information at an appropriate level (i.e. not too elementary or advanced for your needs)?
• Have you looked at a variety of sources before determining this is one you will use?
• Would you be comfortable citing this source in your research paper?

A - Authority

The source of the information:

• Who is the author/publisher/source/sponsor?
• What are the author's credentials or organizational affiliations?
• Is the author qualified to write on the topic?
• Is there contact information, such as a publisher or email address?
• Does the URL reveal anything about the author or source?

A - Accuracy

The reliability, truthfulness, and correctness of the content:

• Where does the information come from?
• Is the information supported by evidence?
• Has the information been reviewed or refereed?
• Can you verify any of the information in another source or from personal knowledge?
• Does the language or tone seem unbiased and free of emotion?
• Are there spelling, grammar or typographical errors?

P - Purpose

The reason the information exists:

• What is the purpose of the information? Is it to inform, teach, sell, entertain or persuade?
• Do the authors/sponsors make their intentions or purpose clear?
• Is the information fact, opinion or propaganda?
• Does the point of view appear objective and impartial?
• Are there political, ideological, cultural, religious, institutional or personal biases?

The CRAAP Test is an evaluation method that was designed by librarian Sarah Blakeslee at the Meriam Library California State University, Chico. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

Evaluating sources to determine their trustworthiness, credibility, and reliability is challenging.

Image Credit: SIFT-Infographic by Mike Caulfield under CC BY 4.0

SIFT is a helpful acronym for initially evaluating source credibility. Developed by Mike Caufield, SIFT stands for:

STOP.

Pause and ask yourself if you recognize the information source and if you know anything about the website or the claim's reputation.

No? Then proceed with the following. If you start getting too overwhelmed during the other moves, pause and remember your original purpose.     

INVESTIGATE the source.

Take a minute to identify where this information comes from (like looking it up in Wikipedia) and consider the creator's expertise and agenda. Is this source worth your time?

For example, a company that sells health food products may not be the best source for information about health benefits/risks of consuming coconut oil. A research study funded by a pharmaceutical company is also suspect.   

FIND better coverage.

Sometimes it's less important to know about the source and more important to assess their claim. Look for credible sources; compare information across sources and determine whether there appears to be a consensus.

For example, look up the news event you found on social media with one of the library’s newspapers like The New York Times or The Wall Street Journal.

TRACE claims, quotes, and media back to the original context.

Sometimes online information has been removed from its original context (for example, a medical study published in an academic journal was summarized in a web article). If needed, trace the information back to the original source in order to recontextualize it.

Modified from Mike Caulfield's SIFT (Four Moves) and Andrea Baer and Dan Kipnis' Evaluating Online Sources. Both are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Later, when you determine that the site is worth your time, you can analyze the source's content more carefully.