Be a Research Skeptic

Investigate the Source

When we investigate the source, we're focusing on how likely it is that the creator or publisher of the information would present accurate, reliable information. We can approach this with our own research of the source and by looking for information about the creator or publisher from other sources.

Ask questions like:

• Who wrote it? Who published it? ​

• When was it published?

• Is it peer-reviewed/ under editorial oversight? ​

These questions can be helpful, but often additional context is needed. Here are a few techniques or tools we can use to find that context.

Media Bias Chart

It can be helpful to investigate how other people view a source. The Media Bias Chart is one of my favorite sources for this context because it charts sources along two axis. It will tell you if a source is mostly balanced or skews left or right. It also tells you what kind of information the source tends to produce. Original fact reporting is at the top of this list, and inaccurate or fabricated information is at the bottom. In the middle are categories like analysis or opinion. These categories of information aren't bad! However, it's important to know that is what you're looking at.

Wikipedia Reliable/Perennial Sources

This list rates publishers for suitability as citations in Wikipedia. That is a very specific use case, and your information need will likely be different. However, it can be helpful to see what this list has to say about a source, if it's included. To find your source, use Cntrl+F on your keyboard to search this page for the name of your source.

+ Wikipedia

Wikipedia has strengths and weaknesses. One of it's strengths is that it is likely to contain the kind of information about groups or publishers that is helpful to us as source evaluators. When you are looking at an article online, you can quickly find the associated Wikipedia page (if there is one) using the + Wikipedia technique.

When on the page of the source you would like to use this technique with, look at the address bar in your browser. When looking at a source, you'll see an address that contains the domain name and extension, plus the page specific address.

Here's the url for this page: https://libguides.snhu.edu/c.php?g=1234459&p=9033746

The domain name is: https://libguides.snhu

The domain extension is: .edu

The rest of the url related to this specific page: /c.php?g=1234459&p=9033746

To use + wikipedia, remove everything after the domain extension in your address bar. Then, type: + wikipedia and press enter to perform a web search. There should be a space between the end of the address and +.

You can practice this now using this page. Look for the result related to the publisher of the source that is a Wikipedia article. When performing this technique with a source you would like to evaluate, skim the Wikipedia page for:

• controversies
• designation as a hate group
• mentions of misinformation

Consider this source

Consider the article title "Vaping illness, deaths likely very rare beyond U.S., experts say"​ by Reuters. You can use the link below to visit the article if you like. Investigate this source. When you're ready, expand the panel below to see my thoughts.