Evaluating Individual Sources

The saying "Don't judge a book by its cover" can apply to all types of resources. As you go through your research process, you may come across a vast number of resources on your topic. A novice researchers will accept the first document he or she finds, or else judge the quality of the resource based only on the look and feel of the item. In contrast, an expert researcher will judge the quality of an item based upon the suitability of its contents and the quality of the evidence and arguements. Use this learning module, as a framework to guide you from lower levels of evaluation that examine the suitabilty of sources, to higher levels of analysis on the quality of the research content and rhetoric within the ongoing scholarly conversation.

 

Step 1: In order to pick and choose among all these books, articles, videos, webpages, and other sources, apply this simple framework to help you quickly decide whether the resources that you find are suitable or not.

The CRAAP framework

• Currency
• Relevance
• Authority
• Accuracy
• Purpose

 

return to top | previous page | next page