How to evaluate information in an article!
The CRAAP test evaluates sources based on five criteria. These include: Currency, Relevance, Authority, Accuracy,and Purpose .
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Currency |
•What is the publication date?
•Books—Year
•Journal articles– year, possibly month
•Newspaper articles– Month, day, year
•Websites—Year
•Articles on a website—Month, day, year
•Currency is determined by subject area, context, and purpose
•Most subject areas, 3-5 years is current
•Negotiable depending on topic
•Exemptions are historic research, foundational texts, and primary sources
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Relevance |
•Scope, coverage, and depth of info in relation to your needs
•How does this item relate to your topic?
•Does it provide the info you need?
•Who is the intended audience?
•Other researchers? General public? Adults? Children?
•Have you looked at other sources before determining this is the one you need?
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Authority |
•What is the source of this info?
•Author
•Corporate author
•Government agency
•What are the author’s credentials?
•Why do they have the authority to provide info on this topic?
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Accuracy |
•Reliability and correctness of info
•Does it tell you where it is getting its info?
•Citations?
•Links to other sources?
•In-text sources?
•Professionalism of writing
•Free from spelling and grammatical errors?
•Is the language professional? Objective?
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Purpose |
•What is the purpose of this item?
•Provide academic research?
•Inform on a topic?
•Entertain?
•Sell something?
•Persuade you?
•Is there a political, ideological, religious, or institutional bias?
•Is the bias clearly identified on the page?
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How to evaluate information in an article!
The 3R Method is a set of three questions that asks you to make critical thinking decisions to evaluate the appropriateness and usefulness of a source for your assignment/project/class.
| Relevant | Reliable | Recent |
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Look beyond the abstract. Skimming the results/conclusion can provide a better idea of the main topics of an article. For a webpage, read at least the first few paragraphs. Look at the titles in the works cited / reference list. Are they relevant to your topics or are all of the sources used talking about something else. The content directly references your topic. The primary subject is related to your topic. Your topic can use most / all of the information in the source |
Look up the author. Often, bios are included and link through the author’s name. However, sometimes you need to look elsewhere. Everyone is biased all the time. You should look for attempts to remain more factual and less descriptive, emotional, and promotional. Articles that cite many other sources, and cite sources that pass the 3R Method, are usually more objective. Articles should disclose any conflict of interest or funding they received as well. | “Recentness” can be subjective. What is your topic? Is it technology? Covid 19? The Biden Administration? Your sources will need to be within the past 2 years to be useful. It is Paleontology? Historical Fashion? Mathematics? Your sources could be 10-15 years old and still be recent enough. |
How to evaluate information from a website!
The first move is the simplest. STOP reminds you of two things.
First, when you first hit a page and start to read it — STOP. Ask yourself whether you know and trust the website or source of the information. If you don't, use the other moves to get a sense of what you're looking at. Don't read it or share it until you know what it is.
Second, after you begin the process and use the moves it can be too easy to go down a rabbit hole, chasing after more and more obscure facts or getting lost in a "click cycle". If you feel yourself getting overwhelmed in your fact-checking efforts, STOP and take a second to remind yourself what your goal is. Adjust your strategy if it isn't working. Make sure you approach the problem at the right amount of depth for your purpose.
Investigating the source means knowing what you’re reading before you read it. This doesn't mean you have to do a Pulitzer prize-winning investigation into a source before you engage with it. But taking sixty seconds to figure out where information is coming from before reading will help you decide if it is worth your time, and if it is, help you to better understand its significance and trustworthiness.
Follow this link to learn more: Information Evaluation: Move Two: Investigate the Source (Links to an external site.)
Sometimes, when you investigate the source (Move Two), you’ll find that the source is sufficient for your needs. Other times, however, you may not be able to determine the reliability of a source. Often, we don’t really care about the source at all—we just want to get an accurate story on the subject from somewhere.
That’s where Move Three comes into play! When the initial source you encounter is low quality and you just care about the claim, your best strategy might be to find a better source altogether.
In order to find better coverage, you can do a “quick check” on a claim/story. Simply type keywords from the article title into Google and (1) observe any consensus, disagreement or controversy on the story, and (2) determine whether the claim is true or false by trying to find reporting by other sources you can confirm are credible. If your Google search shows that this story is being covered by multiple outlets, that’s a good sign—after all, most big (true) stories will get covered by multiple, major news outlets.
Follow this link to learn more: Information Evaluation: Move Three: Find Better Coverage (Links to an external site.)
Most of the stuff you see on the web is not original reporting or research. Instead, it is often commentary on the re-reporting of re-reporting on some original story or piece of research. And that can be a problem because, in most cases, the more a story is passed around, the more it starts to become a bit warped.
Very often, by the time a story finds you on the web, it has been altered so much that it presents a radically wrong version of an event or a piece of research. The person you are reading usually did no original reporting, made no phone calls to check facts, and often barely skimmed the original story before writing up their blog post, thinkpiece, hot take, or re-reported news item. And so they either get things wrong by mistake, or, in some cases, intentionally mislead.
Follow this link to learn more: Information Evaluation: Move Four: Trace Claims, Quotes and Media to Their Original Context
*Information on this page is taken from LAVC (2021) Information Evaluation: What is the SIFT Method? https://lib.lavc.edu/information-evaluation
All of the fact checking organizations linked below are nonpartisan and transparent about their processes and staff.
Additional Fake News Resources
A step-by-step guide to reporting fake news articles that are shared on Facebook to help stop it from spreading.
A checklist guide from NPR to help you identify fake news.
Strategies for determining the reliability of sources.
UW-Green Bay Libraries / Research Guides / Identifying Bias
Brown, D. [TED-Ed] ( 2014, Jun 5). How to choose your news - Damon Brown. YouTube.
