{"id":2792,"date":"2020-11-09T12:18:56","date_gmt":"2020-11-09T12:18:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/?p=2792"},"modified":"2025-06-05T15:29:20","modified_gmt":"2025-06-05T14:29:20","slug":"evaluating-information-choosing-the-cream-of-the-crop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/evaluating-information-choosing-the-cream-of-the-crop\/","title":{"rendered":"Evaluating Information: Choosing the Cream of the Crop"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"601\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2019\/11\/agriculture-1845835_1920-1024x601.jpg\" alt=\"Field of Wheat\" class=\"wp-image-2793\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2019\/11\/agriculture-1845835_1920-1024x601.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2019\/11\/agriculture-1845835_1920-300x176.jpg 300w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2019\/11\/agriculture-1845835_1920-768x450.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/files\/2019\/11\/agriculture-1845835_1920.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 767px) 89vw, (max-width: 1000px) 54vw, (max-width: 1071px) 543px, 580px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>With the high volume of information available to you online when you begin your research, it can be difficult to know which of the sources you find to actually use in your assignments or essays.&nbsp; Ultimately, you\u2019ll want to choose the information that is of good quality and that can help you to answer your research questions most effectively.&nbsp; This means you need to make some critical decisions about the information you have found.&nbsp; Even if the materials you find are from reliable sources, such as <a href=\"https:\/\/libsearch.ncl.ac.uk\/\">Library Search<\/a> or a Subject Database like <a href=\"https:\/\/libsearch.ncl.ac.uk\/permalink\/f\/1jraif3\/NCL_ALMA61108923400002411\">Scopus<\/a> you\u2019ll need to consider how the information you\u2019ve found compares to other information and if it is suitable for your purposes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To help you make effective critical decisions you\u2019ll need to think about these key areas:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Currency<\/strong> \u2013 is the information up-to-date?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Relevance<\/strong> \u2013 does it help you answer your research question?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Authority<\/strong> \u2013 who wrote it?&nbsp; How qualified are the authors?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Accuracy<\/strong> &#8211; how did the authors of the information reach their conclusions? What evidence and data have they used?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Purpose<\/strong> \u2013 Why was it written? <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The video below looks at these in more detail:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"ASK Online Learning Resources 2.1: Evaluating Information - Six questions\" width=\"525\" height=\"295\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/lkRva8muMAc?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>See the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncl.ac.uk\/academic-skills-kit\/information-and-digital-skills\/evaluating-information\/\">Academic Skills Kit<\/a> for more advice on selecting suitable information for your assignments and for more on the ins and outs of critical thinking take a look at this great blog from the Writing Development Centre<a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/academicskills\/2015\/11\/19\/shopping-around-for-a-critical-opinion\/\">: Shopping Around for a Critical Opinion<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>With the high volume of information available to you online when you begin your research, it can be difficult to know which of the sources you find to actually use in your assignments or essays.&nbsp; Ultimately, you\u2019ll want to choose the information that is of good quality and that can help you to answer your &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/evaluating-information-choosing-the-cream-of-the-crop\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Evaluating Information: Choosing the Cream of the Crop&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8034,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[114],"tags":[43,44,45,25,10,142,46,36,2,47,48,49,18,50,4,27,51,52,28,95,37,53,29,54,55,23,22,56,57,21,11,16,30,135,9,20,62,63,64,65,66,67,38,6,70,100,33,41,71,34,19,35,42,72,24,73,74],"class_list":["post-2792","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-top-tips","tag-agribusiness","tag-agriculture","tag-animal","tag-linguistics","tag-archaeology","tag-architecture-2","tag-biology","tag-biomed","tag-business","tag-chemeng","tag-chemengnuis","tag-chemistry","tag-chinese-and-japanese","tag-civil","tag-classics","tag-combhon","tag-computing","tag-countryside","tag-communication","tag-culture-and-heritage","tag-dentistry","tag-earth","tag-education","tag-eee","tag-electricalnuis","tag-english-language","tag-english-literature","tag-environeng","tag-environsci","tag-film","tag-art","tag-french","tag-geography","tag-geospatial","tag-history","tag-italian","tag-marinesci","tag-marinetech","tag-marinenuis","tag-maths","tag-mecheng","tag-mechnuis","tag-medicine","tag-philosophy","tag-physics","tag-planning-and-landscape","tag-politics","tag-psychology","tag-reneweng","tag-sociology","tag-spanish-and-latin-american","tag-speech","tag-sport","tag-sustainability","tag-translating-and-interpreting","tag-transport","tag-water"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2792","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8034"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2792"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2792\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7431,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2792\/revisions\/7431"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2792"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2792"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/subject-support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2792"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}