Finding Information on the Web

Evaluating What You Find

Evaluating resources you find, for accuracy and reliability of contents as well as relevance to your research purposes, is a crucial step not to be taken lightly. This is especially true when using sources on the Internet. Print sources in the library are reviewed first by a publisher before printing, then by librarians and faculty before purchase. This is also true of online sources purchased or subscribed to by the library.  This does not guarantee the contents are correct, but they are at least likely to be reasonable and useful contributions to scholarly research.  But anyone with a computer and a modem can put up a freely accessible, unreviewed, unregulated, unmonitored Web page. Some of what is freely available on the Web is very reliable and valuable for scholarly research, but much of it is not. You should always consider a Web site doubtful until proven reliable.  Here are some general rules and points to consider to assess the reliability of sources you find: (See the section What you can tell from a URL below for more tips on how to determine answers to many these questions) 

Who is the author? In addition to any information you can find at the Web site (an "about" page, an email address to contact the author, links to other pages in the site, etc.), you can search the Web, ask your professor, check biographical sources, check citation indexes, find articles/books/reviews/etc about the author, to determine the author's qualifications for writing on this subject, or whether the author is a respected scholar in the field (what do others say about the author). 

What are the author's sources? Is this a report of the author's own experiments, surveys, field work, etc? If so, is the author's research methodology appropriate for the subject? Is this the author's own thoughts or opinions? If so, is the author a qualified authority in the field, or does the author at least display a good understanding of the field? Does the author cite other sources (online or print)? How reliable are those sources? 

What is the author's purpose? Is this an opinion piece designed to persuade readers, is it intended to be an objective examination or presentation of information, is it trying to sell something, is there a political/social/etc agenda? What is the author's perspective or point of view? Do you see any unstated or undefended biases?

Who is the "publisher"? Is the page officially endorsed by an organization or institution? If so, what can you find out about the "publisher"? Is the page a section of a larger, reviewed and edited work (e.g. an article in an online periodical publication)? Or, is the page a personal page, not necessarily reviewed or endorsed by any organization or institution? 

When was it published or last updated? In other words, how current is the information? This can be difficult to determine. A page or a site often includes a "last updated" date. This, however, does not mean that all the contents were reviewed and updated at that date. Does the page state when as well as how the information, facts, data, etc. were gathered, compiled, recorded, etc? 

Stability of the site and its contents? Unlike print publications, which can only be altered by printing a new edition (and even then the old edition is still available), Web pages, especially personal pages, can come and go or be changed frequently and easily. It may be useful to print or save particularly useful or important pages to make sure you do not lose access to the contents. 

Has the page or site been reviewed? And if so, by whom (is the reviewer reliable)? Using subject directories compiled by subject specialists is a good way to find positively reviewed Web sites. Many search engines allow you to enter a URL and search for pages that link to it, which may also include reviews. Print publications (including newspapers, scholarly journals, etc.) sometimes include reviews of Web sites; look for citations to reviews in appropriate indexes and databases. 

Software or hardware requirements? Does the site have features that require specific software or hardware to access? Can you access everything the site offers? 

When in doubt, verify. If you find any reason to be suspicious of the reliability of a Web page's facts, statistics, interpretations, conclusions, assertions, etc. (and remember, suspicion should be your default position when evaluating a Web page), verify it with a more reliable source (print or online) before you use it for your own research. 

What you can tell from a URL: 

As pointed out in the section on URLs (uniform resource locators), a URL is of the form: 

transfer protocol://servername.domain/directory/subdirectory/filename.filetype

The URL for a page is displayed in the "Location" (Netscape) or "Address" (Internet Explorer) box of your browser. By looking at the URL, such as the one for this page (http://www.wesleyan.edu/libr/tut/websearch/evaluate.html), you can determine such things as: 

• Transfer protocol - The type of information being transferred, and the method of transfer: 
  • http - hypertext transfer protocol. The standard format for the Web. Your browser reads the contents of the file and interprets how to display the contents on your screen.  
  • ftp - file transfer protocol. A method for transferring files to your computer. Make sure your virus detection software is up to date before downloading any files if you are not convinced of their safety. 
  • gopher - gopher was a text-only precursor to the Web, still occasionally used for text files.
  • news - newsgroup, or online bulletin board. Newsgroups can contain valuable and reliable information, but most are unmoderated, and anyone can contribute, so verify the information and/or the contributor before relying on anything you find in a newsgroup. 
• Domain - The type of institution, organization, etc. that hosts the computer on which the Web page resides. Some common domains are: 
  • edu - education. For pages at educational institutions, be sure to determine whether it is an "official" page whose contents are endorsed by the institution or department, or whether it is a personal page of a professor or student. 
  • gov - government. Which department, agency, etc, is responsible for the page? 
  • com - commercial. Includes news sources, but also includes companies' information and marketing pages: who hosts the page, what is the purpose of the page? 
  • org - organization. Includes many advocacy groups: what group is responsible for the page, what is the purpose of the group and of the page? 
  • uk, jp, aw, ... - country codes (uk: United Kingdom; jp: Japan; aw: Aruba). Usually, "us" (United States) is not included in U.S. URLs, but other countries' codes are. 
• Personal or "official" page - Personal pages often (but not always) have a "~" in the URL, or a directory called "/users/" or "/people/" followed by a name. The contents of a personal page are not necessarily endorsed by an institution or organization hosting the Web site. 
• URL "chopping" - You can "chop" a URL to move up "higher" in the hierarchy of directories and folders. This can be helpful if you want to find out what else is at the Web site or who is responsible for the page or site you are viewing. For example, chopping the URL for this page to "http://www.wesleyan.edu/libr/tut/" would take you to the list of all the online tutorials which Wesleyan librarians have created. Chopping it further to "http://www.wesleyan.edu/libr/" would take you to the Wesleyan Library home page, where you can find out more about the institution that hosts this page. 

Next: Citing What You Find     

Contents - Internet - Searching - Search Engines - Subject Directories
Invisible Web - Listservs and Newsgroups - Evaluating - Citing