Everybody's: social dynamics and modern culture

¶ … quality of research from an opinion requires a more careful examination of the source. This is why you want to consider how those sources are selected. At which point, you can make an assessment as to which ones are the most factually accurate. The way that this will be accomplished is through: considering how a source was developed and the impact that it will have on your critical thinking skills. This will provide the greatest insights as to how to effectively conduct research and analyze a variety of different sources.

How do you consider the source and determine accuracy, authority, completeness, content, and information?

There are a number of different sources that are used during the course of conducting research. The way that you would determine them for accuracy is: by examining if the information is coming from a direct source and corroborating the information with other sources. A direct source is: when someone of authority is directly commenting about what is taking place. For example, when CNN is talking about the health care debate, they will often quote direct sources from the White House. This would be considered to be accurate information, because it is coming directly from the source. Then you have what is known as secondary sources. These are sources that will cite information from a direct source. An example of this would be: when someone says according to, they are quoting from a secondary source. Next, there is a third level of sources, where they are providing information on uncorroborated facts. This means that the source could be reporting a rumor that may or may not be true. In general, these types of sources could be considered to be blogs, chat rooms, You Tube videos and message boards.

Once you have identified the different levels of sources, you want to always corroborate the information with other sources. This means taking a fact that was disclosed at anyone of the different levels and then verifying with higher as well lower levels of sources. For example, a fact was discovered by an anonymous source at the White House would have to be corroborated with other sources. In this particular case, while this is a direct source, it must treated with caution. This means that you want to corroborate the information with other direct sources or secondary / third level sources. Normally, if the information can be verified with at least three different sources, it would be considered to be credible information.

However, when you are analyzing any of the different kinds of sources you must use flexibility and common sense. This is because some sources can appear to be legitimate, while at the same time they are not. An example of this can be seen in the book, the Red Badge of Courage, where it is a depiction of Civil War battles. Yet, when you look at little deeper, the author (Stephen Crane) wrote the book based on experiences he observed on the football field (which took place over 40 years after the Civil War ended). ("Stephen Crane") What this shows, is how flexibility and common sense must be applied when examining all sources. This will help you to most accurately identify the credibility of the source.