Module 3: Evaluating Info Need
Books, articles, and websites all are examples of resources you might need for your research. But these information sources differ in several ways:
- Currency - How up-to-date is this information?
- Coverage - How comprehensive is this information?
- Authority - How trustworthy is this information?
There is no single tool to find all these things - books, articles and websites.
| Source type |
Best for... |
Examples |
| Reference Books (encyclopedias, etc) |
general background on a topic; facts |
Encyclopedia of Race, Ethnicity, and Society; Encyclopedia of American History |
| Books |
in-depth information on a topic; historical information |
Culinary fictions: food in South Asian diasporic culture; Harnessing America's wasted talent: a new ecology of learning |
| Newspapers |
current events |
New York Times; Wall Street Journal |
| Magazines |
general interest articles for a wide audience, current events, popular culture |
Time; Economist; New Yorker |
| Scholarly journals |
in-depth research on a topic, written for other scholars in a field |
Literature and History; Public Health |
| Trade publications |
general interest articles for members of a particular profession |
Advertising Age; APA Monitor |
| Websites |
current information, popular culture, government information |
www.uncg.edu, www.cnn.com |
| Search tool |
Use for... |
| Library catalog |
Finding books, DVDs, etc. that the library owns |
| Article databases |
Finding newspaper, magazine, trade publications, and scholarly journal articles |
| Search engine |
Finding websites |
For more details on currency for these types of sources, view this Info Timeline:
http://www.lib.unc.edu/instruct/tutorial/searching/timeline.html
For help guiding you through the research process, use our Assignment Calculator:
http://library.uncg.edu/acalc/index.aspx