Evaluating information

Tips for evaluating information

Evaluating information is an important part of academic work and everyday life. We have access to more information than ever before, and emerging technologies, including generative artificial intelligence, can make it easier to produce and share inaccurate or misleading information at scale.

When you find information, pause before deciding whether to trust or use it. 

• Who or what created this information?
• Why was it created?
• What kind of source is it?
• Where did the information come from originally? 
• Do other reliable sources support the same claims?
• Is this source appropriate for your assignment? 

Two common approaches to evaluating information are SIFT and CRAAP. 

The SIFT method is especially useful for evaluating online information because it encourages you to stop, investigate the source, find better or additional coverage, and trace claims back to their original context.

The CRAAP test is a checklist that can help you remember basic questions about a source's currency, relevance, authority, accuracy, and purpose. It can be a useful starting point, especially when deciding if a source is relevant to your assignment. However, checklists work best when paired with broader strategies like SIFT, which asks you to look beyond the source itself, to verify against other sources, and to consider the context of how the information found you in today's online algorithmic environment. 

For a detailed explanation of SIFT, including example videos and strategies for checking online sources, visit the Library's Evaluating Information Guide.

All SIFT information is adapted from Mike Caulfield's materials with a CC BY 4.0 license.

Watch and learn

Watch the Sort fact from fiction online with lateral reading video by Digital Inquiry Group to see how checking beyond a webpage can help you judge whether online information is trustworthy. 

It can be especially difficult to evaluate AI-generated material. Generative AI (GenAI) tools can produce information that seems authoritative and convincing, but may be inaccurate, biased, or based on sources that do not exist. 

If you choose to use an AI tool, first be sure to check your assignment instructions and make sure you are not going against academic integrity guidelines and the learning outcomes in your course, designed for you to genuinely grow your knowledge. Follow your instructor's expectations for using and acknowledging AI use.

Always evaluate: 

• Claims using reliable, authored sources
• Quotations, references, statistics, and links 
• Whether important perspectives or context are missing