Evaluating Web Sites for Research: Part 2

Two weeks ago, I began a series on how to evaluate web sites for research purposes. This week I will discuss more criteria you can use to determine if a web site can be cited for your term papers and projects.

One way you can determine the reliability of a web site's information is by its currency. The currency of a web site refers to how often it is updated with new information. Just because the Internet is growing by leaps and bounds, it does not mean that there are no outdated web sites. You can sometimes determine if a site's information is current by checking it against other sources, such as other web sites, books, magazine articles, and so on.

Some professions, such as computer science or astronomy, are constantly changing, so you need to make sure that what you download is up to date. For example, if you download a web site that lists Pluto as a planet, you will need to find another source of information, because astronomers no longer consider it to be a planet. Even the field of literature changes. If you are doing research on the life of the writer Norman Mailer, you should check several sources to see if he is still living (he recently died).

Many web sites also indicate when they were last updated on the site itself; others will indicate the publication date of the articles or information on the site.

Another way to determine if a site is outdated is by clicking on the links to see if they still work. A very outdated web site will have links that lead nowhere; you will end up seeing an error message or a note that the information has been moved.