Evaluate the Sources

The next step in the cycle is about evaluating your search results. After getting your search results you will want to read and evaluate to find the sources that are the best fit for your research project. Searching within the SLCC Libraries website offers a great number of specialized search tools that will help you to limit and streamline your search. Future tutorials will cover some of these tools.

One of the most useful steps you can take during this stage of your research is to read the information source’s abstract. An abstract is an author-supplied summary about the article or accompanying information source. Reading abstracts will greatly cut down on the time needed to learn the contents of any given article. Not every information source will include an abstract, but many do. Be on the lookout for them to help you evaluate your search results.

👉 Optional: For now, practice clicking on article title links to locate abstract summaries. Be sure to look past the first page of your search results to find articles that are the most relevant to your topic. Eliminate articles that are not as relevant to your topic. The more you practice reading articles and abstracts, the better you will get at evaluation of your information sources. Evaluation of information sources is very much a part of the development of your critical thinking process as it relates to research.