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Minor People and Goods on the move: F1

This Libraryguide is aimed at students of the F1 minor (school year 2021/2022)

Evaluating your resources

Relevancy

Information is relevant when it helps you answering your research question. You assess the information on the basis of format, content and degree of up-to-dateness.

Content and level of information
Ask yourself the following questions:

  • Does the information answer my research question?
  •  Are the quality and the level of the information appropriate to my research question and the aim of the research?

Which publications are most suitable depends on your information requirement. I.e. if you need current, in-depth information on a topic it is better to consult recent journal articles in stead of a handbook.

Currency
The term ‘current’ usually refers to recent events or developments. In order to determine whether information is current, check whether it still reflects the present situation. A book or article that was not written recently may still be current.

Usually current information is required, but not always. The importance of this criterion depends on your research question.

Completeness
Are you sure you haven‘t overlooked any relevant information? Have you considered all points of view? Although being comprehensive is usually not possible and at this stage in your academic career not strictly necessary, you should always try to be as complete as possible in the literature you are using for your research.

 

Reliability

How credible and objective is the information you found? There are several aspects to take into consideration when you are assessing how reliable your information is. These aspects relate to the origin of the information as well as its quality.

Authority

  • What do you know about the author? Is he an authority on the subject? Is he a recognized author in his subject area? Has he been cited by others? Which organization does he work for?
  •  What do you know about the organization? Publications by well-known and respected organizations are generally more reliable than material published by vague charitable foundations with dubious or unclear objectives.
  • Does the author or organization receive funding from sponsors? Sponsorship is not necessarily a problem, but be aware of any commercial interests that may be involved.
  • Is the quality of the publication assessed? If so, is this done by editors? Are articles peer reviewed?  Peer-reviewed articles are very reliable because they have been critically assessed by more than one expert/academic.
     

Check the content of the information you found on:

Accuracy

  • Are the supposedly factual descriptions correct? Check whether they are backed up by information in other sources.
  • Are opinions supported by facts?

Objectivity

  • Is informing the reader the author's primary goal, or is he rather trying to persuade his audience? (Opinion-forming, propaganda, etc.)
  • Is the information based on hard facts or on opinions?
  •  Is the subject explored from different perspectives?

Verifiability

  • Are source references provided?
  • What is the quality of the cited sources?
  •  Is it possible to verify whether the information is correct and complete?

 

How to cite?

This video explains what you should pay attention to when you want to use information from a source. (watch from 4:50)

Citing rules

Citing a source correctly is important because it shows the reader where the information was found.

There are different ways of citing resources. At the BUas Academy for Built Environment and Logistics the APA method is used. APA was developed by the American Psychology Association.

This website by the Library of HAN university of applied sciences is a useful APA resource.You can find tips on citing correctly in your reference list and in your text.

BUas Library has also created a  libraryguide on referencing.

Using images & pictures

Do you want use images or pictures in your report? Please have a look at our BUas Libraryguide on Multimedia & Copyright.