It’s essential that you evaluate the quality and authority of the sources you intend to use in your academic work. Explore this section to discover why evaluation is so important and how to evaluate material.
The CRAAP test consists of five main criteria that you can use to judge the academic quality of information:
- Currency
- Relevancy
- Authority
- Accuracy
- Purpose
Each criteria encourages you to ask a series of questions of your sources to help you determine if they should play a role in informing your work. This process does not need to be taxing or time consuming; indeed many of these checks can be completed without having to read the article or source you find in full.
Currency: the timeliness of the information
Relevancy: the importance of the information for your needs
Authority: the source of the information
Accuracy: the reliability and correctness of the content
Purpose: the reason the information exists
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