Tutorial: Evaluating Information: Evaluating Information

Additional resources for evaluating the information that you find

Tired of fake news? Check out these guides on spotting false and misleading popular information.

Currency

• When it comes to health, you often need current, up-to-date information. Check the website for a copyright date, or 'last updated' date, often at the very bottom of the page.
• Try the links on the page. If many of them are 'broken', it's likely that the page has not been updated or maintained.

Relevance

• Check that the information is relevant to your question. Choose your search terms carefully to retrieve the most relevant results.
• Who is the intended audience of the website? Is the information meant for health consumers (lay people) or health professionals?

Authority

• A good website will provide clear information as to the author/owner of the site and the source of the information. You should be able to find an 'About' link somewhere on the page.
• Legitimate sites often provide contact information.
• The web address can be a clue to authorship: .edu indicates an educational institution and .gov indicates a government website. 

Accuracy

• The accuracy of the information can be difficult to determine, but some clues may be a warning sign. Trust your judgement and beware of sites that make health claims that you know to be false or that are debunked by another reliable, trustworthy source.
• Beware of biased or opinionated language.
• Steer clear of websites that are poorly written, full of grammatical errors and spelling mistakes, or lots of exclamation points.

Purpose

• The purpose of a reliable health information website should be to teach or inform. The information should be objective and impartial.
• Beware of sites whose primary purpose seems to be selling products, entertaining, or sites that are strongly biased or opinionated.