Introduction
The Mundt Library Home Page
Information Quality

Contents:
Module 1: How to Solve an Information Problem
Module 2: Search Techniques
Module 3: SD Library Network
Module 4: Proquest
Module 5: Infotrac
Module 6: Lexis-Nexis
Module 7: OCLC Firstsearch
Module 8: 
Module 9: 
Module 10: 
Module 11: Internet Searching
Module 12: Evaluating Internet sources
Module 13: Scholarly vs. Popular
Module 14: Citing sources
Module 15: How to Get Material Not Available Online

Introduction. Information Quality

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Your goal in research is not to find just any information but to find good, reliable information.

If you use unreliable sources, your own paper, essay, etc. will be unreliable and unbelievable. In most cases, you are not an expert. So to be believable to your readers, you must bring to your paper the opinions and research of experts. Such sources are written by the experts themselves or rely on expert opinion/research for their content.

Quality control of information is maintained by editing and peer-review. Magazines have editors and editorial review boards to select material and assure its quality. Scholarly journals not only have editors and editorial boards but are also "refereed" to ensure quality.

Definition. A "refereed journal" is one in which articles are selected for publication by a process of peer review. An author submits an article for publication; the editor sends it out for review to 3 or 4 specialists in the same field of study; and the reviewers comment on the value and quality of the article. A reviewer might recommend publishing the article, recommend publishing after changes are made, or recommend not publishing the article.

You can maximize your chances of finding good quality material and can minimize the time invested by using search tools that only include edited or peer-reviewed material.

Such search tools are not free, because creating them requires time, money, and human resources. The Mundt Library buys these search tools or buys online access to the search tools for you. Several of the modules describe the search tools -- "information services" -- to which the library subscribes. These information services provide access to many databases of good quality material. You get to them through the Internet, but you are not "searching the Internet" when you use the information services.

The problem with searching the Internet

... is the lack of quality control. Anyone can put anything "out there" on the Web. It is chock full of useless junk with some pearls scattered here and there, and you must be able to tell the difference.

The Internet is very different from the information services to which the library subscribes.

• The information services carefully select the databases they include.
• The database publishers carefully select the journals and other materials to be included in their databases.
• The publishers of the journals and other materials select and carefully edit the material they publish.

Because there is no mechanism for quality control of the Internet, every item you find when searching the Internet must be suspect until you find proof of its reliability. Although a search of the Internet may pull up a list of results quickly, evaluating the items you find can take a long time. 

The fact is, finding articles of good quality is usually faster
using subscription information services.

When researching topics for composition classes, using information services before searching the Internet is usually easier. You will have developed some knowledge of your topic based on what you find in reliable sources before having to deal with (evaluate) what you find in the flea market known as the Internet.

The Internet does have pearls -- excellent and valuable material. Some kinds of questions can be answered more quickly by using the Internet than by using the information services. When you learn to use information services and the Internet effectively, you will begin to get a sense of which is more likely to produce the results you need.

So, here are the key points:

• You need to be comfortable searching the online information services AND the Internet.

• You need to learn how to evaluate material so that you select good sources.

The modules in this online manual/workbook are intended to teach how to solve information problems -- how to find and evaluate material and how to select good sources.

Module 1 describes the process for solving an information problem.

Module 2 teaches the online search techniques for successfully finding good material in electronic sources.

Modules 3 - 10 introduce the various information services.

Module 11 focuses on improving searches of the Internet.

Module 12 describes the criteria used to evaluate material found when searching the Internet.

Module 13 teaches how to evaluate sources based on their "scholarliness" along a continuum from popular magazines to scholarly journals

Module 14 provides help citing sources.

Module 15 tells how to get materials that are not available online.

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