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SIFT Instruction

(F)ind better coverage

Look around to see if someone else has already fact-checked the claim or provided a synthesis of research or provided coverage that gives more useful information about the claim or the context of the claim. Generally, I search on the topic or about the news item, and look for other outlets reporting on the same incident or topic. 

Watch the following video to learn more:

Skill: Find better coverage with Mike Caulfield by CTRL-F.  Video is closed captioned and a transcript is available on YouTube. (4 minutes, 27 seconds.)

Need to check on rumors or viral claims?

As you become more familiar with news sources and information sites you can trust, "trade up" the topic to them. Then spend your time with a trusted source instead of trying to figure out if an unknown sources is credible and trustworthy.

Watch the following video to learn more:

Online Verification Skills- Video 4: Look for Trusted Work by CTRL-F is closed captioned and a transcript is available on YouTube. (approximately 4 minutes)

Search in Google for articles only from your trusted sources.

Add site: to your web search string, followed by your trusted source or URL. A search for Climate Change on a trusted site like Pew Research would look like this:

"climate change" site:pewresearch.org

I will only receive search results that are on my trusted site.

Screen shot of search results

Practice example

We're going to take a look at what else is available on the same general topic as the Huffpost article. Looking at the headline, I'm thinking the article is about climate change, rising sea level, and human displacement. I will use those ideas to search on Google for another source that may be more credible and less biased.

Before I get started, some information about websites:

A note about .org websites: At some point in the past, you may have been told that .org websites can always be trusted, but I am here to tell you that is a myth you need to forget. Anyone can register for a .org domain, and bad actors can use the .org to promote a false sense of security and trustworthiness. This doesn't mean that all .org are untrustworthy either.  You will still need to evaluate .org websites for credibility.

 

Information about .gov websites: Government websites should be well sourced with documented evidence. .gov is the government website domain of the United States, and at times, you will also see a prefix for a specific state, like wa.gov for a Washington state government site. On Google, you can limit your results to only .gov sites by adding site:.gov to your search. Each country has a different secondary domain for their government sites, and here is a list of international government domain equivalents.

 

Take a look at the following video to see how to search using Google for another web source.

Searching the Web for Sources (Like a librarian) by Meredith Tummeti is licensed CC BY 4.0. Closed captions are available and a transcript can be located on YouTube. (8 minutes, 35 seconds)

Tip: If you have a "trusted source" like Mike talks about, you can use the 'site: ' to search for your topic only on that site. 

Example: if the Wall Street Journal is one of my trusted sources, I could add site:wsj.com to my Google search to see only those results. 

Hint: If the article happens to be behind a paywall, look for it in the Kirk Library US NewsStream database (by article title (add quotes around the exact title.)

Next up, find other/additional viable web sources on your topic! 

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