Resources for Evaluating Information
This page offers a compilation of resources related to evaluating information. Some are from our own team and others are from reliable sources. We hope you will find many of them to be useful as you hone your own skills or help others build their skills. If you find other useful resources, please reach out using our online form, so that we can evaluate and add them if appropriate.
Resources that can help when evaluating information
Printable resources
- Evaluating information: What You Should Know (PDF)
- Logical Fallacies: What You Should Know (PDF)
- Website evaluation criteria, developed by the World Health Organization’s Vaccine Safety Net program
- How To Know What To Trust (PDF)
- Surgeon General’s 7 Common Types of Health Misinformation (PDF)
Articles
- Policy: Twenty tips for interpreting scientific claims – Sutherland WJ, Spiegelhalter D, Burgman M. Nature. 2013 Nov 21;503(7476):335-7.
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8 Ways Social Media Distorts Our Realities – In this article the Center for Humane Technology examines how social media shapes and distorts society and details actions that can be taken.
Websites
Fact-checking sites
- FactCheck.org (includes SciCheck for checking science-based information)
- SciCheck.org
- PolitiFact
- Snopes
- The Washington Post Fact Checker
Scientists addressing misinformation
- Science-based medicine
- Skeptical Raptor
- Those Nerdy Girls
- Beyond the Noise with Dr. Paul Offit, Substack | YouTube
Other websites with helpful information
- News Literacy Project (NLP) – Provides information for educators and the public to help them become active consumers of news and information.
- AllSides – Provides media bias ratings for hundreds of media outlets and writers to help the public identify different perspectives.
- Media Bias Charts – See media bias charts from 2016 until today, offered by Ad Fontes Media.
- What is a good study?: Guidelines for evaluating scientific studies – Article from Science-based life blog offering eight questions to ask about scientific studies.
- Evaluating Internet Health Information: A Tutorial from the National Library of Medicine – A 16-minute online tutorial that helps people learn to evaluate online health information, offered by the U.S. National Library of Medicine.
- Skepticism 101: The Skeptical Studies Curriculum Resource Center – Resources offered by Skeptic.com.
- Surgeon General’s Community Toolkit for Addressing Health Misinformation – The US Surgeon General offers this information for how to recognize health misinformation and what you can do about it.
- National Association for Media Literacy Education (NAMLE) – Organization that provides resources, events, and community interaction to improve the ability to access, analyze, evaluate, create and act using all forms of communication.
- Rumor Guard – Verifying Tweets – This tool, presented by the News Literacy Project, was created after Twitter’s blue check verification became a paid service. Rumor Guard provides evaluation guidelines to determine both the accuracy and authenticity of tweets.
Reverse image search tools
Use these tools to see if the image you are viewing was altered:
Mobile apps
Informable mobile App — A free app by the News Literacy Project aims to help players practice differentiating between good and bad information they find online.
Videos
- Sort Fact from Fiction Online with Lateral Reading – Video from The Stanford History Education Group discusses the practice of lateral reading and how it helps when evaluating information.
- Check Yourself with Lateral Reading: Crash Course Navigating Digital Information #3 – Video from Youtube education channel CrashCourse examines how to critically examine a source and fact check in real-time with lateral reading.
Books
- Nibbling on Einstein’s Brain: The Good, The Bad & The Bogus in Science by Diane Swanson, 2001
- Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens Our Future by Chris Mooney and Sheril Kirshenbaum, 2010
- The Life-Changing Science of Detecting Bullshit by John V. Petrocelli, 2021
- Web Literacy For Student Fact Checkers by Michael A. Caulfield, 2017
Materials in this section are updated as new information and vaccines become available. The Vaccine Education Center staff regularly reviews materials for accuracy.
You should not consider the information in this site to be specific, professional medical advice for your personal health or for your family's personal health. You should not use it to replace any relationship with a physician or other qualified healthcare professional. For medical concerns, including decisions about vaccinations, medications and other treatments, you should always consult your physician or, in serious cases, seek immediate assistance from emergency personnel.