Session 2
Maya Hadar
Agenda For Today
1. Introduction: Research and the internet
2. Researching using the internet: things you should know
3. The Internet as a source of quality research material
4. Searching, Evaluating and citing web sources
5.The Wikipedia controversy
6. Internet Polling
A Brief history of Internet mediated research (IMR)
 Pioneers implementing online data collection methods around the mid-
1990s Dillman (1991), Hewson (1994), Bordia (1996); Gaiser (1997); Reips
(1997)
 Reports (e.g. validation studies) have since supported the quality of data
that can be obtained in IMR (Corley & Scheepers (2002); Hewson & Charlton
(2005))
 A new era of IMR- The web as organic, collaborative, interactive, everchanging
(e.g. Wikipedia); the rise of social media (e.g. Facebook,
Twitter).
Research and the Internet
 The Internet as a source of quality material to be used in your academic
writing
 The internet as a tool for research
 Obtrusive Approach (experiments, surveys, interviews)
 Unobtrusive Approach (observation using traces and archives, e.g.
blogs, social networks
 ‘Big Data’ & indices - large data sets
 Potentially difficult to manage
 Sometimes hard to read/understand
Research and the Internet
 The Internet’s transformative impact: makes research easier, but also has
some potential dangers
 Explosion of information makes it even more necessary to have a good
analytical framework to handle it, otherwise simply information overload
 Theoretical frameworks become more, rather than less important: need to
develop a critical attitude towards information obtained via the web.
Using the Internet for Academic Research
Things you should know…
 Not everything is available on the Internet => massive amount of info,
but subject dependent
 What is available may not be as appropriate as the information in other
sources
 The Internet is only one research tool, provides access to only some of
the many sources of information available to you
 Information on the Internet is not stable; At any time, information may be
moved, altered, or deleted.
Using the Internet for Academic Research
Things you should know…
 Research on the Internet will take time (all research does)
 Not everything on the Internet is accurate, true, current, or reliable
What is a quality online resource?
 A resource fit for purpose –in academic settings that might mean peerreviewed
or just credible – e.g. information found on the British Library
website
 In some circumstances could be informal sites, news sites/sites expressing
an opinion
 Still, we should take into account some criteria which can be universally
adopted to evaluate whether sites are worth using.
What is a quality online resource?
 Fit for Purpose – things to look for:
 Original content?
 Statement of intention/intended audience
 Title/author/ date – minimum needed for citation
 Site map- gives an overview- helpful
Using the Internet for Academic Research
Finding Information online:
 There are two major ways to begin a search on a research topic: by
subject or by keyword
Searching by Subject:
 Use an academic subject directory => portals organized by
librarians/other academics providing a collection of links to sites that
are appropriate for academic research
Useful Subject directories
 Political Studies Association of the UK, highly rated gateway site
http://www.psa.ac.uk/
 Entry for each country with information on economy and politics
https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/
 British National Archives
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/default.htm
 News outlets (e.g., Thompson, Reuters)
Using the Internet for Academic Research
Finding Information online:
Searching by Keyword:
 A keyword search may be more appropriate for a very specific topic
 Use Internet search engines to do a keyword search
 There is no standard or controlled vocabulary for finding information on
the Internet. This means you will have to think of synonyms, variants in
spelling, different word endings, etc.
Using the Internet for Academic Research
Finding Information online:
 Google is one of the best Internet search engines; It displays the search
term in context and has an good results ranking system
 Google has "Basic" and "Advanced" search modes
 What’s wrong with Google?
 Too many hits, too unfocussed, sorting results by ‘popularity’, some types
of site e.g. news sites are favoured, not always helpful for academic
research
 Consider also using other search engines (subject-specific search engines,
Bing, etc.).
Using the Internet for Academic Research
“Basic" Internet searches using Google:
 Phrase searching: Use quotation marks for words that should be found
together in that order (e.g. "electoral reform")
 Multiple terms: Boolean "and" is stated as the automatic default, so
entering two or more words should retrieve pages containing all of the
terms you enter. (e.g. elections reform)
 If not all terms are found, results without them will be displayed
 To force retrieval of results for all keywords enter each word with a plus
sign (+) directly before it (e.g. +elections +reform).
Using the Internet for Academic Research
“Basic" Internet searches using Google:
 Narrowing a search: Enter more search terms to specify more clearly what
you want to find (e.g. elections reform canada)
 Broadening a search: Use "OR" to search for alternative terms at the same
time (e.g. "election reform" OR "electoral reform")
 Truncation/stemming* (a search technique which refers to the ability
to search just a portion of a word) is not available on Google.
*wom!n = woman, women
colo?r = color, colour
Using the Internet for Academic Research
“Advanced” searches using Google (https://www.google.com/advanced_search)
 See the Google Advanced Search page for more ways to search
efficiently (language, file type, etc.)
Google Scholar
Google scholar Pros =>
▪ Useful, focussing on academic websites
▪ May often pick up book chapters which can be harder to find
▪ Can download to reference manager software/easy to cite from
▪ Can often link in to full text
Google Scholar Cons =>
▪ Can be inaccurate (picks up items from bibliographies)
▪ Often randomness about results
▪ Won’t go into all institutions/databases/repositories- need subscriptions
▪ Older items often listed first as more often linked to
▪ Older items may not be available (just citations)
Specialist Search Engines – Invisible Web
 Invisible web – items that are not found by conventional search engines
because:
 Exist within sites that have been blocked by owners
 Spiders (bots) cannot penetrate them (no/ristricted access)
 Are not linked to by other sites so not found by spider
 Institutional repositories, databases (can be commercial)
 OAIster
 Solo (only searching Oxford University resources)
Why do we need to evaluate online info?
 It is always important to evaluate the information you intend to use for a
research paper => even when using printed books and articles found in a
library, but even more so for information found on the Internet
 Quality in printed resources is often assured by editors and publishers
who pay the costs of publishing, and by libraries that select what books to
buy
 Unlike most print sources, web sources do not have to be
professionally accepted and edited to be published (e.g. Wikipedia);
 Some web sites have strict editorial policies; some have none at all
Why do we need to evaluate online info?
 Reliability- Virtually any person can publish almost anything on the
Internet at any time
 Content can seem to be objective but is biased/commercial
 Sometimes the actual purpose of the web site may not be clearly
articulated
 Personal sites are used to express individual opinions, not facts
 Similar to ‘quality’- web sources do not have to be reliable- no/little
control Wikipedia
Why do we need to evaluate online info?
 Appropriateness- A basic keyword search on a search engine will find
various sources (reliable/non reliable/commercial sites, etc.)
 It is, thus, up to you to determine which are appropriate.
Why do we need to evaluate online info?
 Need for a general attitude of critical skepticism
 Check the entire document you are viewing
 Check all the "meta-data" available, ie. all clues you can find that put
the information in context or provide details about it.
Evaluation Criteria
Things to look for when evaluating information on the Internet:
 Identify the web site =>
 Informative pages
 Personal web pages
 Political/interest group pages
 Marketing-oriented / “infomercial” pages
 Academic material
Evaluation Criteria
Things to look for when evaluating information on the Internet:
 Host site or "Publisher” =>
 Web addresses often indicate the country of origin (.ca = canada, .fr
= france), or the type of organization hosting the web site
(.edu=educational, .com=commercial, .gov=governmental,
.org=organization)
 You may have to back up to the home page to find out more about the
web site on which a document is found and who is responsible for it
 If the information at the site is not original, locate the the original
source and make sure you cite it properly.
Evaluation Criteria
Things to look for when evaluating information on the Internet:
 Type of Information =>
 Many different kinds of information resources can be found on the
Internet:
 Peer-reviewed journal articles and books, government documents,
professional working papers, student essays
 Personal letters, fiction, spoofs of serious research
 In print these are usually easy to distinguish- not online.
Evaluating Criteria
 Who are they?
 What is their background or
expertise?
 Why should they be trusted to know
about the field? What are their
credentials?
 Are they affiliated with an institution
or university?
 What is their bias or point of view?
 Is it peer reviewed? Who else thinks
this is good?
 Other publications/references by the
author
 ‘About ‘ section
 Institutions’ home page
Things to look for when evaluating information on the Internet:
 Authority=> who wrote it, could be a person or an organization
Evaluating Criteria
 Date => Most, if not all, information is only relevant in a context of time
 If no date is given: suspicious
 There may be an original creation date or/and a date for when the information
was last modified (often small print at the bottom)
 Test a few links
 Look for dates in the references (bibliography)
 References to current events? (main text)
Things to look for when evaluating information on the Internet:
Evaluation Criteria
Things to look for when evaluating information on the Internet:
 Depth and scope of the information presented =>
 Does the material look like an academic research (references?
hyperlinks? footnotes?)
 Does the author consider opposing points of view?
 How closely does the site match the information for which you are
searching?
 Corroborate information whenever possible.
Why do we need to evaluate online info?
Things to look for when evaluating information on the Internet:
 Purpose => Commercial uses of the Internet are growing faster than any
other, and much of the "information" on the web is advertising
 The Internet is also a very effective propaganda tool
 Be aware of the purpose of the site and of the document, you are
viewing (hidden?)
Citing Online Information
Using and Citing Internet Sources:
 It is a good idea to check the suitable style guide/s BEFORE starting your
research, so that you know what information to include in your footnotes or
bibliography for all sources you retrieve from the Internet
 The standard citation manuals include instructions on how to cite electronic sources
in the body of your paper and in the bibliography
 Information on the Internet is protected by copyright unless specifically
stated otherwise. Be sure to cite all information used for your paper.
The Wikipedia Controversy
 Strength: free, up to date, large range of topics, scores highly on
Google, various languages
 Credibility: there is no peer review process
 Entries may deteriorate
 Unbalanced – entry on McDonald’s critical but very little about history,
problematic concerning “sensitive” issues (e.g., Israeli-Palestinian conflict)
 Gropes towards a consensus, but that it’s not the same as validated
knowledge
 A rough guide to knowledge, useful for a first/quick overview of a
subject
 Do not use in academic contexts.
New forms of Politics
 Highly individualised => People create their own political home by
framing their own ideas and channels for political action
 Easy to mobilize/manipulate people using social media
 Sharing information easily, globally => fake news?
 Micheletti argues that geographical closeness can be replaced by
Internet interactions
 Challenge:
 Traditional conceptions of politics as a process of debate, where our
views are modified as a result of argumentation, learning about the
views of others
 Highly dependent on the information presented to us/we seek/ we
find
 Feasible online?
New forms of Politics
Internet Polling
You Gov (https://today.yougov.com/)
 A community of 6M people around the world who share their political
views. The information is being analysed and posted online
Advantages:
 Cheap
 Quick, although probably no quicker than telephone polling
 People more likely to be honest, especially on sensitive issues
 People may give more thoughtful answers than when stressed by an
interviewer with time constraints
 Makes it easier to reach specific population, e.g., high income –
difficult door to door, phone, streets
 No problem of interviewer bias
 Respondent convenience.
Internet Polling
Drawbacks:
 Sampling bias => Not everyone in the population have computers
and are connected to the internet. Are those on You Gov database
typical?
 More men, relatively few elderly (You Gov has to weight elderly x 6)
You Gov’s defence:
 Biases are not huge
 Have a very large base of respondents to choose from
 Got the some election results and Pop Idol results right
 Telephone response rates falling.
Internet Polling
Conclusion:
Internet Polling
In Conclusion
 Before searching the Internet consider…
 Strategy – think through what sort of information you want and where
you might expect to find it
 Make sure you are clear and focussed about your research area – time wasting
is very easy on the Internet
 Suitability of search engine/source – Google? Google scholar?
Specific website? a bibliographic database?
In Conclusion
 Before searching the Internet consider…
 Search engine as a starting point- once you’ve found a lead,
systematically browse specific journals/authors
 Use a range of Internet tools (gateways and specialist search engines)
Evaluation Criteria: Key considerations =>
 Currency – when was this written? When updated? Are the links live?
 Reliability/Verifiability – Are there references to other credible
sites/publications? Are statements backed up? Who is allowed to
edit/add to the site?
In Conclusion
Evaluation Criteria: Key considerations =>
 Standpoint – what’s the purpose of the site? Why has the author written
it? Are there obviously unbalanced arguments?
 Fit for purpose – Is the information of an appropriate breadth and
depth for your purposes? Who is the intended audience? Does the
information add to information obtained from other sources?
In Conclusion
Next Session...
42
 Reading week- no class!
43
Thank You For Your Attention!
Questions???