Finding and Evaluating Research Sources

One of the most common places to find research sources is the internet. However, people often forget to look for signs to show that the website is a reliable source. The main thing I look for on the website is the author or sponsor. The safest websites are the ones supported by large corporations. If I can't find an author I look for a date next, to see if the source is at least current. Usually, if the website lacks both of these features I consider the site to be unreliable and I will go look for another website. Although websites are the easiest sources to reach, books are still important to use as resources. It is necessary for us to be able to find useful information out of books because using the internet is a shortcut, and for some sources that is fine, but in order to get the full effect of creating a research paper we need to research the "old fashioned" way as well. By using printed resources and researching normally our brains can grow in a way that is different from the growth from internet research. Even though we take in information while reading online, we can use short cuts so that we don't have to read unnecessary information, which allows our brains to slack off a little bit.