Assessing Field Research
If you’ve conducted experiments, surveys, interviews, observations, or any other field research in developing and supporting an argument, make sure to review your results with a critical eye. The following questions can help you evaluate your own field research:
Have you rechecked all data and all conclusions to make sure they’re accurate and warranted?
Have you identified the exact time, place, and participants in all your field research?
Have you made clear what part you played in the research and how, if at all, your role could have influenced the results or findings?
If your research involved other people, have you gotten their permission to use their words or other materials in your argument? Have you asked whether you can use their names or whether the names should be kept confidential?
If your research involved interviews, have you thanked the person or persons you interviewed and asked them to verify the words you have attributed to them?
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RESPOND •
The chapter claims that “most of the evidence that is used in arguments on public issues . . . comes with considerable baggage” (Chapter 19, “Evaluating Sources). Find an article in a journal, newspaper, or magazine that uses evidence to support a claim of some public interest. It might be a piece about new treatments for malaria, Internet privacy, dietary recommendations for schoolchildren, proposals for air-quality regulation, the rise in numbers of campus sexual assaults, and so on. Identify several specific pieces of evidence, information, or data presented in the article and then evaluate the degree to which you would accept, trust, or believe those statements. Be prepared to explain specifically why you would be inclined to trust or mistrust any claims based on the data.
Check out Goodreads (you can set up an account for free) and see what people there are recommending — or search for “common reading programs” or “common reading lists.” Then choose one of the recommended books, preferably a work of nonfiction, and analyze it by using as many of the principles of evaluation for printed books listed in this chapter as you can without actually reading the book: Who is the author, and what are his/her credentials? Who is the publisher, and what is its reputation? What can you find out about the book’s relevance and popularity: why might the book be on the list? Who is the primary audience for the book? How lengthy is it? How difficult? Finally, consider how likely it is that the book you have selected would be used in an academic paper. If you do choose a work of fiction, might the work be studied in a literature course?
Choose a news or information Web site that you visit routinely. Then, using the guidelines discussed in this chapter, spend some time evaluating its credibility. You might begin by comparing it with Google News or Arts & Letters Daily, two sites that have a reputation for being reliable.
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