{"id":49,"date":"2016-08-05T14:15:41","date_gmt":"2016-08-05T14:15:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/chapter\/categorizing-sources\/"},"modified":"2018-08-02T07:19:28","modified_gmt":"2018-08-02T07:19:28","slug":"categorizing-sources","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/chapter\/categorizing-sources\/","title":{"rendered":"Categorizing Sources"},"content":{"raw":"[caption id=\"attachment_48\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"500\"]<img src=\"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/navegarvela\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/86\/2016\/08\/3-sources.png\" alt=\"a sign post\" width=\"500\" height=\"400\" class=\"size-full wp-image-48\"> Understanding types of sources helps guide your search.[\/caption]Once you have your research question, you\u2019ll need information sources to answer it and meet the other information needs of your research project.\n\nThis section about categorizing sources will increase your sophistication about them and save you time in the long run because you\u2019ll understand the \"big picture\". That big picture will be useful as you plan your own sources for a specific research project, which we\u2019ll help you with in the next section <a href=\"information-needs\/\">Sources and Information Needs<\/a>.\n\nYou\u2019ll usually have a lot of sources available to meet the information needs of your projects. In today\u2019s complex information landscape, just about anything that contains information can be considered a potential source.\n\nHere are a few examples:\n\n<ul><li>Books and encyclopedias<\/li><li>Websites, web pages, and blogs<\/li><li>Magazine, journal, and newspaper articles<\/li><li>Research reports and conference papers<\/li><li>Field notes and diaries<\/li><li>Photographs, paintings, cartoons, and other art works<\/li><li>TV and radio programs, podcasts, movies, and videos<\/li><li>Illuminated manuscripts and artifacts<\/li><li>Bones, minerals, and fossils<\/li><li>Preserved tissues and organs<\/li><li>Architectural plans and maps<\/li><li>Pamphlets and government documents<\/li><li>Music scores and recorded performances<\/li><li>Dance notation and theater set models<\/li><\/ul>With so many sources available, the question usually is not whether sources exist for your project but which ones will best meet your information needs.\n\nBeing able to categorize a source helps you understand the kind of information it contains, which is a big clue to (1) whether might meet one or more of your information needs and (2) where to look for it and similar sources.\n\nA source can be categorized by:\n\n<ul><li>Whether it contains quantitative or qualitative information or both<\/li><li>Whether the source is objective (factual) or persuasive (opinion) and may be biased<\/li><li>Whether the source is a scholarly, professional or popular publication<\/li><li>Whether the material is a primary, secondary or tertiary source<\/li><li>What format the source is in<\/li><\/ul>As you may already be able to tell, sources can be in more than one category at the same time because the categories are not mutually exclusive.\n\n","rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_48\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-48\" style=\"width: 500px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/navegarvela\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/86\/2016\/08\/3-sources.png\" alt=\"a sign post\" width=\"500\" height=\"400\" class=\"size-full wp-image-48\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/86\/2016\/08\/3-sources.png 500w, https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/86\/2016\/08\/3-sources-300x240.png 300w, https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/86\/2016\/08\/3-sources-65x52.png 65w, https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/86\/2016\/08\/3-sources-225x180.png 225w, https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/86\/2016\/08\/3-sources-350x280.png 350w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-48\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Understanding types of sources helps guide your search.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Once you have your research question, you\u2019ll need information sources to answer it and meet the other information needs of your research project.<\/p>\n<p>This section about categorizing sources will increase your sophistication about them and save you time in the long run because you\u2019ll understand the &#8220;big picture&#8221;. That big picture will be useful as you plan your own sources for a specific research project, which we\u2019ll help you with in the next section <a href=\"information-needs\/\">Sources and Information Needs<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>You\u2019ll usually have a lot of sources available to meet the information needs of your projects. In today\u2019s complex information landscape, just about anything that contains information can be considered a potential source.<\/p>\n<p>Here are a few examples:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Books and encyclopedias<\/li>\n<li>Websites, web pages, and blogs<\/li>\n<li>Magazine, journal, and newspaper articles<\/li>\n<li>Research reports and conference papers<\/li>\n<li>Field notes and diaries<\/li>\n<li>Photographs, paintings, cartoons, and other art works<\/li>\n<li>TV and radio programs, podcasts, movies, and videos<\/li>\n<li>Illuminated manuscripts and artifacts<\/li>\n<li>Bones, minerals, and fossils<\/li>\n<li>Preserved tissues and organs<\/li>\n<li>Architectural plans and maps<\/li>\n<li>Pamphlets and government documents<\/li>\n<li>Music scores and recorded performances<\/li>\n<li>Dance notation and theater set models<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>With so many sources available, the question usually is not whether sources exist for your project but which ones will best meet your information needs.<\/p>\n<p>Being able to categorize a source helps you understand the kind of information it contains, which is a big clue to (1) whether might meet one or more of your information needs and (2) where to look for it and similar sources.<\/p>\n<p>A source can be categorized by:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Whether it contains quantitative or qualitative information or both<\/li>\n<li>Whether the source is objective (factual) or persuasive (opinion) and may be biased<\/li>\n<li>Whether the source is a scholarly, professional or popular publication<\/li>\n<li>Whether the material is a primary, secondary or tertiary source<\/li>\n<li>What format the source is in<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>As you may already be able to tell, sources can be in more than one category at the same time because the categories are not mutually exclusive.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"menu_order":1,"template":"","meta":{"pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-49","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":47,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/49","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/49\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50,"href":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/49\/revisions\/50"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/47"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/49\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=49"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=49"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.publiconsulting.com\/wordpress\/choosingsources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=49"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}