(T)racing things (claims, quotes, and media) back before trusting or reusing information you’ve found helps you understand the source's original context and keeps you from perpetuating overly exaggerated and even false claims. You'll get a better understanding of the topic you are exploring, too.
Here are several (t)race it back strategies to help you verify summaries and images from unfamiliar sources and help you find the original source of information. The first set of strategies are for text-based information sources, and the second set of strategies are for pictures and images.
Watch this video by Mike Caufield on how you can use this strategy to quickly understand the context around a claim (without reading the entire story). Have a notebook with you (or grab the transcription) and write out any new vocabulary that you encounter:
This strategy is especially useful when you have a summary (AI generated or not), and want to verify the claims and get to the original source. You can think of it as another version of citation chaining backward, but for a different purpose.
When outdated sources are circulated through social media, it can quickly become misinformation. In our example with the flying spiders, simply checking the publication date (2022) would have saved that friend a lot of unneeded anxiety! Since we haven't had a catastrophic giant spider invasion after the time of publication, you can already call bull💩 on this article.
This strategy is simple: check the date.
Use what you know about the flow of information and citation chaining to get to the most recent information about your topic.
News articles don’t always include direct links to their sources. They may mention the name of a researcher or institution, but not provide a full citation or link.
In the article, “Dinosaur-killing asteroid strike gave rise to Amazon rainforest,” the authors note that their information came from “Mónica Carvalho, from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institution” (BBC News, 2021). But, how do you get to the actual article?
Direct quotes - If there are direct quotes from the original article, use the phrase to Google the study. Even if search results don't give you the original source, you may find links to the study other sources. This may not work if the quote comes from an interview with the researchers instead of the study.
Find related information - Look for the researcher's organization, name, article title, or name of the journal. Use this information in Google Scholar, Quick Search, or a subject database. If your search gives you too many results, use your Boolean kung-fu and stealthy keywords to narrow things down.
Get help - Reach out to your Cy-brarian if you still can't find the original article. They know a lot of tricks and databases to get you the information.
In this example, you have a researcher’s name, “Mónica Carvalho,” and their organization, “the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institution.”
Searching for the author’s name in Google Scholar brings up over 25 articles they have written. To help narrow it down, you add the "Smithsonian Tropical Research Institution" and the keyword "rainforest" to your search.
Voila!
The article, “Extinction at the end-Cretaceous and the origin of modern Neotropical rainforests” published in Science appears at the top of the search results. Nice job!
Misinformation happens when a legitimate image is used in a different context, or when an image is manipulated through Photoshop or AI.
Click on the two tabs to learn techniques you can use with images.
How can you tell something has been photoshopped? Or, how can you tell that real photos are miscaptioned or misexplained? Or, what if you have an image with no description at all?
You can put the magnifying glass away — no need to examine image pixels for evidence of photoshopping. Instead, watch Mike Caufield's video on how to find a photo in its original context. Have a notebook with you (or grab the transcription) and write out any new vocabulary that you encounter:
For images without details, you can use either TineyeLinks to an external site. or Google Image SearchLinks to an external site. to find the original source.
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