Types of Information Key Takeaways
Claire Nickerson
1. There are lots of different ways to categorize sources.
You can categorize sources by whether they contain quantitative or qualitative information (or both); by whether they are objective or persuasive ; by whether they are scholarly, professional/trade , or popular; and whether they are primary, secondary , or tertiary.
2. Information sources come in many formats.
You may have used some of these formats, like books and magazine articles, before, but using others, like data sources and people as sources, may have a learning curve. Different source formats are created by different types of people, and creating them involves different processes and different amounts of time.
3. You should plan what types of sources you will use based on your information need.
You can use information sources to learn, develop, describe, report, answer, and convince. What formats of sources are appropriate will depend on your discipline and the final product you plan to produce (e.g. a paper or a poster).
Information that involves a measurable quantity. Examples are length, mass, temperature, and time.
Information that involves a descriptive judgment that uses words instead of numbers. Some examples are gender, country of origin name, and emotional state.
From a neutral standpoint or perspective.
Based on a specific viewpoint, belief or opinion.
Sources that contain information involved in the scholarly conversation that takes place primarily among academics at conferences, presentations and in books, blogs, pre-prints, and journal articles.
Trade sources are written by practitioners (not scholars) in a field, for an audience of others who work in the same field.
Sources that provide second-hand information. That is, they are not the original information but are about the original information. For instance, such sources are not a novel (the original, first-hand information), but are such sources as a book review of the novel or promo copy that tells readers about the novel (both second-hand information about the first-hand information). Another example: an analysis (secondary source) of a piece of legislation (primary source) that appears in a newspaper. One last example: subsequent news coverage of an event (secondary source) after the initial reporting on the event (primary source) was published by the news outlet.
Sources that provide third-hand information. That is, they are not the original or primary source (say, a novel) and are not second-hand information (such as a book review of that novel), which is always about the original source and usually by someone other than the creator of the original source. Instead, tertiary sources abstract, compile, digest, or otherwise organize primary and secondary sources. Examples are dictionaries, encyclopedias, guides, and handbooks. Tertiary sources are those you usually wouldn’t read from beginning to end.
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