Choosing & Identifying the Best Source Types for Your Research

Wikipedia is not a primary source, nor a secondary source. It is a tertiary source built on the analysis of primary and secondary resources. Find more misconceptions about Wikipedia.

If Wikipedia is used appropriately, it will help you to do the research. Do remember verify whatever you find in another source. Here are a few tips:

• Check the background information of a specific topic or the meaning of a term that doesn't sound familiar to you. 
• Help become familiar with a research topic or serve as a starting point for a research to get a general impression. 
• Help narrow a broad research topic or help develop a research topic. You have to check the subheadings of the Wikipedia article or ask questions to a certain aspect of it. Check "Global Warming" in Wikipedia, do scientific discussions and popular opinion view global warming differently? And why?
• Help develop search terms that can be used in the library's databases. Under "Global Warming," you can find "greenhouse effect," "social aspect," "effects of global warming," and "permafrost," etc., which are very useful to narrow down a topic and used as good search terms in libraries' databases.
• Help find additional resources. At the end of Wikipedia articles, you will find a list of references (magazines, newspapers, journal article, and books, etc.) which direct you to outside resources that contributors consult. Check those works. Some are helpful and relevant to your research. However, some may surprise you and make you evaluate Wikipedia critically.
  --- The above ideas are adapted from "Using Wikipedia in Information Literacy Instruction" by Cate Calhoun

Make use of the REFERENCES and SOURCES to continue your research and double-check facts.