Finding, Identifying and Citing Sources Quick Quiz Answer Key

Quick Quiz Answer Key

1) Decide whether the following five sources are primary, secondary, or tertiary (five marks):

a) A newspaper article about the potential effects of climate change in BC featuring summaries of information from many other sources TERTIARY

b) A M.Sc. dissertation in which climate change effects on native plants were studied PRIMARY

c) A review of current knowledge about the effects of climate change that appeared in a high-profile journal SECONDARY

d) A textbook that covers climate change and other bio-geographical concepts SECONDARY or TERTIARY [PROBABLY TERTIARY]

e) A blog post from the author of some research in climate change that basically reprints the journal article that included this research PRIMARY

2) You are writing an article about the effects of climate change in BC for the local newspaper. Rank the types of sources you should use to find the most accurate information (from most accurate to least accurate, three marks).

Most = PRIMARY
Intermediate = SECONDARY
Least = TERTIARY

The message here is that it doesn’t matter which audience you are approaching with your work; primary sources are still generally more reliable as source content than secondary, which are still generally more reliable than tertiary sources.

3) Choose the most appropriate word to complete the sentences below (two marks):

It is never/sometimes/always acceptable to use tertiary sources in scientific writing. Secondary sources will always/generally be more reliable than tertiary sources in ensuring the original source of the material is correctly interpreted.