7.5.1 Evaluate information from different sources
Be critically aware of the reliability and quality of information from different sources, taking into account factors such as commercial, political, academic or personal interests that may influence selection, content and presentation. How will you judge the quality of the information you find?
You may need to question the validity of statistical information and the way data have been chosen. The size of a survey sample, for example, may be insufficient to support claims of general trends, or the way samples have been selected may introduce bias into the findings.
Explore and critically compare assumptions and predictions based on different data sources, models or mathematical descriptions of a situation. You may need to refer to more than one data source or model, and be able to justify how and why you have selected your data, in order to adequately support your findings or conclusions.
Time out
If you are working with data, note down how and why you have used a particular data source, and why you have confidence in it. If you are using a mathematical model, note down those aspects of the situation which your model stresses, and those aspects it ignores.