Week 3 Assignment
Part One: Background Information from a Web Search
1. Cognitive disorders and gum disease
2. Carrot2.org
a. There might be a link between gum disease and cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s. Pereodontic bacteria might affect/exacerbate features of Alzheimer’s Disease. Porphyromonas gingivalis bacteria is strongly involved in the onset and progression of periodontitis which may contribute to the onset and the progression of Alzheimer’s disease.
b. Porphyromonas gingivalis and other related periodontal bacteria. Tau proteins and this bacterium. Amino acids produced by Porphyromonas gingivalis. Toxic proteases called gingipains.
c. Do all oral bacteria contribute or have correlation? What if you have an abscessed tooth but it’s not due to periodontal disease; is it the same bacteria or does that bacteria have a correlation as well?
d. Porphyromonas gingivalis (related); Alzheimer’s Disease (broad); Tau proteins (narrow); gingipains (distinctive)
Part
Two: Evaluating a Website
1. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/study-links-gum-disease-causing-bacteria-to-alzheimers/
2. Cbsnews.com – commercial site evoking interest in articles they publish so that they can make money, most likely through paid advertisements. Below the article, there were other unrelated articles on cbsnews.com, but also ads appearing to be news articles that redirected to outside sites appearing to sell products.
3. Authority – CBSNews is not an authority in any area of research related to the topic. There is an ‘about’ page that describes CBS as a mass media company that creates and distributes news content. Ashley Welch wrote the news article. When looking for her credentials (google, searching for bio on CBS, Facebook), I could not find anything about her beyond what is on her Twitter account which doesn’t state any degrees or credentials.
4. Currency – The article was published and updated on January 24, 2019. The links throughout the article reference information such as journal articles from 2016-2019, multiple linked news articles from 2017, and a study published in 2017. I would say that the information is current. A study published in 2017 is very recent.
5. Accuracy – Interestingly, one of the journal articles linked within the news article is one that I found when searching on carrot2.org. It provides data supporting the claim on the news article. The research conducted in 2017 found that those exposed to chronic periodontitis, over 10 years, had just under 2% increase risk of developing AD.
6. Purpose - They do not address conflicting opinions or data. From what I can tell, they do not display any biases other than to publish new and exciting information to allure readers as evidenced by a lack of any ads or links to products related to oral health.
1. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/study-links-gum-disease-causing-bacteria-to-alzheimers/
2. Cbsnews.com – commercial site evoking interest in articles they publish so that they can make money, most likely through paid advertisements. Below the article, there were other unrelated articles on cbsnews.com, but also ads appearing to be news articles that redirected to outside sites appearing to sell products.
3. Authority – CBSNews is not an authority in any area of research related to the topic. There is an ‘about’ page that describes CBS as a mass media company that creates and distributes news content. Ashley Welch wrote the news article. When looking for her credentials (google, searching for bio on CBS, Facebook), I could not find anything about her beyond what is on her Twitter account which doesn’t state any degrees or credentials.
4. Currency – The article was published and updated on January 24, 2019. The links throughout the article reference information such as journal articles from 2016-2019, multiple linked news articles from 2017, and a study published in 2017. I would say that the information is current. A study published in 2017 is very recent.
5. Accuracy – Interestingly, one of the journal articles linked within the news article is one that I found when searching on carrot2.org. It provides data supporting the claim on the news article. The research conducted in 2017 found that those exposed to chronic periodontitis, over 10 years, had just under 2% increase risk of developing AD.
6. Purpose - They do not address conflicting opinions or data. From what I can tell, they do not display any biases other than to publish new and exciting information to allure readers as evidenced by a lack of any ads or links to products related to oral health.
Part
Three: Evaluating a Wikipedia Article
1. Porphyromonas gingivalis
a. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porphyromonas_gingivalis
b. While the wiki article is not exceptionally long, it is well-structured. One thing that stood out to me after reading the article is that it seems to me that there could be more information on or development of periodontal disease. However, the article is about the bacteria and it does a great job explaining it as well as linking to various and relating sites/articles.
c. There are no warning messages at the top of the article
d. All facts and claims appear to be referenced
e. The article is clear and concise, however there are no illustrations
f. There are 38 referenced articles, which seems appropriate. The sources are published journal articles from a variety of journal sources. There are multiple external links broken down into subcategories such as microbiology, dentistry, and infectious diseases.
2. From the “Talk” page:
a. WikiProjects: Medicine, Microbiology, and Women’s Health
b. It is rated Start-Class on the Quality Scale for all three projects.
c. This rating seems somewhat critical; however, the start-class says it is for articles that are in development and leave readers wanting more. Since the projects are medicine and microbiology, I imagine people that are knowledgeable in that area might want to see more data and references.
d. Nothing on the Talk page other than the projects and ratings. I do not see any other communication from editors.
3. View History page:
a. I noticed that there weren’t any recent updates since June 2018 until recently there have been three updates. I imagine that this is due to some of the research that appears to have come out very recently.
1. Porphyromonas gingivalis
a. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porphyromonas_gingivalis
b. While the wiki article is not exceptionally long, it is well-structured. One thing that stood out to me after reading the article is that it seems to me that there could be more information on or development of periodontal disease. However, the article is about the bacteria and it does a great job explaining it as well as linking to various and relating sites/articles.
c. There are no warning messages at the top of the article
d. All facts and claims appear to be referenced
e. The article is clear and concise, however there are no illustrations
f. There are 38 referenced articles, which seems appropriate. The sources are published journal articles from a variety of journal sources. There are multiple external links broken down into subcategories such as microbiology, dentistry, and infectious diseases.
2. From the “Talk” page:
a. WikiProjects: Medicine, Microbiology, and Women’s Health
b. It is rated Start-Class on the Quality Scale for all three projects.
c. This rating seems somewhat critical; however, the start-class says it is for articles that are in development and leave readers wanting more. Since the projects are medicine and microbiology, I imagine people that are knowledgeable in that area might want to see more data and references.
d. Nothing on the Talk page other than the projects and ratings. I do not see any other communication from editors.
3. View History page:
a. I noticed that there weren’t any recent updates since June 2018 until recently there have been three updates. I imagine that this is due to some of the research that appears to have come out very recently.
Part
Four: Reflect
Having researched, read and written papers for my various classes over the past four years, I have always researched articles through EBSCO or PubMed. I have stayed away from Wikipedia and other search engines, especially at this depth of research. It was interesting to look at it from the angle of using Wikipedia as a source for information; albeit I wouldn’t use the data or information in writing a scholarly paper. However, I did find that it might be a good place to start in the search for topics and information. Also, Wikipedia might also lead me to some related scholarly articles to look up and use.
Having researched, read and written papers for my various classes over the past four years, I have always researched articles through EBSCO or PubMed. I have stayed away from Wikipedia and other search engines, especially at this depth of research. It was interesting to look at it from the angle of using Wikipedia as a source for information; albeit I wouldn’t use the data or information in writing a scholarly paper. However, I did find that it might be a good place to start in the search for topics and information. Also, Wikipedia might also lead me to some related scholarly articles to look up and use.
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1 comment:
Nice work. Concise analysis.
I'm glad you are seeing the value of Wikipedia. I'm afraid that some librarians and professors may have given students the wrong idea: that you should never consult Wikipedia. It is an invaluable tool, if used properly.
It's good that you recognize the commercial interest behind a news organization, but it seems you haven't given the reporter any credit for being a professional journalist with colleagues, fact-checkers and editors behind her that share her professional ethics of being fair in reporting and admitting when there might seem to be a conflict of interest. Journalists are not merely salesmen pushing the advertised products in their newspapers. She also might be the medical or science reporter for CBS News, which could mean she has developed a certain expertise in this area over years of reporting such topics (and may have majored in science or some such). As you pointed out, however, they do not give you her biographical details, but CBS News is a well established organization that has a reputation to uphold, so I would suspect something like this is the backdrop.
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