Use Your Critical Thinking Skills to Evaluate the Evidence

Do you believe everything you read in a newspaper? Of course not! You use your cognitive and analytical skills to assess what is published there. These are often referred to as "critical thinking skills."

Quality genealogical research involves much more than simply gathering document copies and entering names, dates, and places into a database program. It also means treating each piece of information as if it is evidence in a forensic investigation. You have to couple all of your knowledge and experience with critical thought processes to reach scholarly, plausible hypotheses. You then have to weigh all the evidence you have in order to prove your theory to be factual  –  or to refute your hypotheses in whole or in part. The critical evaluations you perform will involve a thorough examination of a number of criteria: 

• What type of evidence is it?
• Where did it originate and when?
• Who created it and why?
•  Is the evidence original or derived from another source?
• Is it primary or secondary in nature?
• Was content been transcribed, extracted, or simply abstracted?  
• Was the originator or creator an authority? And how do you know that?
• Is there any bias or hidden agenda that influences the quality or truth of the evidence?
• Is there any reason to doubt the authenticity of the evidence?
• Can you corroborate or refute the evidence with other independent sources?
• How does the evidence relate to or with other facts already proved or disproved?
• How will you record the information and create a source citation?

Critical thinking is so much more than scanning a document or someone else’s purported evidence. It is using all your experience with the record types, your understanding of history and sociology of the geographical area, your knowledge of boundary and governmental changes, and applying a huge dollop of common sense to your analysis process. You are building context through solid documentation and analysis, developing rational hypotheses as someone involved with forensic research. And by doing so, you are getting to really getting to know each person and bring them back to life.

Copyright Aha! Seminars, Inc. ®

All rights reserved.

Focus on the Context Because Context Is Everything

I'm often approached at the end of a presentation at a meeting or conference and asked for advice for solving a research challenge. A person will launch in with something like, "I've been unable to find my 3x great-grandfather and he's a complete brick wall. Where should I look?"

I have to stop the person and ask, "Where do you think he lived? When do you think he was there? What are you trying to prove or disprove?" I need to understand the context first before I can even begin to offer any suggestions. It is imperative that I know the place and time period: that determines what geopolitical entity was in power, what records were being produced at the time, and makes me consider boundary changes and other events that might influence the research approach.

Sometimes the responses I get from a person make me wonder if he or she had really focused on the context of the ancestor's circumstances and/or developed a research plan. The research plan would need to concentrate on time, place, historical and personal events, records being produced, and later jurisdictional changes that influence where the records WERE produced and WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

It's easier these days, with the tsunami of new records being made available online all the time, to get pulled into a mode of reacting with rapid research. This can undermine the time we take to thoroughly analyze each record, and to relate it to others. That means we may miss apparent connections, we may not develop thoughtful hypotheses, and we probably don't prepare (or revise) a viable and potentially successful research plan. We may also rush to conclusions without considering the whole picture.

Don't get me wrong. I absolutely love talking to people at seminars and getting these questions. They make me think outside my own research box *and* to use my more than half-century of experience with thousands of research record types and content. And what I will always do is ask you to step back and ask yourself the questions that will help place your ancestor into temporal, geographical, and political context. I hope you will do that on a regular basis. Refer to Cyndi's List and to the FamilySearch Research Wiki for ideas and references to records and methodologies.

And take the time to read, analyze, and understand every record you encounter. Compare and relate it to other evidence you may have (or will) encountered. And develop a research plan, no matter how small, to focus yourself on success.