EVALUATING BIOCHEMICAL INTERNET RESOURCES

• Autor(a) principal: Lima, R.M.
• Data de Publicação: 2007
• Outros Autores: Xavier-Filho, J., Fernandes, K.V.S.
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Revista de Ensino de Bioquímica
• Texto Completo: http://bioquimica.org.br/revista/ojs/index.php/REB/article/view/102
• topic: evaluation biochemical; internet resources

Many people fail to properly evaluate INTERNET information. This is often due to alack of understanding of the issues, by responsible authorities, and, morespecifically, a lack of understanding of the structure and modis operandi of theINTERNET tool. The aim of this project was to analyze biochemical issuesavailable in WEB pages, evaluating contents quality, coverage, accuracy, authorityand currency. Twenty three sites were analyzed for their contents, presence ofbibliographical references, authorship, titles responsibility and adequacy to targetpublic. The great majority (95%) did not mention bibliographic references andtarget public. Less than half divulged names and/or graduation status ofresponsibles. Some sites contained critical conceptual errors, such as: oxygen isessential for anaerobic respiration; presence of H2O in photosynthesis dark phase;yeast is a pluricellular fungal; the overall equation of photosynthesis with errors;NADH2 instead NAD+; etc. None of the analyzed sites was thus consideredexcellent. Although the use of the internet is expanding rapidly on collegecampuses, little is known about students usage; how they perceive the reality ofinternet information and how successful they are in searching through it. Our datastrenghthen the need for rigorous evaluation concerning to educational research ofbiochemical themes on the WEB.