User:Charlotte9034/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visual_communication

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
I’m a visual learner and so I thought this article would be of interest to me to further learn how people use different pictures, media, etc. to communicate and deliver information. This article matters because we use different forms of visual communication on a daily basis. My first impression of the article wasn’t great as it opens up with an additional citations needed for verification warning.

Evaluate the article
Lead section

The Lead section has an introductory sentence that is very broad in scope and does not provide a concise overview of the topic. The opening sentence is more of a partial list of visual elements that could be used to communicate. Important elements are missing from the list such as video and pictures/photographs. The definition provided in this sentence is concise but does not capture everything that is discussed later in the page. The lead paragraph touches on some of the article's major sections, such as visual aids and components of visual communication but does not highlight the important figures section or the Prominence and motive area. The lead section mentions types of characteristics of visual elements such as objects, models etc but these are not described anywhere else in the article. Overall, the lead section has a number of lists of items, only some of which are further defined in the actual article.

Content

Not all of the article's content is relevant to the topic. The important figures section highlights contributions of two individuals but it doesn’t do a good job of explaining why just these two were selected. The second, Max Wertheimer, introduces an entirely different subject. The entire section on Social Media is not really relevant to the topic and is really its own subject and again introduces multiple themes that  don’t belong under the topic of Visual communication such as privacy and control of content. The references cited range from 1997 to 2022, so are up-to-date and the article mentions some current things like social media websites. There could be more content that shows all the types of communication like verbal and non-verbal. Some more history of visual communication and how it has changed over time would be good (i.e. cave paintings, pictures, printing). This article does not deal with any of Wikipedia’s equity gaps and there is no mention of any historically underrepresented populations or topics.

Tone and Balance

This article is written in a neutral tone with no appearance of bias towards any particular position. In the section about Politics the article mentions how different groups or sides can use visual communication to share their points of view. There are no over or underrepresented viewpoints and no fringe viewpoints are called out. There does not seem to be any effort to persuade the reader towards a position as the article does not really present any firm stance on anything.

Sources and References

There are many sources cited in the article, 28 in total, and they seem to be from reliable sources such as academic or peer-reviewed publications and general knowledge published books. The sources provided do not seem to include resources that are returned with a simple google search on the topic. There is a very large amount of literature available on this topic so the Wikipedia article could have highlighted a more thorough list of sources. The sources that are provided range from 1997 to 2022 so do seem to be current. The authors of material cited do not appear to include any historically marginalized individuals with the exception of an article from the University of Hawaii. There are thousands of publications available on the topic, as a search on Amazon.com for “Visual Communication”: returns over 1,000 results. The first link did not work and many of the books cited only have the ISBN number as a link or do not have specific page numbers provided. Another link (number 28) shows that this Wikipedia article is the only citation for the source.

Organization and writing quality

The writing is easy to read in this article and there are no obvious spelling or grammar errors. Although it is easy to read there are some organization issues. As already noted, there are some sections that don’t seem to fit the topic of the article. These out of place sections make the article feel disconnected and like it jumps around. The sections that are relevant to the topic are well thought out and flow in a logical way.

Images and Media

The article only has two images, one is a stock image of a keyboard with social media company logos superimposed on some of the keys and the other is an image of the visual communication process that is very hard to read and does not add much to the article. Neither of these images helps to enhance the understanding of the topic. The captions are suitable to the images as they describe what they are showing.

Talk page discussion

The article seems to be used often for course assignments through the Wiki Education Foundation. It is also listed as an article of interest for WikiProject Graphic design, WikiProject Media and WikiProject Systems. The article has been rated as Start-Class by WikiProject Vital Articles which is for an article that is developing but still quite incomplete. It may or may not cite adequate reliable sources.

Overall impressions

The article has some good content but instead of just listing items they need to be discussed more. The article should use more visual elements considering it is an article in Visual Communication. Additional reliable sources from peer-reviewed articles or published books would improve the article. Overall, the article needs additional development with specific examples and more detail in most of the major sections. A historical view of Visual Communication would be a good addition to the article.

Examples of good feedback

A good article evaluation can take a number of forms. The most essential things are to clearly identify the biggest shortcomings, and provide specific guidance on how the article can be improved.