User:Fernbush/Evaluate an Article

Evaluate an article
This is where you will complete your article evaluation. Please use the template below to evaluate your selected article.


 * Environmental psychology
 * I chose to evaluate this article because it is an interdisciplinary topic that involves two of my interests - the environment and psychology.

Lead

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the Lead include an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic?
 * Does the Lead include a brief description of the article's major sections?
 * Does the Lead include information that is not present in the article?
 * Is the Lead concise or is it overly detailed?

Lead evaluation
The Lead of the article concisely describes the topic in a clearly worded sentence. While the introduction of the article does not clearly provide a guide of the layout of the article and its subsequent sections, it does reference the different facets of Environmental Psychology in a way that lends itself to the subcategories of the article. The Lead does not bring up any information that is not expanded upon in the rest of the article. I believe that while the Lead is straight-forward, it could be shortened and contain less details.

Content

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article's content relevant to the topic?
 * Is the content up-to-date?
 * Is there content that is missing or content that does not belong?

Content evaluation
Most of the article's content is relevant to the topic of Environmental Psychology, but I also feel that there are significant relationships between the environment and the field of psychology that do not appear in the article. I believe the article is fairly up-to-date, but some contemporary issues regarding recent milestones in the state of the environment would provide great insights into this article's content. While I don't believe that there is content that does not belong, there is a lot of information that I believe is marginally important when compared to issues like displacement due to environmental changes and inequalities in environmental services (particularly in developed nations). I don't understand why the article brings up high ceilings and the use of room space before these topics.

Tone and Balance

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article neutral?
 * Are there any claims that appear heavily biased toward a particular position?
 * Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented?
 * Does the article attempt to persuade the reader in favor of one position or away from another?

Tone and balance evaluation
The article is neutral. The entire article consists of summaries of existing research, examples, and applications of this field of study. I agreed with the concerns brought up by one WikiUser on the talk page about the biases involved in listing Environmental Psychology courses at arbitrary universities around the world. There seems to be no reason to include this section in the article other than to advertise these institutions/courses. In terms of the representation of viewpoints on the topic, I would say that nearly every perspective is underrepresented. I do not think that this is due to any biases held by the authors of the page. Rather, this page is simply in the process of being written and through this process, viewpoints will become appropriately represented.

Sources and References

 * Guiding questions


 * Are all facts in the article backed up by a reliable secondary source of information?
 * Are the sources thorough - i.e. Do they reflect the available literature on the topic?
 * Are the sources current?
 * Check a few links. Do they work?

Sources and references evaluation
Violating the general rule for Wikipedia citations, there exists multiple paragraphs that do not contain a citation. In addition to this, I found several ideas that did not have a citation and some examples of synthesizes information from multiple sources. In other words, authors may have been making conclusions outside of existing research. Additionally, there are particularly long quotes which could shortened and put into the authors' own words (see "Challenges" section). The most recent source was published in 2016. All the links that I reviewed worked as they should.

Organization

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article well-written - i.e. Is it concise, clear, and easy to read?
 * Does the article have any grammatical or spelling errors?
 * Is the article well-organized - i.e. broken down into sections that reflect the major points of the topic?

Organization evaluation
I think that the article is smartly organized in a chronological manner. The article begins with an introduction, transitions to the history of environmental psychology, then talks about orientations and concepts, before concluding with applications. Interestingly, there is a section that lists a number of Environmental Psychology courses at various Universities around the globe. This surely non-exhaustive list may not meaningfully add to page. Otherwise, the article does not contain flagrant grammatical or spelling errors. I think each individual section of the article is well written, but I do not think that the article reads as a cohesive piece of text.

Images and Media

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the article include images that enhance understanding of the topic?
 * Are images well-captioned?
 * Do all images adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations?
 * Are the images laid out in a visually appealing way?

Images and media evaluation
The article did not contain any images or other forms of visual media that added to the understanding of the topic. I was particularly surprised to find this as the topics that were addressed could benefit from visual examples, and other topics in the field are full of graphs and maps and other visual representations of data that enhance the ideas present in the field.

Checking the talk page

 * Guiding questions


 * What kinds of conversations, if any, are going on behind the scenes about how to represent this topic?
 * How is the article rated? Is it a part of any WikiProjects?
 * How does the way Wikipedia discusses this topic differ from the way we've talked about it in class?

Talk page evaluation
There does not appear to be active discussions about this page. The last note made by a Wikipedia editor was in 2013 and expressed concern with the section of the article listing Environmental Psychology at various Universities. The user claimed that this section appeared to advertise certain institutions. The article is part of 4 WikiProjects: Urban studies and planning, Psychology, Environment, and Cognitive Science. It is rated as Start-class in the first three, of high-importance in Urban studies and planning and Environment, and is inactive in the Cognitive Science WikiProject. I learned that start-class denotes pages that are developing but still quite incomplete. If we discussed this topic in class, I imagine the coverage would be much more complete in terms of how Environmental challenges disproportionately effect people of certain demographics.

Overall impressions

 * Guiding questions


 * What is the article's overall status?
 * What are the article's strengths?
 * How can the article be improved?
 * How would you assess the article's completeness - i.e. Is the article well-developed? Is it underdeveloped or poorly developed?

Overall evaluation
The external links in the article were edited as recently as 2018. In such an evolving field, I would think that this page would necessitate frequent revisions. The introduction of the article is very helpful for anyone who wanted a general idea of what Environmental Psychology is. After the initial mention of the shift in focus to environmental sustainability, the article does not mention the subject again. This article would benefit from contemporary and more powerful examples of how our environment and one's psychology are related. Some of the less interesting examples could be generalized for brevity. I would say this article is about 20% complete. It is underdeveloped, but not poorly developed.

Optional activity

 * Choose at least 1 question relevant to the article you're evaluating and leave your evaluation on the article's Talk page. Be sure to sign your feedback

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 * Link to feedback: Talk:Environmental psychology