User:Realefu/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
I am evaluating the article Vampire squid.

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
I have chosen this article to evaluate because my group for my Deep Sea Biology class chose the vampire squid as our project topic. We are interested in their habitat, how they avoid predation, feeding mechanisms, and other ways Vampire squids have adapted to extremes conditions in the mesopelagic zone.

Evaluate the article
(Compose a detailed evaluation of the article here, considering each of the key aspects listed above. Consider the guiding questions, and check out the examples of what a useful Wikipedia article evaluation looks like.)

Lead section:

The lead section gives a concise overview of the vampire squid that is easy to understand and includes the table of contents, which shows how the article will be organized. It doesn't give too much information away, and talks about a few of the vampire squid's mechanisms to survive the extreme conditions of the deep sea as well as when it was first discovered.

Content:

The contents on the Vampire squid are relevant, informing the readers about its discovery, physical descriptions, where it lives, detailed information about its adaptations in the deep sea, how it develops and reproduces, how they behave when threatened by a predator, and feeding habits. There are headings for each section, and images with appropriate descriptions underneath them. From my own research on vampire squids, I know that counter illumination through bioluminescence is an important mechanism for predation avoidance. The article should go into more detail about the mechanisms by which the vampire squid utilizes bioluminescence as well as the ways it maintains buoyancy. The article mentions statocytes and gelatinous tissues for buoyancy but doesn't explain it further. Some information might be outdated, since most of the sources used are from before 2019 and date back to 1948.

Tone and Balance

The tone of the article is very neutral and factual. Most of the information written was supported by scientific research articles and peer review articles. One part where I noticed that the information presented was not supported by facts and based on an assumption was the part "If hypotheses may be drawn from knowledge of other deep-sea cephalopods, the vampire squid likely reproduces slowly by way of a small number of large eggs." This assumption does seem to change the professional tone of the paragraph because it isn't backed up by scientific studies like in the rest of the article. The content within each subsection is well balanced. The content within each subsection is well balanced.

Sources and References

I noticed that the notes section includes quite a few news coverage websites such as Forbes, the Evening Standard, Rolling Stone magazine, and KION News. The articles talk about vampire squids, but are focused on other unrelated topics such as the management of Goldman Sachs. These sources were not used in the actual article but provides additional information.

All of the references in this article were scientific journal articles or peer reviewed sources on websites such as Royal Society, Biological Bulletin, Journal of Experimental Biology, ect. The sources are thorough, especially the original scientific research. I did not see any news websites or random websites in the references and all the links worked. Most of the sources were published 2002- 2015. One source, the book External Anatomy, dates to 1948, while the most recent source is from 2019. Perhaps there weren't recent research conducted on vampire squids in the last couple years.

Images and Media

The article has some illustrated images throughout. The images don't really help enhance the understanding of the mechanisms by which the vampire squids lives in the deep sea. It would have been more helpful to have seen real camera- captured pictures of the vampire squid especially when it was using its bioluminescence, feeding, or escaping from a predator. Furthermore, the article could have put a diagram of the anatomy of the vampire squid, labeling important features such its retractile filaments are or the photophores on its arms. The captions also were not very informational. In the Description section, the illustration shows the dorsal and oral view of the vampire squid. However, the caption doesn't explain what we are seeing in the oral view. There should be labels or more detailed captions explaining the images.

Overall Impressions

Overall, I thought this article gave an informational overview of the vampire squid. One of the article's strengths is that most of the facts in the article are backed up by scientific research papers and peer reviewed articles. I liked how there were links to words that might be confusing so readers can further their understanding. Additionally, the organization of the article and heading made it easy to read. Some weaknesses include lack of non illustrated images or diagrams with informational captions. Also, some of the sources are outdated, with the most recent being from 2019 and some dating back to 1948. The article could go more into depth about some of the adaptation vampire squids acquired to survive in the deep sea. They should include more information about counter illumination as well as the bioluminescent mechanisms.