User:Sarahamc0714/Evaluate an Article

Which article is being evaluated?
Forensic psychology

Why did I chose this article to evaluate?
Forensic Psychology has always been an interest of mine. The primary reason I chose this article was to learn more of an overview of the field and to possibly provide more information about this field of psychology. Honestly, my first impression of this article was that there was not much more to add. As I intently looked at this, however, it became more clear that a lot can be edited and/or improved.

Evaluation of the article
The lead section, at first glance, appears to be done well due to its first sentence very concisely explaining the field of forensic psychology. However, this section lacks an overview of major sections of information that will be later discussed in the article. The article discusses forensic psychologists' roles in great detail, so I think it should be briefly mentioned in the lead section if the article is to remain the way it currently is. Additionally, the lead section mentions certain disciplines of psychology at the end that seem to have no relation to what forensic psychology is. These do not appear to aid in the overview of this subject matter; thus, I suggest removing this from the lead section and/or article in general. Overall, while brief in nature, I think the lead section is not quite up to par with general standards.

As a whole, this article appears to be organized and well planned. It could, however, incorporate more recent information on how forensic psychology plays into the modern world. With the world of psychology continuously growing, I think there could be more recent information available to add to this article that could help increase its relevance to the general population. I suggest potentially updating the older citations as some of them date all the way back to the late 80s and 90s. Additionally, I think the information regarding the role of forensic psychologists is necessary to mention but could be condensed. The aim of this article is to explain the topic of forensic psychology, not to explain exactly who a forensic psychologist is and what they do. In this way, I think the article could benefit from some redirection to ensure the subject matter of forensic psychology is being explained instead of focusing on the application of it. The specific section that could use some work is the psychological autopsy one. This appears to be loaded with information that, in my opinion, is not relevant to the understanding of forensic psychology. Thus, I suggest condensing or totally removing this section and potentially adding information about individuals who utilize the forensic psychology discipline but who may not be forensic psychologists.

The overall tone of this article appears to be neutral and provides the reader with a fact-based set of information. It does not seem to be biased toward certain belief systems or ideas but, rather, explains the information in a professional manner.

Several sources for this article were books which would not allow for the general public to easily access the information. This could pose problems as it becomes difficult to ensure the information presented is being accurately done. Additionally, there was a specific citation link that would not direct me to the research article that was being cited. This link is from 2006 and should probably be updated anyway. So, I suggest updating this citation along with other, older ones and the addition of more secondary sources that are available online for the general public to view.

The article, for the most part is easy to read and understand; however, it does have some areas that could benefit from editing. Some sentence restructuring and vocabulary enhancing could be done to help the article, as a whole, be more concise and matter of fact.

This article provides zero visualization cues and, thus, adds no visual aspects to aid in understanding the topic. I do think that the addition of pictures could distract from the understanding of the article and would be irrelevant to utilize in most sections. The only section that I think could benefit from the addition of pictures is the section explaining contemporary forensic psychology views. I think the addition of pictures there could liven up the page and provide a visual for individuals who may not watch many crime television shows.

The talk page for this article does not include much conversation. There are a few comments; however, only one seems to have been addressed by an individual who edited the article. The very first comment, in my opinion, is very critical in nature. This reads in more of an attacking nature to me than one of constructive criticism. While it can be helpful to be very blunt in these comments, I think the tone in which the comment is made does not really help improve the article and goes against the guidelines to be polite. Additionally, this first section of the talk page is difficult to navigate due to the lack of signatures at the end of every comment. Thus, it is unclear to me what exactly is going on in the general comment section of the talk page. Lastly, it appears that no other individual has utilized this article for a WikiProject. I find this hopeful but also daunting as individuals have seemed to stay clear of it for school-related ordeals.

Overall, I think this article needs work to ensure that it is properly explaining the subject matter in which it is intended to. As mentioned above, it currently appears to focus more on the application of forensic psychology rather than giving an explanation of what forensic psychology is. Additionally, the amount of information given on forensic psychologists could be intimidating for some and appear unorganized. While more information would usually indicate a more complete article, I think this article is less complete due to it feeling unorganized and overwhelming. Thus, I think the article could use editing in areas where too much information is provided and where it goes into too much detail about the application of this field as this distracts from the purpose of the article.