1 minute readReference note
How is a cited page's support for an AI answer evaluated?
In brief
A cited page supports an AI claim only when its content establishes that claim within the relevant date, entity, and scope. A page can be related to the subject without supporting the sentence beside its citation. The review should therefore match claims to passages, not count links as proof.
Identify the exact assertion, read the source in context, and record whether its evidence is direct, partial, contradictory, or absent. Match each fact to the passage supporting it, such as a headquarters address or service territory. Distinguish independent sources supporting separate claims from copies repeating one report.
This diagnosis determines the work. A source error needs correction at the source; a missing qualification needs clearer context; an unsupported generated inference needs attention to the output rather than a rewrite of an already accurate record. The test should retain the question, full answer, cited URL, relevant passage, and explanation. Later review checks the same evidentiary relationship. Citation counts remain useful for navigation and recurrence, but claim support is the measure that shows whether the answer is actually grounded in the pages it presents.