It can be easy to jump to conclusions when building a family tree, but following some strategies can help. These steps are adapted from the Genealogical Proof Standard, which the Board for Certification of Genealogists established. These approaches can save you the frustration of finding you’ve been chasing down someone else’s ancestors.

Conduct a reasonably exhaustive search

Records may contain inaccurate information, so it’s best to seek and compare multiple sources. It often takes more than one record to verify that you have the correct information for the right person. Let’s look at an example.

Albert McKee consistently lists his place of birth as Indiana in the 20th-century census records that count him with his wife and children. When we find an Albert McKee who’s about the right age in 1860 in Rochester, Fulton County, Indiana, it can be tempting to assume that it's the Albert McKee we want. But before we add the parents listed for that Albert McKee to our tree, we should look for some supporting evidence. McKee isn’t an uncommon name, so there may have been more than one Albert McKee born in Indiana in the mid-1850s. It’s time to look for more records.

Fortunately, we can find Albert’s father’s name in this death index entry for Albert and his birthplace on his daughter Florence’s record in that same death index, which matches details in that Rochester census record. (The next step will be to request a copy of those original death records to examine for further clues.)

Before adding new people to a tree, make sure the information is accurate. If there’s conflicting evidence, keep searching! It’s a lot easier to take the time to fully research before adding to your tree than it is to remove a bunch of people who were added wrongly.

Cite your sources

Relationships, dates, and any other pieces of genealogical information should have reliable source citations to be considered for your tree.

Source citations indicate the reliability of the information. For example, a birth date in an index of birth records does not have the same weight as a birth date in the actual record. If you find someone’s birth date in a death record and a different one in their marriage record, you must decide which one is more likely to be correct.

Why cite your sources

• When you cite your sources, others can locate and trace them in the future.
• Citing your sources enables you to go back and evaluate the quality of a source in cases where you find conflicting evidence.

How to cite your sources

This video will get you started: Citing Your Sources Can Be Fun and Useful.

Analyze your findings

When looking at records independently, it’s easy to miss problems with your research, like conflicting information. It’s also easy to miss opportunities to learn more, like clues and new avenues to explore. To cover all your bases, take breaks from gathering new records to review what you have. Organize the details in a way that makes sense.

Timelines are good tools for analyzing and connecting the evidence you’ve collected. To make a timeline, review each record you have for someone and organize the facts by date, citing the source that verifies it.

Reanalyze facts, looking for new conclusions you can draw based on the information you already have. For example, if someone was born in Ireland around 1817 and they had a sister born in New York in 1820, we can estimate that the family immigrated to the United States between 1817 and 1820.

Translating dates into ages and ages into dates can also offer more perspective. Look for information that's unlikely or impossible, like parents having children when they were very young or very old or someone being in two places at the same time.

Resolve conflicting evidence

It’s common to find sources that don’t agree with each other. To determine which is correct, look closely at each source to find where there might be errors.

Don’t assume that something is correct just because someone wrote it down. Consider who provided the information. Did they know what they were talking about? Did they have any reason to lie?

Calculate the time between the event and when the record was made. The longer it takes to record something, the more prone to error people's memories become. Also, consider what form the record is in. Are you looking at the original (or digitized) record, or can you see only the index? Get as close to the original as possible. Sometimes, resolving conflicting evidence requires finding more evidence.

Emma Bell Mason, daughter of Philip Mason, married Jonathan Groves in Washington County, Ohio, on January 31, 1901. According to the marriage record at the probate court, Emma “is 20 years of age on the 27 day of July, 1900,” which would make her birthday July 27, 1880.
 

However, Philip states in his Civil War pension application that she was born on July 27, 1881. (Emma’s birth record has not been found.)

Emma’s marriage record contains at least one error. In it, she's listed as "Emma Bell Fox." This error is likely due to Rev. C. J. Fox performing her wedding. It’s important to note that Emma didn't fill out the record; the probate clerk did.
 

The error calls into question how carefully the clerk filled out this record. Since the wedding was in January, might the clerk have confused the year?

Presumably, Emma’s father would know when she was born. The Civil War pension application is in his handwriting, so he provided the information. Also, Emma was still living at home when Philip made his statement, and there's no reason to believe he had cause to lie about her age.

The 1900 and 1920 censuses also corroborate an 1881 birth. However, we should give those records less weight because we don't know who provided the information. Unless Emma’s birth record turns up and points to the contrary, the evidence points to her birth date being July 27, 1881.

Write down your conclusions

Writing down your conclusions is an important step. Record what makes you confident that your tree's names, dates, and other facts are accurate.

This exercise can help you spot gaps in your research. Look through notes and compile sources. You may notice things like a marriage date based solely on a census, not on a copy of the marriage record.

Like a good source citation, a written conclusion will help when revisiting research you haven’t looked at recently. It serves as a condensed version of your research notes, preventing you from having to retrace your research steps.

A written explanation will also help others understand your train of thought. This goes beyond the source citation. In the case of Emma Bell Mason’s birth, citing just her father’s Civil War pension file would be tempting since that's the source we believe is correct. But other researchers could easily dismiss it if you don't record why you trust the pension file more than her marriage record—adding that you’ve looked for her birth record but haven’t found it will also let others know that you’re aware that the best record might still be out there.

Writing can take many forms. Add notes to your tree on Ancestry, open a document on your computer, or grab a notebook. Write paragraphs, a bulleted list, a spreadsheet, or another format. The main thing is to get your thoughts and sources in one place. The more you write, the more you may want to know about your ancestors. Writing things down often ends up being a springboard to more research ideas.