Key answer
Check citations twice: establish that the work exists, then that its text supports the particular sentence. Professional-looking authors, journals and DOIs are unverified bibliographic information.
Full explanation
Walters and Wilder generated 84 short reviews on 42 topics with GPT-3.5/GPT-4 and checked 636 references, finding fabricated works and errors in real citations. These 2023 model/method results identify error types to check. Study abstract ALCE evaluated answer correctness separately from citation support: fluent answers and real papers can still have insufficient support. Sections 3 and 5
Check in order:
1. Existence: search titles, authors or DOIs on publisher sites/databases; confirm title, author, year and venue match. Broken links are not proof of fabrication; similar titles are not confirmation.
2. Correspondence: read the supporting passage, table or result with context. Split multifactual sentences into claims; narrow claims or add sources when only partly supported.
3. Evidence type: distinguish experimental results, discussion hypotheses and another study quoted by the source. Trace key secondhand claims to originals.
4. Record status: supported, partly supported, unsupported or unverified, with locations and issues.
Verify each key claim with original sources, supporting locations and scope. Disclose abstract-only access; do not present search snippets as full-text evidence. Leave missing citations unverified rather than inventing similar works.
This makes checks explicit; personally open important sources before delivery, especially for numbers, causality and populations. More citations do not ensure a complete evidence chain.