Wikipedia Survey

Wikimania Buenos Aires26 August 2009

Collaborative Creativity GroupUnited Nations University MERITRishab Ghosh, Ruediger Glott, Philipp Schmidt

http://ccg.merit.unu.eduschmidt@merit.unu.edu

BACKGROUND

• Wikimedia Foundation &United Nations University MERIT

• First official Wikipedia survey (for readers and contributors)

• Questionnaire developed with community input and building on existing research

• Translated into 22 languages by Wikipedia community

BACKGROUND

• Online survey hosted at MERIT. Code reviewed by WP technical community

• Survey went live November 2008• Link to survey was posted in page headers of

WP sites• Staggered across different language editions

to deal with traffic loads

RESEARCH QUESTIONS / OBJECTIVES

• Who is contributing to Wikipedia and how?• Who is using Wikipedia?• What are users' and contributors' perceptions

of quality?• Pragmatic findings that help the WMF improve

use and benefits.• Establish baseline for possible monitoring

system (panel studies)

SCOPE

• Questionnaire contains 50+ questions (with sub-questions) on a broad variety of topics and is broken down into sections:– General, Contributing, Reading, Non-contributors,

Ex-contributors• 310,000 users/contributors accessed the

survey• 175,000 valid responses

ANALYSIS

• Extensive data cleaning (removed more than 3500 cases)

• First sub-reports shared with WMF– Survey Overview (available via blog)– Non-contributors (for WMF presentation)– Quality

ANALYSIS - NEXT STEPS

• August 2009 – Share moderately anonymized data with WMF and make available additional sub-reports

• November 2009 – Publish comprehensive survey report (including all sub-reports)

• Post publication – Open access to all fully anonymized data

LANGUAGE EDITION SURVEYS

• 22 languages (incl. 2 surveys for chinese)• Started with largest language editions• Added further editions based on interest by

WMF, availability of volunteer translators, and diversity of sample

• Top 5 language editions ~ 80% respondents• Russian largest group (tested against

manipulation)

LANGUAGE EDITION SURVEYS

LOCATION

• Responses from 231 countries

USER/ACTIVITY TYPES

• Readers 66% Contributors 31%

• Contributors: 4 hrs / week

• Additional categorization based on focus areas

AGE

• Quartile: 18 yrs - 22 yrs - 30 yrs - 85 yrs

Type Avg Age

All respondents 25.22

Readers 24.79

Contributors 26.14

Female 23.79

Male 25.69

GENDER

• Gender by user type• Female: 30% readers, 12.5% contributors

EDUCATION

• High levels of education (esp. given avg ages)• Contributors slightly higher than readers

(~ 50% with tertiary education)

MOTIVATIONS TO CONTRIBUTE

• Ranked motivations (1st - 4th)

REASONS FOR NOT CONTRIBUTING

HOW TO INCREASE CONTRIBUTION

• I would be much likelier to contribute, if …

FOCUS AREAS AND EXPERTISE

• Culture & Arts most popular, Technology & Applied Sciences (then History, Geography)

• 70-90% of contributors self-identify as “experts”

• Highest shares of experts in technical and scientific fields

• Focus areas do not correspond perfectly with expertise levels. “Geography & Places” attracts high levels of contributors, but comparatively low levels of expertise.

FOCUS AREAS AND EXPERTISE

PERCEPTIONS OF QUALITY

• Quality compared to “traditional” encyclopedia– Reliability (only category where “traditional”

received higher scores)– Broadness– Variety– Depth– Understandability– Timeliness

• Compare reader and contributor responses

QUALITY - RELIABILITY

• The information provided is correct

QUALITY - DEPTH

• The information provides deep understanding of a topic

QUALITY - VARIETY

• A wide range of topics is dealt with

PERCEPTIONS OF QUALITY

• Contributors are both more critical (reliability, understandability) and more supportive (all other dimensions) than readers.

• Relationship between transparency, understanding of the processes and mechanisms, and perception of quality.

ANNEX – ADDITIONAL TABLES

MOTIVATIONS TO CONTRIBUTE

REASONS FOR NOT CONTRIBUTING