Experts Rate Wikipedia Higher Than Non-Experts

Grooves writes "A new Wikipedia study suggests that when experts and non-experts look to assess Wikipedia for accuracy, the non-experts are harder on the free encyclopedia than the experts. The researcher had 55 graduate students and research assistants examine one Wikipedia article apiece for accuracy, some in fields they were familiar with and some not. Those in the expert group ranked their articles as generally credible, higher than those evaluated by the non-experts. One researcher said 'It may be the case that non-experts are more cynical about information outside of their field and the difference comes from a natural reaction to rate unfamiliar articles as being less credible.'" That's the problem people face when 'everyone who disagrees with you is a moron'.

Good to Know

[huckda]

that just by being a grad-student or a research assistant you become labeled an expert!

Re:A Possible Reason

[gigne]

Of all of the historical things you could used as an example, you choose Nazism. If you didn't have such a good point I might have called Godwin's law [wikipedia.org] on you.

I hope they didn't act on it.

[rdmiller3]

A new Wikipedia study suggests that when experts and non-experts look to assess Wikipedia for accuracy, the non-experts are harder on the free encyclopedia than the experts.

I just hope that those non-experts didn't feel the urge to "fix" anything.

Re:Good to Know

[jbeaupre]

They were reviewing the articles on Ramen and sleep deprivation.

Re:Simple

[diersing]

For a change I tried to RTFA but all I got was "Server Error in '/' Application."

I didn't realize the study was editable prior to it being released.

Re:Weirdly, it does

[DiamondGeezer]

Actually the opposite of an expert pretty much covers most of Wikipedia.

off-by-one error invokes thread exception

[maddogsparky]

It appears that Goodwin's law is not invoked for the first comment in a discussion. This come logically from the requirement that Goodwin's law apply to a discussion that involves the Nazi/Hitler example as a means to refute another comment.

Being the first comment, an off-by-one exception occurs, resulting in an aborted termination of the thread.

Re:A Possible Reason

[Jon_E]

I think that this is what the "Everyone who disagrees with you is a moron" article is getting at. I'm guessing experts are training not to suffer from that disease.

That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard, you moron ..

Re:A Possible Reason

[iocat]

One example talks about nazis, the other about nazi-ism. Both statements can be true! And, IMHO, both are true: The nazis were a bunch of assholes who didn't even have a totally coherent ideology. Historian B's description is a pretty precise definition of an asshole, anyway.

Re:A Possible Reason

[freeweed]

As a non-expert in both Nazism and Godwin's Law, I'm highly sceptical of that article.

Re:off-by-one error invokes thread exception

[Profane MuthaFucka]

Ironically, the Nazi's observed no such rule. In the educated social circles of the Third Reich, anybody who used the term Godwin in any sense was immediately set upon by rabid guard dogs.