Using Wikipedia in Research

Using Wikipedia in Research - scientific work related to Wikipedia quality published in 2012, written by Sanja Petkovska.

Overview

Wikipedia as an encyclopaedia and a social network engaged in the development of modern information technology is a phenomenon that causes many debates and controversies. As an international community committed to the idea of expanding knowledge through the new media, Wikipedia has epistemological, political, social and economic consequences that are important to the modern higher education and research. Due to insufficient research of this issue in region, this paper in the first part addresses the dimension of Wikipedia as an encyclopaedia, a technology and a social network, with emphasis on the relationship to the structure and status of knowledge, higher education institutions and processes of knowledge production and distribution. The second part deals with the critics of Wikipedia for its implications to the status and structure of knowledge through reflection of social, economic, political and cultural circumstances in which Wikipedia is created and continues to intercede on a global level. The third part is a presentation of results of an exploratory qualitative research of the use of Wikipedia in researches, conducted with academics from Serbia.