Wikipedia:Psychology
A study seemed to indicate that the majority of Wikipedians, through their participation, are compensating for 'something' (the study showed negative behavior, compensation was suggested as the explanation).
THESIS: Regardless of any flaws in the study, the psychology and motivations of Wikipedians should be considered rather than assumed.
- Assumption: study only showed negative behavior and presumed unspecified compensation as explanation.
- Jobs: Most Wikipedians may contribute in their pre-established fields or in deep hobbies with nothing to prove aside from what comes necessary from the anonymity of the internet.
- Howard Hughes: better to compensate through a contribution than through taking.
Important questions include:
- How do people read into conversations they literally read?
- How do people respond to conflict?
Motivations
[edit]Possible positive motivations include:
- Anal retentiveness
- Sociality
- Joy in knowledge
- Fun – enjoying the activity[1]
- Ideology – expressing support for what is perceived to be the underlying ideology of the activity (e.g. the belief that knowledge should be free)[1]
- Values – expressing values to do with altruism and helping others[1]
Possible negative motivations include:
- Competitiveness
Positive or negative:
- To gain recognition within the community[2]
- Addictiveness
Rewards
[edit]Wikipedia appears to offer no award aside from:
- Joy in collaboration
- Satisfaction in completion of activities or correction of errors
- Occasional thanks from other contributors
Inhibitors
[edit]Inhibitors to contributions include:
- Complexity/difficulty
- Fighting
- Bias and discrimination
In stone
[edit]How does it affect editors that all interactions are permanently recorded?
See also
[edit]Sources
[edit]- 1 2 3 Nov, Oded (2007). "What Motivates Wikipedians?". Communications of the ACM. 50 (11): 60–64. doi:10.1145/1297797.1297798.
- ↑ Forte, Amy; Bruckman, Andrea (2005). "Why Do People Write for Wikipedia? Incentives to Contribute to Open-Content Publishing". SIGGROUP 2005 Workshop: Sustaining Community: 6–9. CiteSeerX 10.1.1.120.7906.
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External links
[edit]- Robertson, Niel (March 3, 2010). "Wikipedia’s Decline and the 7 Types of Human Motivation", Enterprise Irregulars.
- (February 19, 2011). "Nine Reasons Women Don’t Edit Wikipedia (in their own words)", Sue Gardner's Blog. Cites: Cohen, Noam (January 30, 2011). "Define Gender Gap? Look Up Wikipedia’s Contributor List", NYTimes.com.