Using Wikipedia for Research

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What is Wikipedia?

Wikipedia is a free Internet encyclopedia "that anyone can edit".  As of August 2007, it contained 1,934,671 articles.  Wikipedia often appears near the top of the results list if you do a search in Google.  

Here's a screenshot of the Wikipedia entry for Global Warming.

Wikipedia is an amazing resource.  It covers a phenomenal number of topics.  Most of the articles are current and fairly extensive.  

One of Wikipedia's great strengths is also a weakness: anyone can edit Wikipedia.

Wikipedia contains such a depth and breadth of information because it has allowed everyone in the world to contribute. Some of the contributors are experts in their field;  other contributors may be less informed on the topics they are writing about or may be trying to make an article fit their particular biases.  A Wikipedia article can go through significant changes at any moment.  Without knowing who is responsible for the information at any given time, you cannot effectively judge the quality of the information.

Evaluation and Wikipedia

We have discussed evaluating the quality of information you find on the Internet.  In Website Evaluation we found that one of the most important criteria for evaluating a website is who is responsible for the information.  The example of the Martin Luther King, Jr. website created by white supremacists demonstrated why this is so important. 

With Wikipedia you just don't know enough about the editors of the different articles to judge the quality of the information or any biases the author may have.

This is not to say that Wikipedia is not useful for you as a student. You could certainly use Wikipedia to better inform yourself about a topic, to get background information or an overview of current research.  However, you should always look at other sources to verify any information you find  in Wikipedia before using it (in fact, a good Wikipedia article should always cite sources for the information it presents).  This is particularly true for any controversial topics where contributors may have strong biases which will affect the information. Professors generally discourage students from citing Wikipedia in their papers, and many do not allow it at all.  So, in short, if you are going to use Wikipedia, you need to use it responsibly.

Want more information on Wikipedia?  Take a look at this fascinating article from The New Yorker.

So, where should you go to find better quality research resources?  The best place to start your research is actually the Library Databases. 

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