Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals/Research

The following discussion is an archived proposal of the WikiProject below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the project's talk page (if created) or the WikiProject Council). No further edits should be made to this page.

The resulting WikiProject was created at Wikipedia:WikiProject Research

Description

Scholarly research in Wikipedia is essential to understanding the encyclopedia's history, current state and future, content and editors, and this work also yields important knowledge applicable to other open content communities. In addition to driving scholarly knowledge of such systems, this work can also give results that can improve the Wikipedia community itself.

Much valuable research cannot take place without interacting with members of the Wikipedia community, but there are currently few guidelines for these interactions. For example, while researchers want to be able to contact a random sample of Wikipedia users in order to conduct surveys or invite volunteers for other studies, there are no guidelines on frequency and manner of those contacts nor how individual users might express their preferences on being contacted.

The goal of this WikiProject would be to find consensus between researchers and Wikipedians about what policies/guidelines/systems are appropriate to both respect users' preferences and facilitate research.

Examples of unmediated interactions

User_talk:KatherinePanciera#MfD_nomination_of_User:KatherinePanciera/WPMentoring - IRB approved survey - negative reaction from some Wikipedians halted the process. No policy to turn to.
User_talk:CMUResearcher#Survey_difficulty - Several Wikipedia norms/policy violations by a researcher trying to promote a survey
Wikipedia:Village_pump_(technical)/Archive_61#Wikipedia_interface_modification_(NICE)_study - Deployment of IRB approved UI study that met with resistance from Wikipedians questioning the study's methodology and execution.

How to participate in the discussion

Key decisions to be made

Guidelines/Policy

How frequently can individuals be contacted? By the same researchers? By all researchers in total?
What details of a study must be shared with participants during or after the study?

Recruiting Subjects

Should it be opt-in (users need to take action to join the volunteer pool) or opt-out (users need to take action to exclude themselves from the volunteer pool)?
How will requests for samples of subjects be regulated? Should there be a study approval group like the bot approval group?

Coordinating with WP Projects

Should there be additional policies before contacting editors in a WP:Project that differ from contacting editors or intervening in a WP overall?

Support

EpochFail ^{(talk|contribs)} 17:42, 2 November 2009 (UTC) - Aaron Halfaker, University of Minnesota[reply]
PiperNigrum (talk) 18:14, 2 November 2009 (UTC) - Bryan Song, University of Minnesota[reply]
R27182818 (talk) 18:25, 2 November 2009 (UTC) - Reid Priedhorsky, University of Minnesota[reply]
asbruckman Asbruckman (talk) 19:37, 2 November 2009 (UTC) - Amy Bruckman, Georgia Institute of Technology[reply]
Stu ^(aeiou)_{I'm Researching Wikipedia} 19:58, 2 November 2009 (UTC) - R. Stuart Geiger, Georgetown University[reply]
--Andicat (talk) 15:52, 3 November 2009 (UTC) - Andrea Forte, Drexel University[reply]
John Vandenberg ^(chat) 00:37, 6 November 2009 (UTC) - Research Office general/administrative staff (i.e. not academic), University of New England, Australia[reply]
Robert Kraut (talk) 10 November 2009 (UTC)Human Computer Interaction Institute Carnegie Mellon University
CMUResearcher (talk) 21:29, 16 November 2009 (UTC) Carnegie Mellon University[reply]

Discussion

♦ I added a section on how to participate above, since I wasn't at WikiSym. For example, where will this policy be discussed/planned? Right here? Could someone in the know please put some brief notes in this section above. Thanks! --R27182818 (talk) 01:21, 3 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This is a good question. I imagined that the WikiProject and its talk page would be a good hub for this discussion, but it seems others want to bring it to the talk page of WP:Research. I'm not sure which is the best option at this point. --EpochFail ^{(talk|contribs)} 17:24, 3 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Related Projects

WikiProject Wikidemia has a similar purpose, but has not been updated in years. I've intended this WikiProject to be an update and refocusing of Wikidemia. --EpochFail ^{(talk|contribs)}

One of the suggestions at Wikisym was delink the redirect from Wikipedia:Research (it currently goes to WikiProject Wikidemia), and have that be the new locus for this. Any thoughts on that? Stu ^(aeiou)_{I'm Researching Wikipedia} 20:03, 2 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I see. I think I misunderstood that suggestion when it came up. It seems to me that WP:Research would be a good place for proposed policy/guidelines where WikiProject_Research would be more general and could support the creation of a "study approval group" that would manage sampling of editors to ensure that they are not overwhelmed. --EpochFail ^{(talk|contribs)} 20:42, 2 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Should recruitment be opt-in or opt-out?

We discussed this quite a bit at WikiSym. It appears that there is a relatively common practice of allowing users to opt-out of various bot interactions such as putting {{NoAutosign}} on your talk page when you don't want SineBot to automatically sign your comments when you forget. I felt like we all agreed that, if we were to deploy a subject recruitment bot that posts on users' talk pages, this style of opting-out would be appropriate. Editors who would not like to be contacted by the subject recruitment bot would be left alone. No one would be automatically opted-in to any study. Instead, they would only be opted-in to hear about studies. It seems that a minimal amount of harm/annoyance would take place. --EpochFail ^{(talk|contribs)} 15:41, 3 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Another note... If we do approach the subject recruitment problem via a new bot, we'll be able to get good feedback from the community during the approval process. --EpochFail ^{(talk|contribs)} 15:42, 3 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

♦ I agree -- as a researcher, opt-in would be far less useful than opt-out. But, I think it's a key issue to reach consensus on. --R27182818 (talk) 15:00, 4 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:WikiProject Research vs. Wikipedia:Research as hub for discussion?

A new WikiProject would be able to support discussion and organization with full use of main and talk page and could accommodate a multi-fronted effort (study bot, construction of policy, communication, etc). On the other hand, the last time we tried something similar to this (Wikidemia), it didn't last long. It could be that bringing the discussion to the talk page of WP:Research would be sufficient. Thoughts?--EpochFail ^{(talk|contribs)} 17:35, 3 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I think WP:Research would be an excellent place to eventually put down the guidelines that the community comes to consensus on, but I find a WikiProject better for discussion, coordination, and deployment purposes than just one talk page. -- PiperNigrum ^(hail|scan) 19:42, 3 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

♦ You mention several types of effort, but it seems to me that the key problem - no policy - should be the highest priority, and that we should focus on that before worrying about implementation (bots, etc.). Is it easier to work towards consensus with a proposed policy (i.e., WP:Research) and an accompanying talk page? --R27182818 (talk) 15:00, 4 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

When do we bring non-researchers into the discussion?

♦ So far it's just academics on this page. --R27182818 (talk) 15:00, 4 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It seems to me that we could do a bit of canvasing of editors who would are likely to be interested in this process. We might want to wait until we decide whether we want to bring the discussion to a new WikiProject or Wikipedia_talk:Research. --EpochFail ^{(talk|contribs)} 15:55, 4 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the project's talk page (if created) or at the WikiProject Council). No further edits should be made to this page.