Qu’apprennent les jeunes usagers à propos de Wikipédia ?

International audienceLa très grande majorité des jeunes sont des usagers de Wikipédia. Pour autant, apprennent-ils quelque chose sur cette encyclopédie collaborative par le simple fait de son usage ? Si oui, qu’apprennent-ils ? Nous nous focalisons ici sur l’effet d’une variable assez triviale : le niveau de scolarité des jeunes usagers. Nous avons ainsi mené une enquête par questionnaire auprès de 841 collégiens, lycéens, étudiants de licence et de master. Les résultats montrent que dans l’ensemble, les répondants ont des connaissances informationnelles limitées à propos de l’encyclopédie collaborative. Néanmoins, celles-ci augmentent en fonction du niveau de scolarité et donc, de l’ancienneté et de la fréquence d’usage

The Effects of Expert and User Ratings on Behavioral Intentions on a UGC Site

The study examines whether expert and user ratings affect students’ behavioral intentions to use a fictitious book at Goodreads.com, a user-generated content (UGC) site regarding books. It also explores students’ perceptions of others’ susceptibility regarding user ratings. Data were collected using both an experiment and a web survey in fall 2013. A total of 206 surveys were useable for this research. The findings show that only expert ratings affected students’ behavioral intentions to use a book. Students tended to perceive others as being more influenced by user ratings than they, themselves, were. The results indicate that experts’ opinions still continue to be important for accepting the object of ratings on UGC sites. In addition, despite the need for more evidence, the influence of user ratings on, at least students’ intentional behavior, may not be as strong as expected.ye

The Wikipedia in the spanish schools of education. Design and validation of quantitative and qualitative diagnostic tools

RESUMEN: Se ha constatado que el número de investigaciones referentes a la Wikipedia es cada vez mayor, analizando principalmente los problemas que existen en ella, como el vandalismo, la brecha de género y racial, la fiabilidad, la neutralidad y las guerras de edición entre los editores. El número de investigaciones referentes al uso de la Wikipedia en la Educación también es creciente, pero prioritariamente han estado influenciadas por procedimientos cuantitativos. Este artículo describe la estrategia para el análisis de información, la muestra y población empleadas, el proceso de diseño y validación, así como la obtención de la fiabilidad de los tres instrumentos utilizados para la recogida de información (cuestionario, grupo de discusión y entrevistas). Tras realizar dicho proceso, finalmente se obtuvieron cuatro dimensiones en cada uno (datos personales, parte general de la Web 2.0, consultas sobre la Wikipedia y colaboración en la Wikipedia), resultando instrumentos muy útiles para el estudio de la evaluación de la Wikipedia como recurso educativo en el ámbito universitario español.ABSTRACT: It has been found that the number of investigations concerning Wikipedia is increasing, mainly those analysing the problems that exist in it, such as vandalism, gender and racial gap, reliability, neutrality and editing wars among publishers. The number of investigations concerning the use of Wikipedia in Education is also increasing, but they have been influenced by quantitative procedures as a matter of priority. This article describes the strategy for the analysis of information, the population employed, the process of design and validation, as well as obtaining the reliability of the three instruments used for the collection of information (questionnaire, discussion group and interviews). After carrying out this process, finally four dimensions were obtained in each one (personal data, general part of Web 2.0, consultations about Wikipedia and collaboration in Wikipedia), resulting in very useful tools for studying the evaluation of Wikipedia as a resource education in the Spanish university environment

Heuristic Principles and Differential Judgments in the Assessment of Information Quality

Information quality (IQ) is a multidimensional construct and includes dimensions such as accuracy, completeness, objectivity, and representation that are difficult to measure. Recently, research has shown that independent assessors who rated IQ yielded high inter-rater agreement for some information quality dimensions as opposed to others. In this paper, we explore the reasons that underlie the differences in the “measurability” of IQ. Employing Gigerenzer’s “building blocks” framework, we conjecture that the feasibility of using a set of heuristic principles consistently when assessing different dimensions of IQ is a key factor driving inter-rater agreement in IQ judgments. We report on two studies. In the first study, we qualitatively explored the manner in which participants applied the heuristic principles of search rules, stopping rules, and decision rules in assessing the IQ dimensions of accuracy, completeness, objectivity, and representation. In the second study, we investigated the extent to which participants could reach an agreement in rating the quality of Wikipedia articles along these dimensions. Our findings show an alignment between the consistent application of heuristic principles and inter-rater agreement levels found on particular dimensions of IQ judgments. Specifically, on the dimensions of completeness and representation, assessors applied the heuristic principles consistently and tended to agree in their ratings, whereas, on the dimensions of accuracy and objectivity, they not apply the heuristic principles in a uniform manner and inter-rater agreement was relatively low. We discuss our findings implications for research and practice

The Use of Social Media in Enterprises for Communication, Collaboration, and Knowledge Management

Der Erfolg von Social Media im Internet hat dazu geführt, dass diese Technologie zunehmend auch in Unternehmen eingesetzt, oder über deren Implementierung nachgedacht wird. Durch die erwartete Verbesserung der Kommunikation und Interaktion zwischen Mitarbeitern auf der einen Seite und des Wissensmanagements auf der anderen Seite er-hoffen sich Entscheidungsträger in Unternehmen einen erheblichen betriebswirtschaftlichen Nutzen. Obwohl es einige Beispiele erfolgreicher Enterprise-Social-Media(ESM)-Implementierungen gibt und mehr als 90% der Fortune 500 Unternehmen ESM eingeführt haben oder dies planen, verfehlen 80% der ESM-Projekte die eingangs definierten Ziele. Während die Entscheidung, die Software einzukaufen, zentral getroffen wird, hängt deren Erfolg von der aktiven Partizipation der Mitarbeiter ab – wie sich anhand der genannten Statistiken zeigt, ist beides nicht zwangsläufig korreliert. Im Gegensatz zu organischem Wachstum, wie es in Social-Media-Anwendungen im Internet in den vergangenen Jahren beobachtet werden konnte (z.B. bei Facebook), ist die Nutzungsrate von internen ESM oft zu gering, um den Fortbestand der Community zu sichern. Es zeigt sich dabei verstärkt, dass passive Roll-Out-Strategien, die darauf vertrauen, dass es ein vergleichbares organisches Wachstum auch bei ESM gibt, zum Scheitern verurteilt sind. Viel-mehr müssen Analysen im Vorhinein das für einen spezifischen Anwendungsbereich geeignete Tool identifizieren, und Strategien entwickelt werden, wie Mitarbeiter für die Interaktion über die neuen Anwendungen gewonnen werden können. Da Ausgaben für Informationstechnologien bei einem geringen Nutzungsgrad nicht zu-rechtfertigen sind, trägt die vorliegende Dissertation in acht Essays dazu bei, verschiedene Facetten der ESM-Nutzung näher beleuchten und so zu einem besseren Verständnis des Themas und damit einhergehend einer effektiveren und effizienteren Implementierung von ESM beitragen. Sowohl die Analyse von Einflussfaktoren auf verschiedene Nutzungstypen von ESM, die Optimierung von Enterprise-Suchalgorithmen als auch die Neuinterpretation von Online-Produkt-Ratings können dabei helfen, die Veränderungen der internen und externen Kommunikation, Kollaboration und des Wissensmanagements, die sich durch den Einsatz von ESM ergeben, besser zu erklären und bedarfs-gerechter einzusetzen. Die theoretischen und praktischen Implikationen, welche sich konkret aus den einzelnen Essays ergeben, werden in den entsprechenden Abschnitten der jeweiligen Papiere erläutert

Decision-making in practice: The use of cognitive heuristics by senior managers

This thesis uses a grounded theory methodology to reveal the processes by which cognitive heuristics are used by senior managers to make decisions in a large UK local authority. The thesis is based on primary data, organisational documentation and an extensive and critical review of the pertinent literature. Primary data was generated over four years and involved detailed observation of 156 senior managers making a total of 513 decisions, together with formal interviews and informal discussions with these managers. The organisation under study provided an ideal context for this research since it offered a rich insight into management decision-making practices in diverse contexts such as social work and highways, and with varying degrees of urgency ranging from procurement decisions lasting several months to instant decisions concerning child protection. Furthermore, UK local government has been subject to drastic change in recent years, such as the introduction of private sector management practices and increased competition. This has been exacerbated by an austerity programme which means that local authorities, in common with much of the world, have to do a lot more with a lot less. The turbulent context of local government is, in Yin’s (2009) terms, an ‘exemplifying’ case study, and hence the issues raised in this study resonate far beyond the scope of this thesis. This thesis makes a number of significant contributions to knowledge. Firstly, original flow charts are developed that allow the underlying processes of heuristic decision-making to be identified, and these reveal that, whereas the academic literature treats heuristics as discrete entities, there is actually considerable interplay between them. Further, a new definition of the moral heuristic is developed, which allows researchers to view this heuristic at a higher, more conceptual level than has hitherto been possible. The thesis also extends the work of Daniel Kahneman and demonstrates that the role of the unconscious in decision-making is more complex than previously thought. For instance, intuitive heuristics can be used consciously and choice-based heuristics can be used unconsciously. It is also argued that the underlying processes of ‘classical’ theory are better explained by the degree of consciousness involved when making a decision, and not by the commonly accepted normative/behavioural distinction made by Herbert Simon and others. As such, this thesis represents an important contribution to the decision-making literature