AbstrAct: the success of Wikipedia demonstrates that self-organizing production communities can produce high-quality information-based products. research on Wikipedia has proceeded largely atheoretically, focusing on (1) the diversity in members' knowledge bases as a determinant of Wikipedia's content quality, (2) the task-related conflicts that occur during the collaborative authoring process, and (3) the different roles members play in Wikipedia. We develop a theoretical model that explains how these three factors interact to determine the quality of Wikipedia articles. the results from the empirical study of 96 Wikipedia articles suggest that (1) diversity should be encouraged, as the creative abrasion that is generated when cognitively diverse members engage in task-related conflict leads to higher-quality articles, (2) task conflict should be managed, as conflict-notwithstanding its contribution to creative 72 ArAzy, NOV, PAttErSON, AND yEO abrasion-can negatively affect group output, and (3) groups should maintain a balance of both administrative-and content-oriented members, as both contribute to the collaborative process. Key wOrds ANd PhrAses: co-creation, cognitive diversity, collaboration, communitybased production, group composition, information quality, task conflict, Wikipedia. receNt yeArs hAve seeN the emergeNce Of A community-based model for collaborative work, whereby a self-organizing online community creates knowledge-based goods We center our investigation on Wikipedia 1 to study the performance of editor groups within Wikipedia, we focus on the quality of its main outcome, the information provided in its articles, as the primary indicator of group output. Wikipedia articles are created using wiki technology, a Web-based collaborative authoring tool that is designed for openness, anonymity, and egalitarianism [56, Prior literature identifies three central aspects in Wikipedia's collaborative authoring process: (1) the cognitive diversity in members' knowledge and experiences, (2) task conflict, and (3) the roles members play. Cognitive diversity of an editor group is believed to contribute to the quality of the produced article, in line with "the wisdom of the crowd" argument the unique setting of online peer production [52] and the distinctive affordances of the enabling wiki technology Our empirical method relies on Wikipedia's system logs. Harvesting these logs can reveal important insights regarding members' ongoing behavior in its natural setting related Studies eArLier, we ideNtified three ceNtrAL themes in Wikipedia's collaborative authoring process. two themes refer to the composition of Wikipedia editor groups: the inclusion of specific types of members and the diversity in members' knowledge bases. the third theme refers to group work processes: task-related conflict. Here we review prior studies related to these three themes, as well as works related to the group output (the quality of the produced Wikipedia article), focusing primarily on studies of Wikipedia and on works in related areas: virtual teams, online communities, and OSS projects
