Wikipedia is the largest online encyclopediae that is used to develop articles under a free license. The encyclopedia works to develop and collect educational content and consequently engage and empower people worldwide. Wikipedia can be instrumental in helping students to understand critical information about a given topic. Wikipedia has developed critical policies that help to ensure the quality of its content. However, the site should not be used as a credible source. This is attributed to the fact that everyone is free to edit or develop articles, and as a consequence, articles may contain inaccurate or wrong information. Additionally, data from Wikipedia is not peer reviewed and may contain bias. Regardless of the numerous policies that Wikipedia has developed to ensure its quality, articles from the website cannot be considered scholarly sources.
Wikipedia has taken several measures to enhance the policing of its content. Wikipedia was developed to engage and empower people across the globe to develop and collect educational content in a public domain or under a free license. Wikipedia has prioritized a number of efforts to ensure the neutrality and quality of its content. One way of achieving this objective is by maintaining a strong commitment to NPOV (neutral point of view) (Prasad, 2015). The strong NPOV means that Wikipedia's content is not debatable. Wikipedia has also been able to ensure its quality by implementing a real-time peer review process that appraises content to ensure it's of the required quality (Prasad, 2015). Wikipedia also has a strong community that is committed to providing quality. The implementation of these measures helps Wikipedia to ensure quality content.
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Wikipedia is popular among students because it has many articles on different topics, and these articles are easy to access. Notwithstanding, Wikipedia articles are not credible sources and should not be used in research or academic papers. Any person can write an article or edit an article on the Wikipedia website (Connors State College, 2020). While Wikipedia has developed policies to ensure quality, quality control cannot comprehensively look at all articles. This limits the credibility and dependability of Wikipedia as a scholarly source.
Wikipedia should not be considered as a scholarly source because its articles are not peer reviewed. It is important to note that the information collected from Wikipedia should not be taken as fact, especially information in the areas of law and medicine (The National University of Ireland, 2020). The fact that anyone can edit a Wikipedia article means that there is some article that contains incorrect or misleading information. The policies instituted to ensure quality in Wikipedia have not ensured the quality of all resources in the online encyclopedia. Aside from this, information written on Wikipedia may be subject to bias since people may choose to write a biased article on the site. Wikipedia may help students understand the contents of a particular field; however, they should not be used as a scholarly source because its articles are not peer reviewed.
Wikipedia has been developed to engage and empower people all over the world through its content. Nonetheless, it cannot be considered a credible source because it is not peer reviewed, it is subject to bias, and anyone can write or edit articles on the website. The encyclopedia can be an infective tool to help students understand a particular topic better. Students can also use Wikipedia to discover issues linked to given research and understand key terms. However, students should review Wikipedia articles with a certain level of skepticism. Wikipedia should not be used as a primary or secondary source in any research or academic paper because it lacks credibility.
References
Connors State College. (2020). Should You Use Wikipedia as a Credible Resource? https://connorsstate.edu/disted/wikipedia/
The National University of Ireland. (2020). Wikipedia - Research & Contributing: Using Wikipedia for Research. https://libguides.library.nuigalway.ie/c.php?g=579892&p=4002374#primaryNavigation
Prasad. (2015). Wikipedia: Information in the 21st Century. Harvard Business School, https://digital.hbs.edu/platform-rctom/submission/wikipedia-information-in-the-21st-century/#
