Wikipedia Project

The Washington, DC-based Association for Psychological Science (APS) has launched a new initiative calling for its members to improve the standard of psychology articles on Wikipedia, the free online encyclopaedia (tinyurl.com/3b6lpnl). The organisation has created a dedicated portal to allow volunteers to contribute to the site, including tutorials and a system for matching people's interests and areas of expertise with the articles on Wikipedia most in need of work. The Association's President Professor Mahzarin Banaji of Harvard University has thrown her weight behind the initiative, and in a recent column she urged her colleagues to incorporate the idea into their teaching. 'My request,' she wrote, 'is that for any course that you are about to teach this semester and beyond, that you consider adding contributions to Wikipedia as part of the course's requirements.' The new APS Wikipedia portal includes sample assignments to help with this process. Banaji and her colleagues have recognised that the anonymity and collective nature of Wikipedia could deter expert contributors by preventing them from citing their efforts on their professional résumés. To address this problem the APS are planning a leader-board to recognise publicly those psychologists and students who are exceptional contributors.