User:Colin/Introduction to Psychology, Part I

Note: This analysis inspired the essay: User:Colin/A large scale student assignment – what could possibly go wrong?, which is considerably more readable than these jottings.

This is an analysis of student edits for the course Wikipedia:Canada Education Program/Courses/Introduction to Psychology, Part I (Steve Joordens). The students were awarded bonus marks for their course as follows:

  • 1% for creating a Wikipedia username and linking it to the Canadian Education Program, Registering with the APS Wikipedia Initiative, and linking your student number to your Wikipedia username as Steve highlighted in class
  • 1% for editing any psychology-related article in the English language Wikipedia (an article either pulled from the list on the APS website, or one you found yourself) to include at least one sentence expanding on the article and including an appropriate citation to back up the claim made in the sentence.
  • 1% for editing an additional article on a psychology-related topic either in the English version of Wikipedia or, preferably, in another language version you feel suitably proficient to edit.

Raw student contributions analysis edit

There were over 1500 students in the class. Only 317 (20%) created a username and registered themselves on the above list. Only 158 (10%) then went on to edit articles.

Namespace edit

Edit namespace breakdown

  Article – 841 edits (72%)
  Wikipedia – 228 edits (20%)
  User – 75 edits (6%)
  User talk – 17 edits (1%)
  Article talk – 14 edits (1%)

Students mostly edited article namespace. Their edits to Wikipedia namespace were to register with course assignment. A small number of students made basic edits to their user page. Edits to article talk pages were mostly to add an student project banner (5 cases). One student mistook the talk page for the article and added their information there. Another student, who registered but did not actually participate in the assignment, added a suggestion to the talk page of a food article.

All the following statistics are for article namespace edits only.

Edit counts edit

Tasks performed
(taking 1500 as student total)

  0 tasks
1183 students (80%)
  1 task (user account)
159 students (10%)
  2 tasks (user account + 1 article)
51 students (3%)
  3 tasks (user account + >1 article)
107 edits (7%)

Of the 158 students who edited articles, each student made an average of 5 edits and a maximum of 46 edits.

Student edit count
# Edits # Students
1
16
2
30
3
27
4
14
5
16
6
14
7
10
8
5
9
6
10
4
> 10
16


Of the 158 students who carried out the second task of editing a single article, one third chose not to carry out the third task of editing another article. Note: the option was given to the students to edit on another language Wikipedia for the third task, and we are unable to track those edits.

Student article count
# Articles # Students
1
51
2
86
3
14
4
3
5
3
6
1


Articles edit

Most of the 216 articles edited by students attracted a single student but 54 were edited by more than one student.

Number of students per article
# Students # Articles
1
162
2
34
3
15
4
2
5
3


Each article was edited an average of 3 times and a maximum of 50 times.

Article edit count
# Edits # Articles
1
59
2
42
3
39
4
19
5
18
6
11
7
5
8
7
9
4
10
0
> 10
12

Timespan edit

The assignment ran from the 26th September to the 1st December (the start of week 39 to the middle of week 48). However, many students were late in performing their homework and editing continued into the next week. Four students had accounts prior to the assignment and registered those accounts on the student list. None of them had made many edits to Wikipedia articles. Only one of them participated in the assignment by editing psychology articles. Of the three who did not, one of those is responsible for the few edits made since mid December.

Student edit activity
Week # Edits
39
42
40
4
41
9
42
6
43
27
44
14
45
13
46
59
47
108
48
361
49
182
50
5
51
8
52
3
Student activity
Week # Students
39
12
40
1
41
5
42
3
43
9
44
4
45
4
46
16
47
28
48
86
49
43
50
2
51
1
52
1

Articles edit

Many of the edits were to articles that were a topic in psychology or were a biography of a psychologist. However, a large number of edits were to articles in medicine and neuroscience in particular, suggesting the students took a loose approach to the scope of the assignment. None of the students who participated in the assignment made edits other than for their assignment, for example to unrelated topics.

Article list

People edit

The assignment was organised by Steve Joordens – WoodSnake (talk · contribs) – professor of psychology at the University of Toronto at Scarborough. Steve has had an account since 16 August 2011 but has made no article edits at all.

There were four campus ambassadors:

Help from Wikipedia's Global Education Program was provided by two people:

  • Jonathan Obar – Jaobar (talk · contribs) professor at Michigan State University. Johnathan has had an account since 13 Jan 2011 and has made 811 edits (12% article).
  • Frank Schulenburg – Frank Schulenburg (talk · contribs) Frank has had an account since 6 July 2005 but has only made 354 edits to the English Wiki (44% article). He has made more than 20,000 edits of which more than 50% are to the main space on the German Wiki.[1]

Review of student edits edit

Process edit

Here's the process I'm going through with each student.

  • Review all their contribs, their user and talk page. I look at the talk page to see any warnings and this might give a clue about deleted edits (I'm not an admin so I can't see them).
  • For each article they edited, summarise what they did, whether it was sourced, made sense, etc.
  • Investigate the source and check for accuracy and copy/paste. I don't have subscription journal access or a university library to borrow from so I may reach a dead end. If I can find the source, then great but sometimes searching for the text added on Google or Google Scholar will throw up the paper/book/website from which it has been copied -- Google Scholar will show a snippet view of a paper with the found text even if on subscription.
  • If the edit scores 4 or 5 (see below), then either fix or revert. I'm no psychologist so often its a revert. Fix small mistakes too.
  • Check to see what happened to to edit in the history -- sometimes another editor has reverted or it is now lost.
  • I've not been leaving user-warnings on talk pages. I don't have time and these students have finished -- nobody has responded to any warnings I've seen so far.
  • Blatant copy/paste must go, as must edits that only superficially reword the source. However, I'm probably being more lenient than some. I think the nature of this assignment makes it very hard for these students to write original text. Since on WP we must echo our sources, and don't allow original thought, we can only condense from them. Most of us can use our worldly knowledge and vocab to help rewrite some biographical or everyday-thing article in our own words, but for scientific works this is much harder. Unless we are already subject experts, it is very hard to rewrite without making mistakes. Particular words may be crucial: an "inhibitory" synapse cannot be rephrased as "dampening"; a "tonic" seizure cannot be rephrased as "stiffening". If these students could draw on several sources for their single-sentence-addition then they'd have a variety of phrasings to pop into the pot. But they've got one source and one sentence.
  • Score the student against the best edit they did and the worst.

If you think this should be done differently, let me know. Colin°Talk 20:18, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Scoring edit

The scoring system used by Colin and Doc James is as follows:

  1. Beneficial. Appropriate, original reliably-sourced text was added to the article.
  2. No worse than what was there. The additions/changes had problems but they don't stand out because the article was already lousy.
  3. Didn't make any content changes.
  4. Not helpful. The text added was inappropriate, confused/confusing or incorrect.
  5. Harmful. The text was a clear copy/paste job with no or little attempt at rewording.

The difference between 1 and 2 is subjective but very few students used sources that would be considered ideal when judged against WP:MEDRS and very few wrote text at an FA level of professional encyclopaedic English. The difference between 1 and 2 is quality improvement vs quantity-of-text improvement, though the mood of the reviewer at the time is also a factor :-). The actual number should not be considered a score: just a grouping for allocating student edits.

Peter.C's reviews used a score that counted the number of good and bad edits. --Colin°Talk 08:53, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Group 1 - Colin edit

Student list
User Best Worst Comment
johnjiang1989 (talk · contribs) 2 2 Created Peter Marsh (psychologist) which was speedy deleted (possibly due to lack of references to indicate notability). Added DOB to Martha McClintock (a psychologist) with reference to a biography journal article. Reference was adequate but could do with the article title and the DOI linked. Talkpage got welcome at same time as speedy-delete notice. No response.
Sheopau2 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content.
Raoufili (talk · contribs) 5 5 Added a sentence to Alvin Liberman (a psychologist). "Human listeners are able to decode the repetitive variable signal of running speech and to translate it into phonemic components". This was sourced using a general reference to an acceptable but not optimal source. The text added is very similar in structure to the source: "Human listeners are biologically adapted to decode the continuously variable signal of running speech and to recover its discrete phonemic components" and the two changes ("repetitive" and "translate it into") are dubious.
kf19891023 (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added two sentences in a new section (Prevention) to Forgetting. It was sourced to an alt-med journal article on forgetting. Can't read source. The additions have not survived subsequent edits. Also added two sentences and a new section (Drugs Affections) to Neurotransmission. Correctly cites a student textbook. However, the text is poorly written and thought out and was reverted by another editor.
Nagrasat (talk · contribs) 4 4 Adds a sentence to the "Propaganda" section of Persuasion. The sentence doesn't fit in that section, doesn't match what the sources says, and doesn't in fact make any sense. I've reverted it. Note, the source was added as a general ref and was online but no hyperlink given. The source refers back to Wikipedia's persuasion article so perhaps not the best choice!
sabrina.saifullah (talk · contribs) 1 2 Added a sentence to the lead of taste. Generaly, text should only be added to the lead if it summarises text in the body. It only partly did this and could have made use of the body text's sources. The source used was not ideal: a journal news summary of rat research that presumably contains the facts as a tangential comment. Also the url was private to the university. Added a few sentences to the Hippocampus section of the Declarative memory article. Source used was appropriate and apart from the url was correctly cited. However, I have concerns the original inserted text was very close to the source but I don't have access.
mustafa.mubina (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added a sentence to the lead of sleep disorder. Source wasn't cited well but I found it anyway. The added text was inappropriate for the lead and I've reverted it.
Solesilence (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added a sentence to the body that describes a book. But that book is already listed in the Further reading section. I've reverted it.
Mscsenna (talk · contribs) 2 2 Added two sentences to Marcel Kinsbourne (a neurologist). Merely listing the titles of some of the several publictions he has produced. Not particularly useful. Was sourced using a bare URL to a website (not a journal) that was already used as a source on the article. A similar edit was made to Martha McClintock.
Adrianjey (talk · contribs) 2 2 Added a sentence noting one treatment for one cause of anosmia to the Diagnosis section. Not well written or appropriate. Subsequently removed by another editor. Source used was OK but oldish (1988). Added two sentences to Carl Rogers with appropriate source. Can't read the source so can't comment on accuracy or weight.
Wiki-uoft (talk · contribs) 4 5 Added two inappropriate sections to Nature versus nurture. The text was 100% copied from the sources which weren't psychology journal articles. User warned and text removed. Similar issue with problem solving also reverted. Poor edits made to Zone of proximal development that appear to have been subsequently removed. Unclear if they were all copyvio though one sentence certainly should have been in quotes and attributed.
openevilsky (talk · contribs) 5 5 Added two sentences to Avoidant personality disorder. Copyvio detected and removed. User warned.
shafiana (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions.
hilary.123 (talk · contribs) 2 5 Added two sentences to the very short Logopenic progressive aphasia article. A fair attempt at rephrasing the source text, which is a website rather than a journal, albeit a reasonable website. Added two sentences to the lead of Non-rapid eye movement sleep. Text should be added to the body first and summarised in the lead as appropriate. Cites Britannica which isn't ideal. Text too close to source text in structure and word choice. I've reverted it.
cstavro (talk · contribs) 2 4 Added text to Figure and ground but this is a DAB page, not an article page. I've reverted it. Added a long paragraph on slow-wave sleep to the Non-rapid eye movement sleep article. But the text should really have been added to the Slow-wave sleep article, if at all. There's too much text about some rat experiment and some quoted text that needs direct attribution. Can't read the source so no idea if text is original.
sdhirani (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added a sentence about the number of chromosomes in a human embryo to the Prenatal development (biology) article. It isn't relevant to this short article that describes the stages of prenatal development (in any animal). I've removed it.
Shanty0808 (talk · contribs) 2 4 Added a couple of sentences to two sections in Relationship counseling. The citation wasn't complete and I can't complete it. Screwed up the formatting of the Professional associations section, which has now been deleted.
psya01 (talk · contribs) 2 5 Expanded the diagnostic criteria of Adjustment disorder. Unfortunately, this was just adding to the already extensive copying of the DSM text. We are not allowed to reproduce the DSM text on Wikipedia. I've blanked the section. User added a section on treatment to the Criticism section. There already was a Treatment section. I've moved it. However, the text cites an old review and two primary research studies. I'm not convinced it is great but don't have the ability to tell. I can't read the sources.
Kacper.mirek (talk · contribs) 2 5 Added two sentences to the lead about an experiment. 100% copy/paste from website bio source. I've removed it. Revised the lead sentence of Working memory. Someone has fixed the reference citation but the text is poor English and is an inadequate lead sentence. The previous lead sentence wasn't good either. I've tagged the lead as needing improvement but left this student's text.
hopelessatMATH (talk · contribs) 2 4 Added two separate small additions to Bulimia nervosa. I've reverted one of them as it did not appear to be correct for where it was added. Added two sentences to the lead of Locus of control. They appear to be useful additions, though it is always best to expand the body first. The source is a student textbook; I can't comment on whether the text is original enough. Also added to the lead of Machiavellian intelligence. Out of my depth here but the article doesn't seem very clear and seems to contradict material in Machiavellianism. Needs looked into.
ashesid (talk · contribs) 4 4 Revised the lead sentence of Echoic memory and added part of a sentence later. The lead sentence revision merely repeated information that was already in the lead. The text addition added a fact that doesn't appear to be supported by the source. I only have access to the source abstract but it doesn't seem to indicate the 20s claimed here. Regardless, this is a primary research paper as a source -- we should have a secondary source that is directly discussing echoic memory. I've reverted. Also revised the lead of Synapse and removed the existing text about chemical and electrical synapses, replacing it with text about exitatory and inhibitory synapses, possibly a less "fundamentally different" distinction. I've reverted that too. Also added a section to Motion perception but it was so confusing that I've removed that too. Editor I think is trying to explain concepts he/she doesn't understand sufficiently.
PaulyOr (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content.
Utscwyl (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added a sentence to the Nature versus nurture article. Doesn't seem applicable and is so general it appears obvious. Source not appropriate. I've reverted. Added a sentence to Reproductive success. Not encyclopaedic language. Key point not clearly made and nor really appropriate for this article. Source used was a primary research paper looking at just one animal's behaviour. I've reverted.
Afghanya (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content.
JonGM93 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content.
torrenuevac (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content.
rsellathurai (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added a sentence to Julian Rotter. Although correct, the minor fact was misleading as to what he actually studied at college. I've removed it. Addded a sentence to Harold Kelley (though also removed some text). Some of that sentence was removed in subsequent edits.
cani04 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions.
narsinghdixit (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content.
Areti54906 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content.
vailla12 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content.
Totalmindblank (talk · contribs) 2 2 Replaced a source in one article and added an external link in another. Neither are scholarly works!
Cherryffang (talk · contribs) 4 5 Added a short paragraph to Night terror discussing a study on treatments of nightmares. But night terrors are not nightmares. Also url was internal to college. I've reverted it. Added a couple of sentences to Words per minute. 100% copy vio from the abstract of the cited paper. Wasn't relevant either as it confused the measurement (article topic) with an ability (high speed handwriting). I've reverted that too.
Emeraldleaf (talk · contribs) 2 4 One trivial change to Adolescence (unsourced but not really requiring one). Added an unsourced sentence to the lead of Olfaction (the sense of smell). But the sentence was about the sense of taste so not appropriate. I've reverted.
HelicopterBoi (talk · contribs) 2 4 Added some text to the lead paragraph of [Inner ear]. Can't access source (which is an entire book -- no page number given). Broke the wikilink to the previous sentence (now fixed). Added a sentence fragment to Julian Rotter which has been reverted by another editor with a request to try again with a full sentence.
olanmatt (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
flying_mantis (talk · contribs) 2 4 Added two sentences to Simple eye in invertebrates in the wrong section and duplicating information that was better explained in the right section. I've reverted it. Added a sentence to Sleep disorder about sleep apnoea. Some doubts over sourcing, which I can't access, and isn't a great source anyway.
Sakinasyed (talk · contribs) 2 4 Added a sentence to Machiavellianism that didn't say anything helpful and had a broken citation. I've reverted it. Made a pigs ear of edits to Trichromacy and was reverted by an editor who offered help. Made some confused edits to Zone of proximal development that don't appear to have survived subsequent edits. Added some material to the already awful Cognitive Appraisal. I suspect the text may be close to the source but don't have access. Someone with access and understanding of what this is about should please fix this.
Talryu (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content.
Li Marty Wan (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content.
Psychkid18 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions.
06leeben (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions.
Gmac3339 (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added some text to Validity (statistics). Rather confusing and didn't seem to add anything that wasn't better covered already. I've removed it. Added a long set of sentences to the GA Animal testing that was fairly quickly reverted with the comment "Incoherent and riddled with factual errors".
AA.Ally (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content.
Kailanicolette (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content.
Ramish1993 (talk · contribs) 3 3 Changed one word. No better than the existing word.
DragonSlayerer (talk · contribs) 1 4 Added a sentence/section on isolation aphasia to Aphasia citing a student textbook. Don't have access so can't comment on whether this is original, accurate or appropriate. Added a sentence to the stub Behavioural confirmation that essentially repeated the existing setence. I've reverted it.
PSYmeUP (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content.
distans (talk · contribs) 1 2 Added a sentence to Abraham Maslow which was adequately sourced though not well cited. Subsequent edits by others have improved the sentence, which needed some copy-editing.
miowusu (talk · contribs) 5 5 Added a sentence to Kinetic depth effect which was a copy/paste from the source. Screwed up the citation template. I've reverted.
ahmedwajeeha (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
akdxn (talk · contribs) 2 4 Twice added a section to Ablative brain surgery describing a study on Parkinson's disease. Text reads like an abstract (though I don't have access even to an abstract to judge originality). It was twice removed: using primary research papers as a source, and for not being encyclopaedic. Message left on user talk. Added a paragraph to Death anxiety (psychology) on death anxiety in children. Sourced used was primary research paper; text not great.
RoseBra (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Dara.Ron (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added some text to Self-awareness on tests on pigeons. Pigeons do not have self-awareness. Misuse of primary research papers. Futher edits by another editor expanded the list and description of animal experiments, which didn't belong in the article and were also sourced to primary research papers. I've reverted the lot.
Mathurah (talk · contribs) 2 4 Added text about mimicry to the imitation article (which discusses behaviour). We already have a mimicry article. I've reverted it. Added a sentence to Substance abuse on US costs but it was added to the UK costs section and badly phrased. I've fixed it.
nishamiles (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
aliyac (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
tuofengc (talk · contribs) 2 4 Accidentally removed the dab hatnote from the Motivation article. I've restored it. Added a rather non-encyclopaedic few sentences citing an old paper that must contain the information incidentally. Added a couple of sentences to Visual system that mostly repeat what was there plus add a confused historical fact, which doesn't belong there. I've reverted it.
leesan30 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
loki852 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
09yangsh (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
yangyua6 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
FaizaF89 (talk · contribs) 2 2 Added a sentence to the lead of Paranoid personality disorder. The citation was awful and mirrored the awful citations already in the article. I eventually tracked it down and fixed it. Can't read the source so don't know if wording is original. Added a handful of sentences to the lead of Big Five personality traits with two even worse citations (just "Poropat, 2009" and "Miller, 1991"). I've tracked those down too but can't read them. Might be copyvios but can't tell. Added a sentence to Antisocial personality disorder but the source isn't appropriate and doesn't actually support the text, so I've reverted it.
Yenitha (talk · contribs) 2 4 Added a sentence to the lead paragraph of Fritz Heider. Like the rest of the article, a general ref was added rather than using inline citations. Sentence doesn't really belong in the lead paragraph but the article is poor structurally anyway. Similar issue with edit to Rollo May which screwed up the info box template and so got reverted.
sethlee (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
tutudragon3 (talk · contribs) 2 2 Added to the very short Compound muscle action potential. Source wasn't great but then the article had no sources to begin with. Text needed copyediting.
ivyli0424 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
levintsa (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added a section on major depression to Ablative brain surgery but it was sourced to a 1976 primary research paper and was reverted. Added a section on atrial fibrilation to Atrial action potential. It doesn't belong there and was largely impenetrable. I've reverted.
Sarahmelendez (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Hameeda18 (talk · contribs) 2 2 Made some unsourced edits/changes to Alvin Liberman that weren't great but that applies to the rest of the article. Added a sourced couple of sentences to Leon Festinger but had an internal college url.
yanyiyun (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Shanmu48 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
lawjonatUofT (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
WoodBunny (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
DavidTempPsy (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
Ilovemaru (talk · contribs) 4 4 One of several students who edited Dichromacy, adding a general fact about colour defects and not using a great source. I've reverted the lot of them -- we already have a reasonable article on color blindness which is where that material should go (and mostly already exists). Added a sentence to Saccule citing a paper from 1969 but the added text discussed the Laryngeal saccules not the one in the ear. I've reverted it.
lscyuyu (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added a sentence on studying vision in animals to Dichromacy. As with other recent student edits to that article, this has been reverted. Was also one of several students adding text to Isolation (psychology) which is about a idea within psychoanalytic theory, not about social isolation or loneliness, which is what the students wrote. I've reverted the lot.
T.siu.20 (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added some weak material to Smell, which is a dab page. It was reverted.
Krishna1993 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
zainab12 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
Michaelsingh12 (talk · contribs) 5 5 Added a section on appetite enhancing drugs to Appetite. 100% copy of the source. I've removed it. Added an example to the explanation of types of Declarative memory. The example wasn't in the source given, was in very poor English, wasn't a great example. Several editors tried to improve it but ultimately, the paragraph already had good examples and didn't need this too. I've removed it.
XINGYINGYU93 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
UTSC137 (talk · contribs) 4 5 Added text on FAS to Alcoholism in family systems which already had sufficient text on this aspect. The source given was a 1976 primary research paper (which I can't read) but the actual text was essentially copied from www.medicinenet.com. I've reverted it. Added text to Alcohol abuse about lab studies and violence. Article already said what it needed to on violence in an encyclpaedic manner rather than discussing lab experiments in detail. This article has been wrecked by the various student edits, most of whom either added nothing to what was there, were about alcoholism or discussed experiments and researchers. I've reverted back to September and restored just one student edit.
Geoffkflee (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
uzzi15 (talk · contribs) 1 1 Added a definition of introspection to Structuralism (psychology) with source. Added a sentence to Humanistic psychology describing their attitude to research. Appears to be correct but I don't have access to the source.
yanyiyun (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
sunnytu (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
Rachanapurohit (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
dibanishi (talk · contribs) 2 2 Added a few sentences to Normative social influence. Text not particularly encyclopaedic and source is primary research paper.
Ashley2911 (talk · contribs) 2 4 Added a sentence on occupational propinquity to Propinquity. The source was from 1918 and the text stated the obvious. Addded two sentences to Workplace stress which were subsequently removed as not fitting and not well written.
Pokebro (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
tiffany.bhagwandin (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
kiwispring (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
Fizzizist (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
DanielUTSC (talk · contribs) 2 2 Added a sentence to Priming (psychology) using an existing source.
UTSCNeuron (talk · contribs) 2 2 Added several paragraphs and a table to Tim Crow with sources (though not great ones).
Sweettooth35 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
betty.kl.chan (talk · contribs) 1 2 Added a sentence to Death anxiety (psychology) explaining existential death anxiety with source. Added to the biography of Lev Vygotsky with source (I don't have access, but the use of curly quotes can be a sign of copy/paste text.
Cxx87 (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added two sentences to Causes of mental disorders. The opinion offered didn't wholly appear supported by the source (which otherwise is a great source). Nor was the text particularly relevant to the causes of mental disorders. I've reverted it.
ghadero (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added a few sentences to Eye movement (sensory) but they were about the vision system in general. I've reverted it. Added a few sentences to Eye movement in language reading. But they were about seeing in general and poorly worded. I've reverted it.
Sumira 02 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No contributions
rimtect (talk · contribs) 2 4 Added details of the five Gestalt principles of grouping to Visual perception. This section is just a summary and the details belong in the other articles. I've reverted. Added some unsourced text to the already poor lead of Mnemonic.
MinhDam1 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Pattychan05 (talk · contribs) 2 5 Added several sentences and figures to Maudsley Family Therapy. The text is not sufficiently different from the source text but since it only consists of a few phrases here and there, I've left it. Added some history to Discrete Emotions Theory. I can't access the source. The text isn't very helpful.
MRPsychA01 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Mujeeb Hussaini (talk · contribs) 4 5 Added a hagiographic sentence to the lead of Alvin Liberman. Opinions need to be notable and attributed, not stated as facts. I've reverted it. Added to the biography of Abraham Maslow text that I suspect is not original and isn't in an encyclopaedic tone. I've left it because the reset of that paragraph is similarly bad.
Sidphilic (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added two paragraphs to Transcranial direct-current stimulation. The first misrepresented it source (which was a magazine, not a scholarly work). The second had an even worse source. Neither are "uses" of the technique as they are just research. Misuse of primary research papers or lay reporting of such. I've reverted.
ganama (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
zahranasser (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Kongfrader (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
tsotiffa (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added some text to Animal testing which didn't added anything new and expressed the editor's own opinion. It was quickly reverted and the editor warned.
srqadri (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added text on Tip of the tongue phenomenon to forgetting when it only really needs a link to the article. Also added text on Ebbinghaus that just repeated earlier text. I've reverted.
Frankiezxc (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Suchidz (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added a sentence to the poor stub Cultural evolutionism. Was in such bad English that I've reverted it.
shruti.zinzuwadia (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added another of the Gestalt principles of grouping. But that principle had already been listed albeit with a slightly different name. I've reverted.
jying93 (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added a parenthetical remark to Short-term memory that contradicted later text in the article. I've reverted. Added a sentence on fine motor skills to the Motor skill article. But it was in the wrong section and the correct section already had this information. I've reverted.

Thoughts edit

  • Psychology articles on WP are lousy. Although that may make them appear ripe for any improvement, it makes them poor examples for editors to learn from and to work with. Their lead sections are often incomplete or otherwise a poor summary of the body. Or they are just stubs themselves. They may contain incorrect information too, which requires a fairly knowledgeable editor to fix -- so additional edits may just compound the problem. Often the existing sourcing/citations is poor.
  • Students need more help formatting proper inline citations. Need to be told not to use in-college urls, to include the article title in the citation (!) and that just saying "(Bloggs 2011)" isn't enough!
  • Some blatant copy/paste and some very poor attempts at rewording. In fairness, writing original text is made harder by the nature of the assignment: having only one source to work from and having just one sentence to formulate. If students had to read a variety of sources on the topic (even if they just used one) and wrote a longer piece of text, there would be more opportunity to vary the prose. Since these are 1st-year undergrads, taking an elementary course, I'm assuming that the students didn't already know the information they were adding -- in other words, they were largely relying on the source for their own knowledge. This also limits one's ability to rephrase and makes it easy to make mistakes when substituting words.
  • Some text added to DAB pages, to the wrong section or to the wrong article.
  • I can't access all the sources used so there may be other copy/paste issues I haven't detected.
  • Although some issues have already been reverted or fixed, many were not until I reviewed the changes. But I've reviewed only 10%36% of the 300+ editors who are listed and that took quite some time.
  • The bulk of the additions have been reverted or not otherwise survived. Does that make this a net-negative? Since not all the revertable material is being detected (unless we see many other editors helping) much of these negative changes will remain. This is particularly problematic for incorrect text or where there are copyright issues.
  • Most of what remains isn't great. I don't think I saw any text+source that would survive if any of these articles were taken to FA level. In other words, this is not adding high-quality material to WP. It is adding weak material to existing weak articles.

Colin°Talk 18:34, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Update: I see folk are adding to / changing this and that's fine. I haven't looked at the additions yet but to be clear, I didn't want this to be just a list of crimes. If the information and stats are to be useful, we need to objectively describe what the students did good/indifferent/ugly. There may be some merit in trying to categorise students/edits for example:

  1. Beneficial. Appropriate, original reliably-sourced text was added to the article.
  2. No worse than what was there. The additions/changes had problems but they don't stand out because the article was already lousy.
  3. Didn't make any content changes.
  4. Not helpful. The text added was inappropriate, confused/confusing or incorrect.
  5. Harmful. The text was a clear copy/paste job with no or little attempt at rewording. Or the text was simply vandalism.

I think later I'll add two columns: Best edit/Worst edit with the above numbers. These can then be sorted optimistically or pessimistically as you desire. Colin°Talk 09:15, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Yes as this is only 6% I thing it would be good to go through the rest and add them.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:58, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
I thought I'd got it up to 10%, unless the numbers have grown some more! I'll dump the full list shortly and take a chunk to work on. If anyone else wants to volunteer then say and I'll chop it up. Plus, if anyone has access to the sources I mentioned above that I don't have, then you could review the copy/paste & accuracy issues I couldn't. Colin°Talk 18:39, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
The class is done for the semester. We need to get this done to figure out what to do next semester.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:04, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
Together with the 5 students added by Peter.C, we've now analysed 55 of the 317 students listed (17%). Note that some of the ratings/comments might get worse if someone with access to the textbook the students keep citing can check that for copy/paste and accuracy. Colin°Talk 23:16, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Summary 1 edit

Summary so far: Of the first 50 students I analysed, 19 made no contributions so will be excluded from the rest of the stats when working out percentages. Eight students (26%) added text that harmed Wikipedia by copy/paste of copyright source text. A further sixteen students (52%) made edits that were so bad they were reverted. So three-quarters of the students made edits that needed to be removed. On the positive side, thirteen students made edits that weakly expanded our already weak psychology articles (42%) and a further three students (10%) made edits that were clearly beneficial. The inclusion of a student in one of the last two categories may be influenced by my mood at the time and also by me giving the benefit of the doubt to edits that cite a source I can't read. I suspect those numbers are optimistic. Colin°Talk 23:33, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Summary 2 edit

Of the 116 students who I have analysed who registered:

  • 53 (46%) made no contributions to content.

Of the 63 (54%) who made contributions:

  • 11 (17%) harmed Wikipedia by copy/paste of copyright source text and their edits were removed.
  • A further 36 (57%) made edits so bad that they were reverted.
  • A combined 47 (75%) made edits that left Wikipedia so much worse that they needed to be reverted.
  • 31 (49%) made edits that added sourced information to Wikipedia that was good enough to be kept.

The positive contributions figure is optimistic: where I didn't have access to the source I gave the student the benefit of the doubt. An expert might also have spotted flaws in the text I missed.

None of the positive contributions were stellar. This was weak text, weakly sourced, added to weak articles.

Many of the bad edits were because the student added text to the wrong article or section. For example, adding to a dab article. These students sometimes got carried away at the apparent lack of information on WP and added paragraphs or sections of text when in fact the correct article had this already and sometimes was good enough to be GA level. Other reasons for bad edits were very poor English or most commonly, where the student clearly didn't understand what they were writing about. That this was obvious to a reviewer who hasn't studied the subject is an indication of the degree of confusion apparent in the writing.

Although some of the bad and copy/paste edits were removed by other editors, the bulk was only detected during this analysis. Therefore, the assumption that Wikipedia will clean up the mess made is false. Partly this is due to the neglected nature of psychology articles. It may also be due to articles being subject to multiple edits from several students -- folk may only look at the most recent changes in their watchlist. Some articles have been attacked by many students over the last couple of months and have been left wrecked in comparison to the slimmer but better text before.

No articles have been structurally improved, nor has any noticeable quantity of existing text been improved. The assignment was just to add a sentence or two.

No student has edited articles outside of the few they chose for this exercise, or made contributions considerably in excess of what was required.

No student has edited since the assignment completed.

No students wrote on or responded to talk page comments. No students asked for help. Even when messages were left on their user talk pages, there was no response. Therefore no students engaged with the Wikipedia community.

I don't believe existing plagiarism tools are useful for this kind of assignment (though don't know much about them). I would assume that any tool looking at an entire article would fail to spot that one sentence was structurally identical to its source and had only one or two words different. Many students chose to use textbooks, ancient journal articles, or articles that aren't free online as their source, which makes it harder for volunteer editors to check the facts and the originality.

Colin°Talk 22:49, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

This is indeed very disappointing. Thank you for your great effort in this matter. I will do a couple of other sections next week. Will than present the final results to the WMF and we will need to have a serious discussion on what to do next. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:48, 14 December 2011 (UTC)
Confused-- 47 and 31= 78, not 63, percentages don't add, what am I reading wrong, but eeeeeek, this is really dismal. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:37, 4 January 2012 (UTC)
There are not exclusive sets. There were some editors who made good edits and bad edits. In fact, very roughly, a quarter of the contributing students did good, a quarter did good and bad and half did bad. Colin°Talk 07:57, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Group 2 - Peter.C edit

Grading system for group 2: Edits of users were viewed and analysed for copyright violations and issues. If an edit had some form of negative impact (such as poor formatting or a copyvio) it was deemed "bad". If an edit improved Wikipedia in a beneficial way, though expansion or a grammar fix, it was deemed a "good" edit. Peter.C • talk • contribs 11:16, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

Note: Unlike the score/grouping used in other sections, Peter.C's scoring is a count of the number of good and bad edits made. The two systems can't be directly compared but perhaps give a useful different way of looking at the same issue. --Colin°Talk 08:45, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Student list
User #Good #Bad Comment
Teenytiny18 (talk · contribs) 0 0 Only added name to course page
Jialuzeng (talk · contribs) 1 5 Has a copyvio warning on talk page. Most edits to Hypothalamus .
Keerthiga996151765 (talk · contribs) 0 0 Only added name to course page.
AIM93 (talk · contribs) 0 0 Only added name to course page.
Bcre16 (talk · contribs) 0 0 No edits at all.
edithtung (talk · contribs) 2 0 2 edits, refed and useful.
serenastavenjord (talk · contribs) 0 0 No edits
gabrielalaureano (talk · contribs) N/A N/A 2 edits, one for grammar fix, one REALLY large paragraph added in one go. Possible copy vio, no access to reffed document to confirm.
liszt dragon (talk · contribs) 0 0 Only added name to course page
Shijie Wu (talk · contribs) 0 0 No edits
Moktiff (talk · contribs) 0 1 Directly copy/pasted a definition from Medicine.Net to Alcohol abuse. No source given. User warned. Edit reverted.
tanious1 (talk · contribs) 5 5 Stole in from from this journal article and copy/pasted the abstract into 2.5D (visual perception) . Other copy vios by the user on that same page have been removed.
roxannenicolai (talk · contribs) 3 0 Likes Abraham Maslow.
tharshikatee (talk · contribs) 11 0 Grammar fixed, and improved, various articles.
Michellezhou1993 (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
sudodo1990530 (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No Grade!
zoono (talk · contribs) 4 1 Like the University of Toronto. Seems to have used a messy link for a ref that is behind a paygate (used the library search URL).
psya01h3 (talk · contribs) 3 2 Likes Saimin (film), which seems to be a horrible movie... Copyviod the IMDB article for it. Reverted and welcomed, despite poor movie choice. Expanded The Personality Test.
Coolsasuke (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
gabrielle.labrador (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
Shoaib.Saleh (talk · contribs) 6 1 Good contributions to Julian Rotter but uses a library link for ref, hence the one "bad" edit.
SamanthaHayden (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
BioSciLover (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
ShinySanaz (talk · contribs) 0 0 Only edited their userpage, added welcome template
Anthony.W23 (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
SyedNizami (talk · contribs) 1 0 Only added one edit to Synapse Films.
naima11 (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
lawyer1012 (talk · contribs) 5 0 Good expansion and grammar edits.
Dashed (talk · contribs) 1 0 One edit to Song Ji-hyo after joining class page, has edits dating back to 2009.
ZPMengdi (talk · contribs) 1 0 Good addition to Workplace stress. Actively debating on Talk:Childhood obesity
maandyt (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
Amir0893 (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
vishu.chakravarti (talk · contribs) 2 2 Added a ref that broke WP:NPoV to Trevor Harley. Added to Peter Deunov.
Mr.TeddyBear (talk · contribs) 3 1 Expanded Appetite, but seemed to use some border line offensive/neutral words in the "Children's appetite" section.
AnastasiaMUofT (talk · contribs) 2 0 Added to Clinical psychology and fixed one spelling mistake.
Dark_Eccentric (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
kuangdia (talk · contribs) 3 0 Added to genetics and Law of effect.
zhenghya (talk · contribs) 0 0 Wants some recipes that deal with Carica papaya...
firecold_icehot (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
Saranga52 (talk · contribs) 7 0 Various edits to different articles. Has edits dating back to 2007.
khalidamohammad (talk · contribs) 2 1 Fixed some ref tag issues, copyvioed a essay.
PCA31bob (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
kuroiitsukii (talk · contribs) 11 0 Added a sentence to Sleep disorder about insomnia. Made several edits which helped remove text somewhat from the original source text.
ilovewinniethepooh (talk · contribs) 2 0 General edits, nothing special here.
Sucumash (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
Jali26 (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
Vjkesava93 (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
User:AfraAlogailly 0 0 No content! No grade!
tsangtiffany (talk · contribs) 0 4 Added a paragraph to Capgras delusion which was a copy/paste of the abstract of the source paper. Peter.C removed the text. Added two sentences to F-scale (personality test) both were copy/paste from the two sources.
Mweogerman (talk · contribs) 3 0 1 minor edit, 2 major edits.
BlazingThunder (talk · contribs) 0 2 Added two sentences to Clustering illusion which were copy/pasted from the source. Peter.C reverted it. Added two sentences to Inert knowledge which were virtually 100% copy/pasted from source. I've reverted it.
hifzabuhari (talk · contribs) 6 0 Expanded and reworded History of psychology.
cactushead1010 (talk · contribs) 3 0 Expanded the content in Cognitive Appraisal and Perceptual narrowing. Used direct library link.
oggniR (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
wade.psych (talk · contribs) 4 2 Expanded 2 articles, had issues with refs, figured it out.
SherooD (talk · contribs) 6 0 Good contributions to Tau protein. Was "welcomed" to Wikipedia.
amriya.naufer (talk · contribs) 25 3 This users contributions are phenomenal! A++ material.
Stephaniecastellano (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
Benesha.Viji (talk · contribs) 3 3 Used library link. Has issues with refs.
SnakeHound33 (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
Mltrknzz (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
Supernerd707 (talk · contribs) 4 0 Solid editing by this user.
TarynLisa (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
gremwood (talk · contribs) 0 0 Previous edits, no edits after joining the course page though.
shouhu107 (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
Aminaalia (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
merreg (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
fcabaneros (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
DarkGohan (talk · contribs) 4 2 Very good contributions, sadly used direct library links. Good understanding of how Wiki works, denoted minor edits and added edit sums.
islammou (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
K.ramkishore (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
JingMing89 (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
naturelover1 (talk · contribs) 3 2 Added to taste. Used library links.
everforever18 (talk · contribs) 3 0 Rewrote parts of Operant conditioning chamber.
Rifai10 (talk · contribs) 6 6 Had issues with refs.
Liangalice (talk · contribs) 0 0 No content! No grade!
greenbbbeans (talk · contribs)
qiaoling (talk · contribs)
DragonTyrant (talk · contribs)
hUssUn (talk · contribs)
Ambreena (talk · contribs)
kanzoghi (talk · contribs)
93sandra (talk · contribs)
AnitaUofT (talk · contribs)
robin998914322 (talk · contribs)
hosnydon (talk · contribs)
kellywang (talk · contribs)
kevinx48 (talk · contribs)
irvineke (talk · contribs)
ShahidA01 (talk · contribs)
niroshaan.utsc (talk · contribs)
blkclkc (talk · contribs)
shadow of roses (talk · contribs)
michelearlene (talk · contribs)
heba-269 (talk · contribs)
Kenyabruce (talk · contribs)
m.v.pekary (talk · contribs)
heatherlui (talk · contribs)
princess62022 (talk · contribs)

Thoughts edit

I will refrain from doing any final calculations on the edits until I have completed them all, but for the most part there were very little "good" edits to Wikipedia articles. For the most part the students either a) did not edit any articles, or b) contributed in a way that was not beneficial to Wikipedia's content, or caused further harm. Despite these poor findings the "good" edits lead me to think that perhaps a program like this will work in a smaller class, or in a more regulated setting where it would be easier for an editor to correct a users edit quicker than slower to prevent further problematic edits down the road. I will continue grading in the next few days to come and I will be done by Saturday night at the latest. Peter.C • talk • contribs 23:21, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Group 3 - Doc James edit

Student list
User Best Worst Comment
samanthalanga (talk · contribs) 5 5 Added a sentence to lead of Aphasia which was 100% copyied from source. I've reverted it. Added two sentences to Axon hillock that were 100% copied from the beginning of an ancient (1968) source. Peter.C reverted (AGF) and added welcome template to their userpage.
Lisa.I.B (talk · contribs) 2 4 Refs need work. Links to U of T internal net.
MichelleY17 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Czechseya (talk · contribs) 2 4 Refs needs work. Links to U of T internal net.
Rohhh (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Elainewater (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Thaki (talk · contribs) 4 4 No ref used
Bintdee (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Gabriel.lansang (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
sindronian (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
SpontaneousRecovery (talk · contribs) 4 4 Inappropriate ref to the website of the a company marketing the product in question.
vewei (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
WingKaHung (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
lilseshi (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Lenighthawk (talk · contribs) 4 4 No references added
henry000267 (talk · contribs) 2 4 Ref not "inline"
Joelsp (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
melissaszopa (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
josephm8 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
yusra.siddiqui (talk · contribs) 2 4 Content added to the wrong spot and ref was a primary research study rather than review
anusan.rasalingam (talk · contribs) 2 4 Ref not connected to text which was added.
RyoKikuchi (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
s.taghavian (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
amo.lobo (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
meerahvijey (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Vipizha.p (talk · contribs) 4 4 User adds bare url to UoT Intranet
Penny4YourThoughts (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Yeungin998504756 (talk · contribs) 2 2 Okay
XinluCheng (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Jennnnnnyy (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
gulciatai (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Merlandy Joseph (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
JackieHo (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Aren Nera (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
wuyutian77 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
nini8765 (talk · contribs) 2 3 A ref was added and properly formatted. No content. Primary research rather than review.
ErangaMunasinghe (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
ItsWallydo (talk · contribs) 2 2 Okay
arash_sa_2020 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
1993kid (talk · contribs) 4 4 Content added without refs. Than ref added in wrong spot.
SinthiyaT (talk · contribs) 4 4 Uses internal UofT links as refs
Maria.zahid (talk · contribs) 2 4 Ref not placed in the right spot.
niroshaan.k (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Delta1993 (talk · contribs) 2 4 Some looks okay.
PsychologyOfBehaviour (talk · contribs) 2 4 Some content has no refs
Jaipex (talk · contribs) 4 4 Used primary research. Provided link to UoT
Cocowater (talk · contribs) 2 2 Okay
teonabaetu997497551 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Saarahjay (talk · contribs) 5 5 Addition was simply vandalism [2]
ea_vargaschang (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Abdulpshyc (talk · contribs) 2 4 Ref not appropriate [3]
shujingkittygao (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
dollluo (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Devika-07 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content. No edits
precious.27 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
keith.wjy (talk · contribs) 2 2
Jeet25 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
CkiaraA (talk · contribs) 2 4 Refs where poor/non academic [4][5] No reply to talk page comments.
Gincarzo (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
rachelleluo (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Vanessa Sissi Zhang (talk · contribs) 2 5 Copy and paste from [6] was latter removed by same editor
TahreemM (talk · contribs) 4 4 Not sure what this editor was attempting to do. About.com not an appropriate ref.
Momotaro219 (talk · contribs) 2 3 No new content. Just rewording current text.
fang48316596 (talk · contribs) 5 5 Large copy and pastes on a couple of pages. Message left with no response.
morrisd5 (talk · contribs) 4 4 Inappropriate ref [7]
yulijiao (talk · contribs) 2 4 Some of the text does not make sense.
Vandana Saunders (talk · contribs) 3 3 No edits
brandon.bharat (talk · contribs) 3 3 No edits
Shivarni93 (talk · contribs) 2 4 Some content was not correct.
Dhanya_ev (talk · contribs) 2 5 Copy and pasted and than went back and fixed some but not all of the copy and pastes.
butterflyteddy (talk · contribs) 4 4 Tone of writing is not encyclopedic.
chantz03 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
kathylai993 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Ragu_moorthy (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
dontvisitme (talk · contribs) 4 4 Added content to an article to which it did not pertain
lulunomnom (talk · contribs) 2 4 Added text to wrong page.
nataliehalabi (talk · contribs) 2 4 Uses old refs.
998964731.blaneyfa (talk · contribs) 4 4 Both edits questionable and quickly reverted.
melonbubblehead (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
psycgirl101 (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
almassatwat (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
darkosrius (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Akb16 (talk · contribs) 2 4 Really old refs.
nickyx (talk · contribs) 4 4 Ref inappropriate [8]
sear.mehran (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
SifthAhmad (talk · contribs) 2 Appropriate BLP info
KarinMeng (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Eugeneliu801 (talk · contribs) 2 Really old refs
fhroe (talk · contribs) 2 4 One ref behind U of T firewall and text not understandable.
Naomi.20 (talk · contribs) 2 2 Needs work on formatting
Silverlights (talk · contribs) 3 3 Changes where grammatical in nature
OjouAtari (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
SMahonez (talk · contribs) 4 4 Source about.com not appropriate [9]
Khanram (talk · contribs) 2 4 Ref used is from the 1950s.
Saharmir (talk · contribs) 4 Content in the wrong spot.
uoftwky (talk · contribs) 4 Content not clear
Randa G (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
bbuunniiee (talk · contribs) 2 2 Okay
bluecoffeebean (talk · contribs) 3 3 No content
Eugeneliu801 (talk · contribs) 2 2 Old ref from the 1970s

Thoughts edit

Of the 98 students analysed in this batch 49 students added no content and 49 students did add content. Of the ones who added content none replied to talk page comments. There where issues with copy and paste of content with at least 4 of these editors. There where also many issues with using old sources or inappropriate sources as references. A couple of students did come back and fix some problems. One editor added vandalism here and was reverted by a bot. No user both properly formatted and used an WP:MEDRS appropriate source. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:48, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

  • 50% made an edit (49)

of this

  • 8.2% copy and pasted (4)
  • 2% added simple vandalism (1)
  • 71% either added content that was not refed or the ref was inappropriate or the content was not comprehensible (35)
  • 18% added content that was okay (9)

These numbers are just a rough count late at night. --Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 05:43, 15 December 2011 (UTC)