Research:Reader Discovery
This page documents a research project in progress.
Information may be incomplete and change as the project progresses.
Please contact the project lead before formally citing or reusing results from this page.
Wikipedia users are highly varied with different goals, expectations and journeys through the site. This research aims to understand the experience, particularly around pain points and unmet needs related to search and discovery experience, of users who visit Wikipedia for more than just an overview or quick fact/answer.
Background & Goals
[edit]Background: Accurate, safe and private access to knowledge is the cornerstone of the Wikimedia Foundation, but the creation of the information is not enough; we also need to provide functionality to discover it. While we’ve collected behavioral data detailing users’ navigation and reading habits, we know less about why readers choose to move through Wikipedia in this way - also called wayfinding.
Study goal: Detail the experiences of visiting Wikipedia to “get an in-depth understanding of the topic” for each of the following three motivations (Source):
- “I have a work or school-related assignment”
- “I need to make a personal decision based on this topic (e.g., buy a book, choose a travel destination)”
- “This topic is important to me and I want to learn more about it (e.g., to learn about a culture)”
by highlighting highs, lows and opportunities for improving mechanisms of discovery and search
Research Questions
[edit]Hypothesis 1: There are many motivations for visiting Wikipedia and some differ in onsite behavior and wayfinding than others - specifically those that lead to deep reading sessions.
Hypothesis 2: Deep reading users - as opposed to casual users - face different challenges when navigating Wikipedia that are addressable through product iteration and/or net-new features.
Hypothesis 3: Deep reading journeys may include not only on-Wikipedia reading components, but also other Wiki projects as well as external sites, as part of this information-seeking behavior.
Approach
[edit]Methods
[edit](1) Internal and external desk research
(2) In-depth interviews and task observation
Participants
[edit]Users who self-report visiting Wikipedia 1-2 times in the last week for one of the three chosen motivations “to get an in-depth understanding of the topic.”
Phases & Timeline
[edit]Phase 0: Scoping & Desk Research
Phase 1: Interview Preparation
Phase 2: English IDIs
Phase 3: Non-English IDIs
Phase 4: Interview Analysis & Reporting
Final report on July 31st