Alison J. Head and Michael B. Eisenberg have published an article in First Monday on how students use Wikipedia. From the post:
Findings are reported from student focus groups and a large–scale survey about how and why students (enrolled at six different U.S. colleges) use Wikipedia during the course–related research process. A majority of respondents frequently used Wikipedia for background information, but less often than they used other common resources, such as course readings and Google.
Also covered by The Chronicle of Higher Education and Slashdot.
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