A study, published on Oct 31st, 2017 in the Journal of Medical Internet Research Medical Education, has found that Wikipedia helps Canadian medical students improve their knowledge of medical content. Wikipedia was compared to UpToDate, a subscription based online medical resource, and a standard medical textbook.
The authors conducted a randomized controlled trial of 116 medical students from four Canadian medical schools. Students initially wrote a multiple choice exam similar to that used for licensing Canadian physicians. They were then randomized to one of three electronic resources, Wikipedia, UpToDate, or Harrison’s textbook of Internal Medicine and had 30 minutes to use their assigned resource. During this time, they were observed for compliance and had the opportunity to take notes. The students then rewrote their original exam, armed with the notes taken while using their resource.
The primary outcome was improvement in tests scores before and after accessing the assigned resource. The authors found that medical students assigned to Wikipedia had a statistically significant greater improvement in test scores, compared to the medical textbook and a trend towards improved performance as compared to UpToDate.
Full study available under an open license at https://mededu.jmir.org/2017/2/e20/
Fantastic news, Doc. /a
On Tue, Oct 31, 2017 at 9:09 AM, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
A study, published on Oct 31st, 2017 in the Journal of Medical Internet Research Medical Education, has found that Wikipedia helps Canadian medical students improve their knowledge of medical content. Wikipedia was compared to UpToDate, a subscription based online medical resource, and a standard medical textbook.
The authors conducted a randomized controlled trial of 116 medical students from four Canadian medical schools. Students initially wrote a multiple choice exam similar to that used for licensing Canadian physicians. They were then randomized to one of three electronic resources, Wikipedia, UpToDate, or Harrison’s textbook of Internal Medicine and had 30 minutes to use their assigned resource. During this time, they were observed for compliance and had the opportunity to take notes. The students then rewrote their original exam, armed with the notes taken while using their resource.
The primary outcome was improvement in tests scores before and after accessing the assigned resource. The authors found that medical students assigned to Wikipedia had a statistically significant greater improvement in test scores, compared to the medical textbook and a trend towards improved performance as compared to UpToDate.
Full study available under an open license at https://mededu.jmir.org/2017/2/e20/
-- James Heilman MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/ wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/ wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Thank you for sharing it Doc James :)
On Wed, 1 Nov 2017 at 10:53 AM, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
A study, published on Oct 31st, 2017 in the Journal of Medical Internet Research Medical Education, has found that Wikipedia helps Canadian medical students improve their knowledge of medical content. Wikipedia was compared to UpToDate, a subscription based online medical resource, and a standard medical textbook.
The authors conducted a randomized controlled trial of 116 medical students from four Canadian medical schools. Students initially wrote a multiple choice exam similar to that used for licensing Canadian physicians. They were then randomized to one of three electronic resources, Wikipedia, UpToDate, or Harrison’s textbook of Internal Medicine and had 30 minutes to use their assigned resource. During this time, they were observed for compliance and had the opportunity to take notes. The students then rewrote their original exam, armed with the notes taken while using their resource.
The primary outcome was improvement in tests scores before and after accessing the assigned resource. The authors found that medical students assigned to Wikipedia had a statistically significant greater improvement in test scores, compared to the medical textbook and a trend towards improved performance as compared to UpToDate.
Full study available under an open license at https://mededu.jmir.org/2017/2/e20/
-- James Heilman MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Hi,
On Tue, 31 Oct 2017 10:09:51 -0600 James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
A study, published on Oct 31st, 2017 in the Journal of Medical Internet Research Medical Education, has found that Wikipedia helps Canadian medical students improve their knowledge of medical content. Wikipedia was compared to UpToDate, a subscription based online medical resource, and a standard medical textbook.
good to hear! Thanks for sharing.
The authors conducted a randomized controlled trial of 116 medical students from four Canadian medical schools. Students initially wrote a multiple choice exam similar to that used for licensing Canadian physicians. They were then randomized to one of three electronic resources, Wikipedia, UpToDate, or Harrison’s textbook of Internal Medicine and had 30 minutes to use their assigned resource. During this time, they were observed for compliance and had the opportunity to take notes. The students then rewrote their original exam, armed with the notes taken while using their resource.
The primary outcome was improvement in tests scores before and after accessing the assigned resource. The authors found that medical students assigned to Wikipedia had a statistically significant greater improvement in test scores, compared to the medical textbook and a trend towards improved performance as compared to UpToDate.
Full study available under an open license at https://mededu.jmir.org/2017/2/e20/
On 31 October 2017 at 17:09, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
Full study available under an open license at https://mededu.jmir.org/2017/2/e20/
If one gets to chose the questions and assemble the questionnaire then shown to all study participants, I would submit that more or less arbitrary study results can be generated by, consciously or subconsciously, picking the "right" questions. Curiously, the two people that "reviewed" the questions here were "a Wikipedia editor and administrator," and a "long-term volunteer editor and administrator of Wikipedia" and "founder of [...] the Wiki Project Med Foundation."
Not being negative or anything, but if you're trying to scientifically evaluate whether a given exam prep book improves students' grades, would you let the editors of the book prepare the test exam?
Best, Patrik
That bit of the paper could have been a bit clearer. I simple downloaded 100 questions at random from a website that hosts lists of exam question. Am checking with Samir regarding if he did any further selection beyond that.
James
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 2:30 AM, pajz pajzmail@gmail.com wrote:
On 31 October 2017 at 17:09, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
Full study available under an open license at https://mededu.jmir.org/2017/2/e20/
If one gets to chose the questions and assemble the questionnaire then shown to all study participants, I would submit that more or less arbitrary study results can be generated by, consciously or subconsciously, picking the "right" questions. Curiously, the two people that "reviewed" the questions here were "a Wikipedia editor and administrator," and a "long-term volunteer editor and administrator of Wikipedia" and "founder of [...] the Wiki Project Med Foundation."
Not being negative or anything, but if you're trying to scientifically evaluate whether a given exam prep book improves students' grades, would you let the editors of the book prepare the test exam?
Best, Patrik _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Hi James,
I finally found time to read the whole article carefully. It is a very well done article and study, in my opinion.
I have one remark/question. Since the study was conducted over a length of time (April 2014 to December 2016), was the data analyzed to see if the increase in the results of good answers in the posttest was higher later during the study (or not) since Wikipedia (and maybe UpToDate, I am not familiar with that resource) evolves with time? Maybe even students who participated in the first iteration of this study went after to improve the related Wikipedia articles, thus obviously having an impact on the results since the information about the specific questions that you retained for the MCQ were "directly" answered on Wikipedia. Is this something that was considered? I do not see that consideration in the discussion section of the article.
Thank you,
JP
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 4:37 AM, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
That bit of the paper could have been a bit clearer. I simple downloaded 100 questions at random from a website that hosts lists of exam question. Am checking with Samir regarding if he did any further selection beyond that.
James
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 2:30 AM, pajz pajzmail@gmail.com wrote:
On 31 October 2017 at 17:09, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
Full study available under an open license at https://mededu.jmir.org/2017/2/e20/
If one gets to chose the questions and assemble the questionnaire then shown to all study participants, I would submit that more or less
arbitrary
study results can be generated by, consciously or subconsciously, picking the "right" questions. Curiously, the two people that "reviewed" the questions here were "a Wikipedia editor and administrator," and a "long-term volunteer editor and administrator of Wikipedia" and "founder
of
[...] the Wiki Project Med Foundation."
Not being negative or anything, but if you're trying to scientifically evaluate whether a given exam prep book improves students' grades, would you let the editors of the book prepare the test exam?
Best, Patrik _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/
wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/ wiki/Wikimedia-l
New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
-- James Heilman MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian
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This could have been alleviated by using a dump of Wikipedia at a specific time throughout the study. I don't know if it was done or not, I doubt it since the article do not mention it, I assume they had direct online access to the current Wikipedia at the time of the iterations during the study. Also that would lift one of the concerns in the discussion section about the replicability of the study because Wikipedia evolves, a new study could be completed with the same dump at the time of that study in order to replicate the same results (however I wouldn't see the interest, but just for the sake of having scientifically replicable findings).
JP
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 11:45 AM, Jean-Philippe Béland <jpbeland@wikimedia.ca
wrote:
Hi James,
I finally found time to read the whole article carefully. It is a very well done article and study, in my opinion.
I have one remark/question. Since the study was conducted over a length of time (April 2014 to December 2016), was the data analyzed to see if the increase in the results of good answers in the posttest was higher later during the study (or not) since Wikipedia (and maybe UpToDate, I am not familiar with that resource) evolves with time? Maybe even students who participated in the first iteration of this study went after to improve the related Wikipedia articles, thus obviously having an impact on the results since the information about the specific questions that you retained for the MCQ were "directly" answered on Wikipedia. Is this something that was considered? I do not see that consideration in the discussion section of the article.
Thank you,
JP
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 4:37 AM, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
That bit of the paper could have been a bit clearer. I simple downloaded 100 questions at random from a website that hosts lists of exam question. Am checking with Samir regarding if he did any further selection beyond that.
James
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 2:30 AM, pajz pajzmail@gmail.com wrote:
On 31 October 2017 at 17:09, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
Full study available under an open license at https://mededu.jmir.org/2017/2/e20/
If one gets to chose the questions and assemble the questionnaire then shown to all study participants, I would submit that more or less
arbitrary
study results can be generated by, consciously or subconsciously,
picking
the "right" questions. Curiously, the two people that "reviewed" the questions here were "a Wikipedia editor and administrator," and a "long-term volunteer editor and administrator of Wikipedia" and
"founder of
[...] the Wiki Project Med Foundation."
Not being negative or anything, but if you're trying to scientifically evaluate whether a given exam prep book improves students' grades, would you let the editors of the book prepare the test exam?
Best, Patrik _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wik
i/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wik i/Wikimedia-l
New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
-- James Heilman MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wik i/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wik i/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
--
Jean-Philippe Béland
[image: Wikimedia Canada] Vice-président — Wikimédia Canada https://ca.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page?uselang=fr, chapitre national soutenant Wikipédia Vice president — Wikimedia Canada https://ca.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page?uselang=en, national chapter supporting Wikipedia 535 avenue Viger Est, Montréal (Québec) H2L 2P3,jpbeland@wikimedia.ca
Okay so followed up with Samir. While the database of questions was selected by he and I, neither one of us did any specific selection beyond randomly selecting 25.
With respect to students going and changing Wikipedia / Uptodate, I very much doubt they would have. There is other students that have found that even when medical students find errors in WP they do not bother fixing them. Both WP and Uptodate change slowly over time.
James
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 4:52 PM, Jean-Philippe Béland jpbeland@wikimedia.ca wrote:
This could have been alleviated by using a dump of Wikipedia at a specific time throughout the study. I don't know if it was done or not, I doubt it since the article do not mention it, I assume they had direct online access to the current Wikipedia at the time of the iterations during the study. Also that would lift one of the concerns in the discussion section about the replicability of the study because Wikipedia evolves, a new study could be completed with the same dump at the time of that study in order to replicate the same results (however I wouldn't see the interest, but just for the sake of having scientifically replicable findings).
JP
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 11:45 AM, Jean-Philippe Béland <jpbeland@wikimedia.ca
wrote:
Hi James,
I finally found time to read the whole article carefully. It is a very well done article and study, in my opinion.
I have one remark/question. Since the study was conducted over a length of time (April 2014 to December 2016), was the data analyzed to see if the increase in the results of good answers in the posttest was higher later during the study (or not) since Wikipedia (and maybe UpToDate, I am not familiar with that resource) evolves with time? Maybe even students who participated in the first iteration of this study went after to improve the related Wikipedia articles, thus obviously having an impact on the results since the information about the specific questions that you retained for the MCQ were "directly" answered on Wikipedia. Is this something that was considered? I do not see that consideration in the discussion section of the article.
Thank you,
JP
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 4:37 AM, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
That bit of the paper could have been a bit clearer. I simple downloaded 100 questions at random from a website that hosts lists of exam question. Am checking with Samir regarding if he did any further selection beyond that.
James
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 2:30 AM, pajz pajzmail@gmail.com wrote:
On 31 October 2017 at 17:09, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
Full study available under an open license at https://mededu.jmir.org/2017/2/e20/
If one gets to chose the questions and assemble the questionnaire then shown to all study participants, I would submit that more or less
arbitrary
study results can be generated by, consciously or subconsciously,
picking
the "right" questions. Curiously, the two people that "reviewed" the questions here were "a Wikipedia editor and administrator," and a "long-term volunteer editor and administrator of Wikipedia" and
"founder of
[...] the Wiki Project Med Foundation."
Not being negative or anything, but if you're trying to scientifically evaluate whether a given exam prep book improves students' grades, would you let the editors of the book prepare the test exam?
Best, Patrik _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wik
i/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wik i/Wikimedia-l
New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
-- James Heilman MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wik i/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wik i/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
--
Jean-Philippe Béland
[image: Wikimedia Canada] Vice-président — Wikimédia Canada https://ca.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page?uselang=fr, chapitre national soutenant Wikipédia Vice president — Wikimedia Canada https://ca.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page?uselang=en, national chapter supporting Wikipedia 535 avenue Viger Est, Montréal (Québec) H2L 2P3,jpbeland@wikimedia.ca
--
Jean-Philippe Béland
[image: Wikimedia Canada] Vice-président — Wikimédia Canada https://ca.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page?uselang=fr, chapitre national soutenant Wikipédia Vice president — Wikimedia Canada https://ca.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page?uselang=en, national chapter supporting Wikipedia 535 avenue Viger Est, Montréal (Québec) H2L 2P3,jpbeland@wikimedia.ca _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Could you share links or titles for those other studies if you have them please?
And what about you editing the articles :P haha
JP
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 4:01 PM James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
Okay so followed up with Samir. While the database of questions was selected by he and I, neither one of us did any specific selection beyond randomly selecting 25.
With respect to students going and changing Wikipedia / Uptodate, I very much doubt they would have. There is other students that have found that even when medical students find errors in WP they do not bother fixing them. Both WP and Uptodate change slowly over time.
James
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 4:52 PM, Jean-Philippe Béland jpbeland@wikimedia.ca wrote:
This could have been alleviated by using a dump of Wikipedia at a
specific
time throughout the study. I don't know if it was done or not, I doubt it since the article do not mention it, I assume they had direct online
access
to the current Wikipedia at the time of the iterations during the study. Also that would lift one of the concerns in the discussion section about the replicability of the study because Wikipedia evolves, a new study
could
be completed with the same dump at the time of that study in order to replicate the same results (however I wouldn't see the interest, but just for the sake of having scientifically replicable findings).
JP
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 11:45 AM, Jean-Philippe Béland <
jpbeland@wikimedia.ca
wrote:
Hi James,
I finally found time to read the whole article carefully. It is a very well done article and study, in my opinion.
I have one remark/question. Since the study was conducted over a length
of
time (April 2014 to December 2016), was the data analyzed to see if the increase in the results of good answers in the posttest was higher later during the study (or not) since Wikipedia (and maybe UpToDate, I am not familiar with that resource) evolves with time? Maybe even students who participated in the first iteration of this study went after to improve
the
related Wikipedia articles, thus obviously having an impact on the
results
since the information about the specific questions that you retained for the MCQ were "directly" answered on Wikipedia. Is this something that
was
considered? I do not see that consideration in the discussion section of the article.
Thank you,
JP
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 4:37 AM, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
That bit of the paper could have been a bit clearer. I simple downloaded 100 questions at random from a website that hosts lists of exam question. Am checking with Samir regarding if he did any further selection beyond that.
James
On Thu, Nov 2, 2017 at 2:30 AM, pajz pajzmail@gmail.com wrote:
On 31 October 2017 at 17:09, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
Full study available under an open license at https://mededu.jmir.org/2017/2/e20/
If one gets to chose the questions and assemble the questionnaire
then
shown to all study participants, I would submit that more or less
arbitrary
study results can be generated by, consciously or subconsciously,
picking
the "right" questions. Curiously, the two people that "reviewed" the questions here were "a Wikipedia editor and administrator," and a "long-term volunteer editor and administrator of Wikipedia" and
"founder of
[...] the Wiki Project Med Foundation."
Not being negative or anything, but if you're trying to
scientifically
evaluate whether a given exam prep book improves students' grades,
would
you let the editors of the book prepare the test exam?
Best, Patrik _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wik
i/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wik i/Wikimedia-l
New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
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-- James Heilman MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wik
i/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wik i/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
--
Jean-Philippe Béland
[image: Wikimedia Canada] Vice-président — Wikimédia Canada https://ca.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page?uselang=fr, chapitre national soutenant Wikipédia Vice president — Wikimedia Canada https://ca.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page?uselang=en, national chapter supporting Wikipedia 535 avenue Viger Est, Montréal (Québec) H2L 2P3,jpbeland@wikimedia.ca
--
Jean-Philippe Béland
[image: Wikimedia Canada] Vice-président — Wikimédia Canada https://ca.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page?uselang=fr, chapitre national soutenant Wikipédia Vice president — Wikimedia Canada https://ca.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page?uselang=en, national chapter supporting Wikipedia 535 avenue Viger Est, Montréal (Québec) H2L 2P3,jpbeland@wikimedia.ca _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
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New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
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