The Role of Wikipedia in providing information on coronavirus to Societies during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Year 2020, Volume: 6 Issue: 3, 316 - 324, 31.12.2020

Adem Doğaner

https://doi.org/10.19127/mbsjohs.781930

Cited By: 1

Abstract

Objective: The coronavirus, which had first appeared in late 2019, turned into a pandemic spreading all over the world in a short time. People used internet resources to get information during the pandemic process. Wikipedia is one of the popular sources of internet preferred for accessing information in diseases and previous outbreaks. This study, the use of Wikipedia as an internet source in the coronavirus pandemic process was evaluated. The societies access to the articles on Wikipedia has been analyzed in detail.
Methods: In the study, among the articles related to coronavirus on Wikipedia, the articles with a high number of views, which are displayed between January 20, 2020, and May 20, 2020, containing information in all languages were determined. 4 articles with the highest number of views matching these items were selected. These articles were evaluated in terms of views and updates. Searched topics on Wikipedia by societies during to pandemic process were determined.
Results: The number of Wikipedia searches in search engines increased significantly in the period of 20 January 2020 - 20 May 2020 compared to the period of 20 January 2019 - 20 May 2019 (p<0.001). During the Coronavirus pandemic, "Wikipedia" was searched more in search engines. 4 articles reached over 130 million page views in total. Societies have researched past outbreaks and measures against coronavirus on Wikipedia.
Conclusion: Wikipedia has been an important source of internet for societies during the coronavirus pandemic process. Wikipedia data can be applied to predicting and modeling trends in societies.

Keywords

Coronavirus, Internet, Information, Wikipedia

Supporting Institution

There is no support for the study.

Project Number

-

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