Open AccessCultural Differences in Collaborative Authoring of Wikipedia
Author(s) -
Pfeil Ulrike,
Zaphiris Panayiotis,
Ang Chee Siang
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
journal of computer‐mediated communication
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 4.15
H-Index - 119
ISSN - 1083-6101
DOI - 10.1111/j.1083-6101.2006.00316.x
Subject(s) - hofstede's cultural dimensions theory , uncertainty avoidance , collectivism , femininity , masculinity , german , individualism , style (visual arts) , psychology , social psychology , dimension (graph theory) , cultural diversity , sociology , political science , linguistics , anthropology , mathematics , geography , philosophy , archaeology , psychoanalysis , pure mathematics , law
This article explores the relationship between national culture and computer‐mediated communication (CMC) in Wikipedia. The articles on the topic game from the French, German, Japanese, and Dutch Wikipedia websites were studied using content analysis methods. Correlations were investigated between patterns of contributions and the four dimensions of cultural influences proposed by Hofstede (Power Distance, Collectivism versus Individualism, Femininity versus Masculinity, and Uncertainty Avoidance). The analysis revealed cultural differences in the style of contributions across the cultures investigated, some of which are correlated with the dimensions identified by Hofstede. These findings suggest that cultural differences that are observed in the physical world also exist in the virtual world.