Grants:IdeaLab/Study the gap with in-depth targeted interviews, not just statistics and crowdsourcing

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Study the gap with in-depth targeted interviews, not just statistics and crowdsourcing

There's already enough quantitative research to confirm there is an imbalance. Now you need better qualitative research to get insights.

idea creator• Mrevan

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created on06:36, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

Project idea

What is the problem you're trying to solve?

It seems like IdeaLab is studying the gender gap from 30,000 feet, instead of from ground level. A "survey of existing research findings" only talks about global statistics, without a single personal experience or first-person recommendation.

https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Address_the_gender_gap/Research

https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Gender_gap

What is your solution?

Don't do another academic-style research. Ask questions like a product manager or a user experience researcher would. Recruit a relatively small number of subjects from among your existing editors. Choose some women and men who are already achieving the results you hope to maximize (e.g. frequent editing), and some who are not. Ask lots of "why" questions. Find out what you don't know you don't know.

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Endorsements

• I like the idea of close-up, user experience style research. Skud (WMF) (talk) 23:53, 17 March 2015 (UTC)
• This makes a lot of sense. The other survey techniques proposed are biased, because they would only include answers to the questions the people designing them thought to ask. They can also take experiences out of context. If a woman feels like her opinions won't be taken seriously, it isn't particularly helpful without knowing what gave her that impression. Does she feel like she needs a PhD in that area to participate? (true for one friend, who doesn't edit). Personally, (I'm a woman) I find that it's the talk pages that make me a once or twice a year editor. This goes double for articles about feminist issues…she says... Xttina.Garnet (talk) 15:25, 24 March 2015 (UTC)
• Long needed this kind of information alongside the larger metrics. Sadads (talk) 15:59, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

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