Wikipedia Allowed?

[DJ CAS]

Is Wikipedia allowed to be used for the IB Extended Essay?

I think one of my teachers said that its not allowed but I just wanted to confirm.

[sweetnsimple786]

Use it if you want. It can help you familiarize yourself in a topic so that you can know what to even look further into. Definitely do not cite Wikipedia as a source. Use other sources to confirm what you read and use those sources.

[Austin Glau]

It may depend on your topic for EE. As sweetnsimple said, it's allowed but don't include it in your Works Cited. The useful thing about Wikipedia is if it has some very good information, look in the sources section. And if your topic is Math or Literature (Not world or past literature), then Wikipedia may help more than if your topic is History. Wikipedia tends to be hard to analyze because it is either really confusing, having been edited by some masters degree professor, or it seems right, but it isn't. So unless your knowledge on your EE topic make you able to pick out easily the incorrect details, I wouldn't use the details on Wikipedia, just sources and general information.

[Godstryke]

In short:

In terms of whether or not it is allowed, I doubt there is any rule that says you cannot use it.

In terms of whether not it's sensible to cite it as a source...that's a different story entirely. I would say no.

In long:

I would recommend Wikipedia only for the very basic background facts that will give you an overall picture of your topic (unless it's one of those pages with no citations, in which case you shouldn't use it just to be safe). Usually the introductory paragraph on the wiki page is helpful in accomplishing this. The table of contents can give you an overview of some of the possible areas to target your research in.

I have mixed feelings about the works cited on Wikipedia articles. Generally, they are credible, but I have found some sources that make you wonder what sort of idiot wrote the article/made the edit. However, for the most part the citations will give you a list of reliable other sources that can be used, though I personally avoid using the news articles for some topics - I've found that with certain topics the news media can't be trusted to give accurate information/present the topic objectively enough for me to pull out neutral research. Of course, you might find it otherwise.

Hope that was helpful.

Edited January 8, 2010 by Godstryke

[Sandwich]

I used it and then used the citations section to find where the info came from, searched THAT up on Googlebooks (<--- this was amazing for my EE) to make sure I had the context right and it didn't look crazy or misquoted and then used that. Wikipedia is a source for sources, but definitely not a source in-itself. I'd say citing Wikipedia, unless your EE is somehow ABOUT Wikipedia is citational suicide in terms of your credibility.

[Peachez]

I agree with the posters above, do not cite a wikipidea source in your Extended Essay. You can use its in the beginning to familiriaze yourself with the topic and if you find the information useful, make sure it comes from a useful source. For example, there are footnotes in wikipidea... if those sources are good then go ahead and use them!