The Streetlight Effect & WikiTree - To what extent? What should be done about it?

Question

Wikipedia defines the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetlight_effect Streetlight Effect] as " . . . a type of observational bias where people only look for whatever they are searching by looking where it is easiest."

In terms of WikiTree, the Streetlight Effect may be most prevalent in dealing with language barriers as, for example, exists for 17th century pioneers born in France who immigrated to Canada.

Since such pioneers of French-Canadian heritage are among the most well researched in world, the Streetlight Effect places some WikiTree users, who might tend to ignore this vast repository of French-based sources in favour of inferior secondary English-based, often on-line private family genealogy sources, at a major disadvantage.

Such major disadvantages should of course have policy implication for WikiTree.

It therefore behooves WikiTree to counter these policy disadvantages.

The fact that solutions to these major policy disadvantages may not be easy to come by does not imply that they should nonetheless not be addressed..

Comments

I agree with the concept of what your saying. Better sources, better wikitree... sometimes you have to venture into the dark and unknown places to find the best sources. I have no idea where one looks, in French or English, for Canadian information. Here's a link to the unsourced Canadian profiles. Have fun! or there's always this week's Collaborative profile Canadian Thomson Beattie

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Enough said.

My parting shot is that the Streetlight Effect is real and applies to WikiTree in certain cases.

Enjoy.

Answer 1

Claude, I am sorry, I just do not understand what you want to do about this. I am English speaking and know a little French and Spanish, just enough to get into trouble, so just how would you propose I use french language sources if i can not understand them well enough to make sure they are for the correct person. The beauty of WikiTree is that my limitations can be overcome by the abilities others have in understanding and adding those sources. Again I just do not see this as a problem.

Comments

Thank you for your comment. My question may not be a problem to you but I stand by my question. The mark of a professional is that he does not undertake a task unless he feels competent enough to bring solutions for the problem at hand. In that sense, the Streetlight Effect is very much alive at Wikitree with users anxious to wade into poor quality sources from the internet even though high quality sources are known to be available in abundance.

Wikitree's Honour Code is clear in terms of giving top priority to coordination and accuracy. WikiTree needs to address the Streetlight Effect by adopting a marketing approach whereby the viewer is king and users continually strive for excellence.

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Claude, when  you join WikiTree you become a Volunteer. This is not a site of professional's.There may be a few on here but I believe that most are not. I would rather have a few lesser sources that apply to the profile than have No sources on it, at least the "poor quality sources from the internet" give others a starting point, hopefully in the right direction.

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I disagree that WikiTree members are "anxious to wade into poor quality sources" -- that seems rather insulting to people doing their best to find sources, rather than leaving profiles unsourced.  And the fact that a source is in a language other than the original, does not necessarily mean that it is useless, or even "poor quality."

As WikiTree continues to grow, there should be more members fluent in different languages.  Until then, we do what we can.

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I am familiar with Wikipedia and there is my view no comparison with WikiTree in terms of willingness to coordinate to produce a high quality accurate product based of course on the highest of quality sources.

No insult or offence meant but I stand by my Streetlight Effect question.

The quality of content should simply not be compromised due to language considerations.

Answer 2

Claude, I think the community is usually receptive to addressing real problems and issues that come up in  this forum.  If you could cite some specific examples of policy "disadvantages," and possible WikiTree countermeasures, or perhaps make a specific proposal as to what you think needs to be done, that would go a long way.  I have no clue what you mean when you say "WikiTree needs to address the Streetlight Effect by adopting a marketing approach whereby the viewer is king ..."???

The Wikipedia link attributes the term to an old joke about a drunk who lost his keys in the park in the dark, but was looking for them under a streetlight "because that's where the light is."  It seems to me like a very long stretch to somehow conjure up a connection to our members' genealogy efforts, so at this point I'm also not seeing the problem.

Comments

The final judge of WikiTree content is the viewer. Otherwise, WikiTree will die.

Wikipedia's treatment of the Streetlight Effect is right on the money. There is no use looking where the streetlight shines if that is not where the lost keys are. Which happens quite a bit in language issues.

I continue to stand by my Streetlight Effect question.

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The language issue is quite simple. Somehow the language of the best quality sources has to be used instead of using inferior quality sources due to convenience of another language.

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While anyone in the community may disagree with this question, there is of course no 'best answer' for the question. The Streetlight Effect is merely another way of saying, to use WikiTree's expression, that « a guiding principle is to "use their conventions instead of ours". »