Arabic Wikipedia users’ personalized behavior analysis considering gender gap

by Bashar Al-Shboul, Dana A. Al-Qudah, Hadeel Boshmaf, Bilal Abu-Salih, Majdi Beseiso, Samar Al-Saqqa

Introduction

As many web platforms adopt collaborative content editing models, the gender gap is addressed as one of the chief concerns in using technology to restrict content editing by one gender.

Objective

This study aims to analyze the Arabic Wikipedia, the largest collaborative content editing platform on the Arabic web, in terms of gender behavior and differences in user activities.

Methods

This study is the first to address the gender gap in Arabic Wikipedia, characterize users’ gender through their behavior, and then address changes in characteristics over the past five years. This study analyzes parts of Arabic Wikipedia offline by linking article pages and page edit histories to user profiles of known genders.

Results

This study reported that a gender gap exists in Arabic Wikipedia. The results reported differences over the past five years between both genders in terms of tasks and user behavior. One aspect that indicated similarity is the period of active time over months/years. Differences were observed in the reported number of increasing users, activities, responsibilities, and average actions performed.

Conclusion

The results reveal a vast gap in terms of gender behavior in Wikipedia activities. Moreover, the results reveal that some administrative activities are disclosed to men more than to women.