Wikipedia Addiction, Addictive mechanism exploited by the Wikipedia Options

[Jon Awbrey]

I did a topic title search before I posted and nothing came up.

18 pages of posts that mention addiction.

[Somey]

18 pages of posts that mention addiction.

Ahh, the memories!

I should say, though, that the post (of mine) that appears at the top of this thread was not originally meant to refer to someone with an addictive personality per se. The person in question may have such a personality, in fact some of his actions strongly suggest it, but that's somewhat beyond what the evidence tells us in his particular case.

What I meant was that there are people in this world who, often for no fault of their own, are hopelessly depressed, miserable, lonely, bored, angry, paranoid, and/or perilously unable to cope with the outside world and what it represents. Some of these folks become "internet addicts" simply because it gives them something to do, but in cases where the person also feels superior to others in some way - and this is most likely to be a feeling of intellectual superiority, but not necessarily - Wikipedia is like a super-powerful magnet. The Wikipedians themselves don't deliberately recruit these people, and in many cases would rather they didn't exist, but the fact remains that Wikipedia, by its very nature, is an attractant for such people.

One of the factors I mentioned was a "non-automated rewards system." Recently we had the subject of Yahoo!Answers come up here, which as many of you know has an automated scoring system. In effect, they're admitting the whole thing is a game and treating it as such, and effectively removing the need for human intervention in the promotion process. (But wait - "Yahoo! Answers recognizes your level achievements with our special brand of thank you's!" )

The result is that Yahoo!Answers probably does not attract "messed-up" folks the way Wikipedia does - since those folks aren't really interested in the kind of ego-reinforcement and personal validation that comes from a computer; they want it from real people, only they don't want to have to actually be with those people physically, or even know who they are. When they get that ego-reinforcement (in the form of barnstars or "thank you" messages, or the ultimate - a successful RfA), it's not euphoric in the sense that a stimulant-type drug is, but it amounts to the same psychological reward that such a substance gives people.

Mind you, I'm not trying to say this is common. Most WP admins probably see the "Support" votes in their RfA, followed by the new "buttons" in their UI, have a little fist-pump or two, and that's the end of it. But if you've got nothing else going on in your life that allows you to feel respected or cared about by other people, that fist-pump becomes a grand exultation, a whole new purpose in life. And it's around such people that cults are formed, because nobody is more loyal to the cult than the person who has only that, and nothing else, to lose.

[Zoloft]

<snip>
But if you've got nothing else going on in your life that allows you to feel respected or cared about by other people, that fist-pump becomes a grand exultation, a whole new purpose in life. And it's around such people that cults are formed, because nobody is more loyal to the cult than the person who has only that, and nothing else, to lose.

So... I see a lot of bizarre characters... but leaving Jimbo aside for a moment, who else has the biggest 'cult of personality' in Wikipedia?

[Somey]

So... I see a lot of bizarre characters... but leaving Jimbo aside for a moment, who else has the biggest 'cult of personality' in Wikipedia?

Wikipedia isn't a "cult of personality" at all, not even for Jimbo Wales (though there are several WP'ers who do idolize him). It's more of a LifeSpring or "est"-style cult, meaning it isn't really a cult in the quasi-religious sense, but has many of the same recruitment objectives and retention techniques, along with the group consciousness, "single mad belief," etc.

I'd have to say that if someone actually got to the point of being personally idolized, even to the limited extent that Jimbo is, the rest of them would figure out some way of tearing that person down to size fairly quickly.

[Zoloft]

So... I see a lot of bizarre characters... but leaving Jimbo aside for a moment, who else has the biggest 'cult of personality' in Wikipedia?

Wikipedia isn't a "cult of personality" at all, not even for Jimbo Wales (though there are several WP'ers who do idolize him). It's more of a LifeSpring or "est"-style cult, meaning it isn't really a cult in the quasi-religious sense, but has many of the same recruitment objectives and retention techniques, along with the group consciousness, "single mad belief," etc.

I'd have to say that if someone actually got to the point of being personally idolized, even to the limited extent that Jimbo is, the rest of them would figure out some way of tearing that person down to size fairly quickly.

I suppose that brown-nosing an admin or using your tools to protect a long-time verbally abusive 'vested contributor' or gathering a clique around one vocal member doesn't really count... because one personality is not powerful enough to severely warp Wikipedia... it's more a Team Douchebag effort...

[The Joy]

What's addicting to me about Wikipedia is the drama. It's a mixture of MMORPG thrills and gladiator-spectator rush. Just hang around the administrator boards or the "trouble-maker" talk pages (i.e. Giano, Malleus, etc.) and you can get your fill of soap operas.

All men have a dark side. We know we shouldn't enjoy violence and war, but deep down we do. Wikipedia certainly can be a place to get your share of violence without all the nasty blood and getting dirty yourself (physically, that is). As far as many are concerned, you're yelling at screenname, not a person. It takes a lot of discipline and empathy for most to realize you're hurting another person on the other side of the screen. Many never get that far.

I guess you can call "drama vampirism?"

[Cock-up-over-conspiracy]

Can we take that addiction down to the level of chemistry and psychology?

We have spoken about the problems of the Wikipedia's hard corn pornography obsession etc, those too are addictive elements to some.

I think I am more concerned at the exploitation of addictive mechanisms, and its last effect on young personalities, than I am about "nudie pictures" ... except where children are concerned.

I remember, for example, when I was watching Caspian blue ... at one point they were editing over 16 hours a day 7 days a week. Others know of other cases. That is surely beyond the point of a "pleasurable hobby".

18 pages of posts that mention addiction.

Attention to detail, please, Jon. I wrote "topic search" I posted it in your meta forum because I intended to be a revision, a meta discussion, of previous disparate threads embedded into other topics. Something that was easy to find for others.

In short, the aim was to create useful 'help file' of other resources both here and elsewhere.

Only here do you have 'experts' focusing on the Wikipedia experience.

This post has been edited by Cock-up-over-conspiracy: Tue 23rd February 2010, 4:48am

[Jon Awbrey]

Da capo … al fine …

Obviously it's inherent to the Wikipedia/MediaWiki platform to take advantage of emotionally/psychologically messed-up people, who are no doubt attracted to it because they're unable to gain the respect of other people (not to mention some form of authority over them) in real life. It's the only site that combines anonymity, high visibility, a non-automated rewards system, and the high valuation of phony expertise, at least to the degree it does.

To someone like this, Wikipedia is quite literally like crack or some other euphoria-inducing semi-addictive substance.

A question … no answers. You have often discussed here "wiki-addiction" … so, what are the addictive mechanism of the Wikipedia or what mechanism within the brain does the Wikipedia tap into?

They say the majority people who fall into an addictive traps never escape. Continued exposure to experiences involving compulsive attraction are said to produce over time neuroadaptations. Persistent neuroadaptations, literally changes in the hardwiring of the brain as I understand it, underlie aspects of addiction including repeated relapses.

I have often look at the potential social aspects of the Wikipedia, its cult-likeness (Stockholm Syndrome etc), but are there more fundamental biological hooks which it exploits?

I can see the addictive nature of the chemical rushes it provides whilst warring over turf and defending edits (adrenalin or whatever). I can imagine how it taps into all sorts of personal psychological projections. I understand that there are all sort of additional pleasure giving stimuli involved with eye and hand coordination of computers.

It a strange thing but part of the "great success" of the Wikipedia is surely that it taps in and exploits these things, including personality and psychological disorders.

Is that understood and questioned by the leadership? Should it come with a health warning?

BTDT.

Read Naked Lunch.

It has nothing to do with euphoric rushes.
It has nothing to do with the need to win.

It has everything to do with blotting out pain.
It has everything to do with the need to lose.

Jon

[CharlotteWebb]

Attention to detail, please, Jon. I wrote "topic search" I posted it in your meta forum because I intended to be a revision, a meta discussion, of previous disparate threads embedded into other topics. Something that was easy to find for others.

I've got a hunch that's not the house definition of "meta-discussion".

[Jon Awbrey]

Attention to detail, please, Jon. I wrote "topic search" I posted it in your meta forum because I intended to be a revision, a meta discussion, of previous disparate threads embedded into other topics. Something that was easy to find for others.

I've got a hunch that's not the house definition of "meta-discussion".

The prefix "meta" is one that I personally try to avoid, because it tends to get mis-used and over-used in many contexts, but it seemed to be the functor that came to many people's minds, so I have tried to get used to it.

On the other hand, a lot of threads got lumped into the Meta*Discussion Forum when it was first created, and a few even now, simply so that I could clean up their digressions and apply a more disciplined style of discourse to them.

The main problem with C↑/C's primer on the theme of addiction was that he started out saying all the things that people who "just now thought" of an idea always say about it and he showed no signs of trying to deal with previous discussions on the subject. That was a bit too reminiscent of Wikipediot Ways for my taste.

Jon Awbrey

[Cock-up-over-conspiracy]

Congratulations for filling this topic full of useless crap and making it unattractive to follow. As I said Jon ...

In short, the aim was to create useful 'help file' of other resources both here and elsewhere.

... and to make it all easy to find for other via Google and a related topic title.

One of the key elements of addiction is that "most people with addictions who present for help have other psychiatric problems as well". This is called comorbidity.

In this model, Wiki-addiction is a mask or distraction from other, greater, perhaps untreated problems. The addiction could be based on its value as an 'impermanent release' from other more stressful symptoms and situations.

Source: here.

If you were asked ‘What are the most important things we know about addiction?’ what would you say?

The 10 things are:

(1) addiction is fundamentally about compulsive behavior;
(2) addictive is initiated outside of consciousness;
(3) addiction is about 50% heritable and complexity abounds;
(4) most people with addictions who present for help have other psychiatric problems as well;
(5) addiction is a chronic relapsing disorder in the majority of people who present for help;
(6) different psychotherapies appear to produce similar treatment outcomes;
(7) ‘come back when you’re motivated’ (aka the standard offer in Wiki-terms) is no longer an acceptable therapeutic response;
(8) the more individualized and broad-based the treatment a person with addiction receives, thebetter the outcome;
(9) epiphanies are hard to manufacture; and
(10) change takes time.

[Text]

Many people who work in offices, or have desk jobs in general, seem to be using Facebook more and more while they're supposed to be working, to the point that it has been necessary to put aggressive blocks to the application to avoid excessive time wasting. The same probably goes for Wikipedia.