Sense of Virtual Community in Wikipedia Online Community for Technology-Enhanced Learning in Higher Education

Abstract

Currently, global crises along the digital revolution challenge the organization of higher education (HE) world-wide. Hence, there is an urgent need to better understand how Web 2.0-technology with their online communities can support learning in HE particularly in distance mode. This article investigates technology-enhanced learning (TEL) in HE, taking place in the Wikipedia online community. Particularly the study focuses on the role of sense of virtual community (SOVC) in the social process of learning. Therefore, this study investigates the student perceptions of purpose and benefits of the Wikipedia community, as well as the perceived SOVC while being an active contributing participant in the community. The study was carried out in one university course, where technology intervention was carried out by using Wikipedia in a learning assignment of collaborative writing. The case study results illustrate that mainly students perceive the purpose and benefits of Wikipedia being cognitive, although only less than one-third of the students experienced SOVC as active participants. The article contributes to the field of TEL in HE, more specifically to Wikipedia-enhanced learning and the significance of SOVC in Wikipedia community during learning assignment as active community participants. The presented case study provides insights into the SOVC in online communities for HE-learning during technology interventions.