We study how the COVID-19 pandemic, alongside the severe mobility restrictions that ensued, has impacted information access on Wikipedia, the world's largest online encyclopedia. A longitudinal analysis that combines pageview statistics for 12 %DIFDELCMD < \WP %%%  language editions with mobility reports published by Apple and Google reveals massive shifts in the volume and thenature of information seeking patterns amidst the pandemic. Interestingly, while we observe a transient increase in Wikipedia's pageview volume following mobility restrictions, the nature of information sought was impacted more permanently. These changes are most pronounced for language editions associated with countries in which the most severe mobility restrictions were implemented. We also find that articles belonging to different topics behaved differently; %DIFDELCMD < \eg%%%  , attention towards entertainment%DIFDELCMD < \hyp %%% related topics is lingering and even increasing, while the interest in health%DIFDELCMD < \hyp %%% and biology%DIFDELCMD < \hyp %%% related topics was either small or transient. Our results highlight the utility of %DIFDELCMD < \WP %%%  for studying how the pandemic affected people's needs, interests, and concerns.
We study how the COVID-19 pandemic, alongside the severe mobility restrictions that ensued, has impacted information access on Wikipedia, the world's largest online encyclopedia. A longitudinal analysis that combines pageview statistics for 12 %DIFDELCMD < \WP %%% Wikipedia language editions with mobility reports published by Apple and Google reveals massive shifts in the volume and nature of information seeking patterns during the pandemic. Interestingly, while we observe a transient increase in Wikipedia's pageview volume following mobility restrictions, the nature of information sought was impacted more permanently. These changes are most pronounced for language editions associated with countries where the most severe mobility restrictions were implemented. We also find that articles belonging to different topics behaved differently; %DIFDELCMD < \eg%%% e.g. , attention towards %DIFDELCMD < \hyp %%% entertainment-related topics is lingering and even increasing, while the interest in %DIFDELCMD < \hyp %%% %DIFDELCMD < \hyp %%% health- and biology-related topics was either small or transient. Our results highlight the utility of %DIFDELCMD < \WP %%% Wikipedia for studying how the pandemic is affecting people's needs, interests, and concerns.
A
Wikipedia
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volume
D
and the
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nature
volume and nature
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amidst
during
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in which
where
A
e.g.
D
entertainment
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related
entertainment-related
D
health
D
and biology
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related
health- and biology-related
A
Wikipedia
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affected
is affecting