Although Wikipedia is frequently on the banned sources list in school, new research is suggesting that the website may actually improve a student's overall work.

According to research presented during the 2011 Congress of the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of New Brunswick in Fredericton, students who were asked to write something that would be posted on Wikipedia were more concerned about checking their facts and ensuring that they were accurate.

The researchers suggest that despite Wikipedia's reputation for being unstructured, it still requires specific citations and accurate research, which is why more students may be concerned about finding concrete evidence to back up their work.

Additionally, the study's authors noted that once the students realized that their work would be broadcast to the public, they were more concerned about the accuracy for fear of being dispelled. This is in stark contrast to students who pass in a plagiarized paper for school because they may think they have a better chance of getting away with it.