Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion/Reuven Bar-On

In light of the fact that the decision to remove or not to remove this page rests with Wikipedia, listed below are the primary reasons for not removing it based on the plethora of unsupported claims made by “@Paulsheer” [Mr Paul Sheer], which are immediately followed by my counter arguments in response. It now appears that Mr Sheer’s claims, from the middle of November until the 27th of November and on multiple occasions, were made to justify his deletion of most of the text and his desire to eventually have it removed entirely. The Wikipedia warning at the top of the page suggesting that there are “multiple issues with this article” are based primarily on Mr Sheer’s editorial comments and suggestions. Moreover, the suggestions for removing and possibly merging the “Bar-On” page with Wikipedia’s “Emotional Intelligence” page is also based primarily on Mr Sheer’s unsupported editorial comments and actions summarized below. 1. According to Mr Sheer, Dr Bar-On’s conceptual model of emotional and social intelligence is “not well-known,” not applied and rarely cited in the professional literature (“nearly non-existent”). Based on this assumption, he apparently concluded that Dr Bar-On is “non-notable” and “not a famous or important person” which justifies removing this page from Wikipedia. However, the following few examples do not appear to support these assumptions: (1) over 9,000 citations appear in the professional literature focusing on this model for example; (2) Bar-On’s measures of emotional intelligence have been translated into more than 30 languages and have been completed by more than 3,000,000 people; and (3) the Bar-On model has been recommended for use in schools by the British Department of Education in 2003, for use in the military by the US Government Accountability Office in 1997, US Senate Committee on Armed Services in 1998, RAND Corporation in 2012 as well as by other government and private organisations worldwide for example.

2. Mr Sheer feels that the Bar-On page contained “exaggerations” and “unsourced claims” that have been “factually disproven.” However, he fails to describe which claims he is referring to exactly and why they are exaggerations and factually unproven in his opinion. Instead of clearly identifying and supporting this, Mr Sheer simply deleted text based on his assumptions. In contrast to what Mr Sheer feels and believes however, everything that appeared in the original version of this page, which was accepted and posted by Wikipedia on the 15th of February 2016, cited numerous independent sources that were not published or co-published by Dr Bar-On as is rightfully required by Wikipedia for the sake of objectivity. Regarding the validity, reliability and applicability of the Bar-On model, it is important to mention that 54 of the 81 references originally appearing in this page support the robustness and usefulness of this model in the following areas: (1) healthcare; (2) teaching, education and career decision-making; (3) selection and training in human resources; (4) leadership assessment and development; (5) organisational development; (6) neuro-psychological assessment; (7) and psychological treatment. Furthermore, Dr Bar-On published 40 studies, over a period of three decades, demonstrating the predictive validity and applicability of his model. In addition to these studies, hundreds of researchers and graduate students have applied the Bar-On model in their research.

3. Additionally, Mr Sheer believes that the content and language of this page was solely designed for “promotional” purposes. Mr Sheer once again fails to point out which language is promotional and why he believes it is promotional. Instead, he indiscriminately deleted text. One of the comments is that the page should be removed because it appears to be “autobiographical and not biographical, which should not be done on a living person.” Within the same comment, it was also suggested that Dr Bar-On needs additional external references to support what appears in the article. In addition to Wikipedia agreeing to post this page with only two references out of 81 being authored by Bar-On, it is important to note that the three other biographical descriptions of living people in the field of emotional intelligence have far less external references than those included Bar-On. For example, Peter Salovey has 31, Daniel Goleman has only 3, and John D. Mayer has only 2 external references. Moreover, Daniel Goleman has 15 selected publications that he authored while Peter Salovey has 25 publications that he has authored. Additionally, there are innumerable Wikipedia pages describing living people. At this point, it is important to point out that Dr Bar-On was reluctant about having a Wikipedia page posted describing his contributions to psychology and the field of emotional and social intelligence, nor was it his idea to post this page. He only agreed to do so when approached by me and others. The only reason that convinced him to have a page created on his behalf was that he has been inundated with direct requests to know more about his model, why and how he developed it, its impact on behaviour, performance and well-being as well as its validity, applicability and limitations. Rather than having to frequently respond to researchers, scholars and students like he has been for the past two decades, he thought it would be easier for him and others to have this relevant information and references appearing on Wikipedia. Knowing him personally for a number of years moreover, it is reasonable to assume that it is beneath his sense of humility and dignity to directly respond to Mr Sheer’s claims and actions.

4. Based on the above erroneous and ungrounded claims, Mr Sheer concludes that Bar-On’s model and research in the field of emotional intelligence is “bunk” and “quackery” as he has described his work. In raising questions, expressing disagreements and voicing criticism with respect to theories and published research findings, there is no place for language like this especially in encyclopaedias and publications of any kind in the academic world. After Mr Sheer emailed Dr Bar-On directly in the latter part of November, Dr Bar-On tried to better understand and patiently address his concerns. More than Mr Sheer’s apparent lack of background in and understanding of psychological research, Dr Bar-On was shocked by the derogatory, defamatory and vulgar language used by Mr Sheer. Dr Bar-On was eventually “forced to respond” on the 30th of November to what Mr Sheer posted on Wikipedia’s talk page on the 27th of November. Dr Bar-On is prepared to share with Wikipedia Mr Sheer’s 12 emails, which he received from the 23rd to the 27th of November. The nature of the content conveyed and the language expressed in these emails will demonstrate the malicious intent behind Mr Sheer’s radical editing and removal of what Wikipedia originally posted on the 15th of February this year. In light of the fact that Mr Sheer’s claims are unfounded and have not been factually supported by him to date, this page should not be removed. As such, I am uploading a mildly revised and shortened version of what Wikipedia originally posted based on guidance from Dr Bar-On. Should anyone wish to edit any part of this revised page, they are of course welcome to do so; however, any future editing should be done by justifying editorial suggestions by citing relevant peer-reviewed sources.

Last, an attempt is currently being made to avoid the “orphan” status of this page as well. In addition to linking this page to the “Emotional Intelligence” page, and a separate “Emotional Quotient Inventory” page will very soon be submitted posting on Wikipedia. Additionally, I will also mildly edit the existing “Emotional Intelligence” page. These three pages will then be linked.

In closing this argument to have Wikipedia retain this mildly revised and briefer version of what they posted earlier this year, I would like to convey the following. Although Wikipedia provides a very valuable service and innovative way of allowing millions of people worldwide to quickly obtain information on a vast number of topics, its current system also allows people to maliciously edit, distort and destroy that same information. There needs to be an effective way of preventing this from happening. For example, Wikipedia could have (a) re-viewed all, most or even a randomly selected number of the 81 references that originally appeared on this page that they agreed to post on the 15th of February 2016, and could have (b) requested from Mr Sheer to cite relevant peer-reviewed sources that support his massive editing and removal of text in this specific case. Such an approach, or some variation thereof, would have prevented what has happened in this case as well as prevent similar situations like this from happening in the future. While Wikipedia has a reviewing committee that decides to accept or reject the posting of new pages that are submitted, it would be good if they could have a re-viewing system in place to agree to edit, delete text or even entire pages that they themselves originally accepted for posting. Such a reviewing system would help protect the professional integrity of Wikipedia as an encyclopaedia. Colin barlow 2016 (talk) 22:44, 18 December 2016 (UTC)