I'm quite happy to admit that anecdotal evidence from my father in law hardly makes for a damning indictment of Wikipedia
Unfortunately I don't really have the to time to conduct my own full scale scientific study of the problem. But I will endeavor to look up and read some of the studies that have been done on the issue.
People do seem however to have a general distrust of Wikipedia even if it's not deserved. I guess that all the attention grabbing headlines that pop up frequently, such as this one
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2...07/2562940.htm
don't help. You don't see blogs and news sites reporting on how great such and such an article is on Wikipedia because it's so accurate. You only hear about how unreliable it is and how "anyone can edit it", that last point just rings alarm bells in most people's heads.
I'm also sure that Wikipedia will make more and more strides in the coming years and will become more and more acceptable as a source for general academic research. It's certainly a resource I make use of on a daily basis.
As an aside the only reason I got drawn into this argument at all was because this is one of the few forums I read on a daily basis, due in no small part to the unusually high number of intelligent and thoughtful posters (and yes sirbruce I count you as one of those) and I'd hate to see it go downhill as it gets more and more popular. Often some posters just get jaded and tend to post in a more combative and cynical way as time goes on, even if they don't mean to come across that way.