Research Data Archive Research Articles

Preserving digital data without an archive: Illuminating the path towards digital preservation through knowledge of essential requirements and strategies

The planned publication shall provide an understanding of the concepts and principles of digital long-term preservation (or archiving) of research data. On one hand, it shall serve as a manual for researchers who don't have access to a trusted or certified digital repository and will provide information on the measures to take for preserving and sustainably disseminating research data. On the other hand, the publication will provide an overview of the technical requirements for the implementation of a service for the long-term preservation of data, as well as non-technical necessities like workflows and policies. The need for archiving will be contextualised by presenting the driving principles of good scientific practice.

Consolidating Research Data Management Infrastructure: Towards Sustainable Digital Scholarship

The sustainability of digital research outputs, particularly in the humanities where these frequently comprise archives of digital cultural heritage material, has always offered a challenge to the researchers and institutions who have responsibility for them. The amount of upfront care, effort, and funding that goes into developing a research project during the active (and funded) research phase is rarely replicated within the post-project maintenance and curation of the delivered digital assets or archives. What often defines the sustainability of a research project and its archive is a combination of research method and expected life span for the digital collection. Innovation in research data design is often at the expense of its longevity. But this does not need to be so. The tradeoff between longevity and functionality is a false dichotomy. Yet what is clear is that care and consideration in planning the research data storage or archive for a project can make a big difference. A data management plan that meets grant funder requirements is asked for for many research projects, but it is more than simply a funding document. Good research data management ensures that outputs are available online for years to come and available for future research and innovation. This article offers a practical insight to the methods being employed at the University of Oxford to support Digital Humanities scholars (and beyond) safeguard their digital legacy for future generations.

The role of reuse of research data in research studies

Open Science presents the idea that scientific knowledge should be openly shared, as central values of science are transparency, verifiability, replicability, and openness (Abele-Brehm, Gollwitzer, Steinberg, Schönbrodt, 2019). Its aim is to make "bodies of knowledge that would advance human understanding and benefit humankind" openly available (Willinsky, 2006, 36). The scientific body of knowledge consists of various information entities, including widely popular research data. Similar to other information entities in open science, research data should also achieve several purposes: be openly available to make the existing research more credible; enhance science as a global public good via data patrimonialization, pooling, and synergies; help in verification and trustbuilding; broader engagement; add value to data production; facilitate and accelerate efforts to address the big challenges of our time and other mission-oriented science (Berkowitz, Delacour, 2022). The demand for openly shared research data has risen over the last decade, both at the national and international levels, putting pressure on researchers from funding institutions and journal publishers (Thoegersen, Borlund, 2022). These purposes become evident in numerous scientific publications and different scientific events as the interest in the research process continues growing (Andrew, Winnie Wan, 2018).
 The purposes also raised a question about whether all research data already stored in, for instance, digital repositories, are suitable for further analysis and can be correctly interpreted and reused in new research. The purpose of this research is to investigate whether researchers in different fields of science in Croatia consider research data as a prerequisite and/or a starting point for their next research, and whether these data are reused just for comparative purposes with their results or as a means to assess the quality of other scientists’ research. The research study is not pre-registered as Croatia does not have a national open science online platform for pre-registration, and there are no ethical concerns with the research questions. The principal research method in this research study is an online questionnaire written in the Croatian language, consisting of 28 questions created for this research study (they will be made available after the conclusion of the study, as is customary). The questionnaire is divided into four parts: aspects of use of research data (sources of research data, importance of research data for planning, executing and quality of research), access to research data for other researchers (quantity of data to share, interaction between researchers, rewards for sharing research data, obstacles when sharing research data, benefits of sharing research data), archiving of research data (where and what) and data about the respondents. The possible participants are invited via e-mail sent to the Croatian scientists mailing list (a central e-mail address) including scientists from all fields of sciences. Therefore, thesample is a convenient one. The results will be analysed using descriptive statistics. It is expected that the participating scientists in Croatia will provide answers that will help clarify their position on the role of use and sharing of research data in their research activities.

RADAR: Building a FAIR and Community Tailored Research Data Repository

The research data repository RADAR is designed to support the secure management, archiving, publication and dissemination of digital research data from completed scientific studies and projects. Developed as a collaborative project funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) (2013-2016), the system is operated by FIZ Karlsruhe - Leibniz Institute for Information Infrastructure - and currently serves as a generic cloud service for about 20 universities and non-university research institutions. Since its launch, RADAR has witnessed significant changes in the landscape of research data repositories and the evolving needs of researchers, research communities and institutions. In our presentation within the “Enabling RDM” Track, we will show how RADAR is responding to these dynamic changes. In order to create a sufficiently large user base for the sustainable operation of the system, we have moved RADAR away from its previous single focus on a discipline-agnostic cloud service and towards a demand-driven functional optimisation. In 2021, we introduced an additional operating model for institutions (RADAR Local), where we operate a separate RADAR instance locally at the institution site exclusively using the institutional IT-infrastructure. In 2022 we opened up RADAR to new target groups with community-specific service offerings, in particular in the context of the National Research Data Infrastructure (NFDI). Beside the expansion of the functional scope, our ongoing development work focuses also on strengthening the system's support for the FAIR principles [1] and the concepts of FAIR Digital Objects (FDO) [2] and Schema.org. Our presentation will outline recent RADAR developments and achievements as well as future plans thus providing solutions and synergy potential for the scientific community and for other service providers.

Inventory of U.S. Public Data Sources to Measure the Socioeconomic Impact of Experiencing Interpersonal Violence

There is limited recent information regarding the impact of interpersonal violence on an individual's non-health-related experiences and attainment, including criminal activity, education, employment, family status, housing, income, quality of life, or wealth. This study aimed to identify publicly available representative data sources to measure the socioeconomic impact of experiencing interpersonal violence in the U.S. In 2022, the authors reviewed data sources indexed in Data.gov, the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research data archive, and the U.S. Census Bureau's Federal Statistical Research Data Center network to identify sources that reported both nonfatal violence exposure and socioeconomic status-or data sources linking opportunities to achieve both measures-over time (i.e., longitudinal/repeated cross-sections) at the individual level. Relevant data sources were characterized in terms of data type (e.g., survey), violence measure type (e.g., intimate partner violence), socioeconomic measure type (e.g., income), data years, and geographic coverage. Sixteen data sources were identified. Adverse childhood experiences, intimate partner violence, and sexual violence were the most common types of violence faced. Income, education, and family status were the most common socioeconomic measures. Linked administrative data offered the broadest and the most in-depth analytical opportunities. Currently, linked administrative data appears to offer the most comprehensive opportunities to examine the long-term impact of violence on individuals' livelihoods. This type of data infrastructure may provide cost-effective research opportunities to better understand the elements of the economic burden of violence and improve targeting of prevention strategies.

Archiving Digital Archaeological Data - Evaluation of a Survey in Germany

Archiving of digital research data based on established standards and methods is an important part of the research data lifecycle. It guarantees the long-term transparency and reusability of research results. In the case of archaeological data, this is of particular importance for the preservation of unique and irreplaceable cultural heritage. To gain insight into the current state of affairs regarding long-term archiving in Germany, the SEADDA (Saving European Archaeology from the Digital Dark Age) COST Action (1) and the Commission on Archaeology and Information Systems in the Association of German State Archaeologists (2), with the support of the IANUS Research Data Center of the DAI (3), conducted a survey in spring/summer 2021. This article presents the results of the survey together with recommendations for further and supporting measures targeted at improving the long-term archiving of digital archaeological data in Germany.

Victimization and Bullying in Taiwan

The present study, conducted in Taiwan, sought to link some elementary and middle school students’ bullying to factors in their social status, social support, direct and indirect bullying victimization, and positive and negative affect. We obtained the secondary dataset from the Survey Research Data Archive, Academia Sinica. Survey data were collected during 2012 from students in grades 5, 7, 8, and 9; of 853 students who filled out the questionnaire, 711 were included in our study’s final sample. Our study found a strong relationship between bullying victimization and bullying perpetration. Therefore, intervention programs seeking to interrupt the implied cycle of bullying could boost their effectiveness by focusing on school children’s capacity to feel empathy for victims of bullying and by developing ways to reduce children’s vengeful feelings toward bullies.

Current Developments in the Research Data Repository RADAR

Current Developments in the Research Data Repository RADAR

Three-Dimensional Gridded Radar Echo Extrapolation for Convective Storm Nowcasting Based on 3D-ConvLSTM Model

Radar echo extrapolation has been widely developed in previous studies for precipitation and storm nowcasting. However, most studies have focused on two-dimensional radar images, and extrapolation of multi-altitude radar images, which can provide more informative and visual forecasts about weather systems in realistic space, has been less explored. Thus, this paper proposes a 3D-convolutional long short-term memory (ConvLSTM)-based model to perform three-dimensional gridded radar echo extrapolation for severe storm nowcasting. First, a 3D-convolutional neural network (CNN) is used to extract the 3D spatial features of each input grid radar volume. Then, 3D-ConvLSTM layers are leveraged to model the spatial–temporal relationship between the extracted 3D features and recursively generate the 3D hidden states correlated to the future. Nowcasting results are obtained after applying another 3D-CNN to up-sample the generated 3D hidden states. Comparative experiments were conducted on a public National Center for Atmospheric Research Data Archive dataset with a 3D optical flow method and other deep-learning-based models. Quantitative evaluations demonstrate that the proposed 3D-ConvLSTM-based model achieves better overall and longer-term performance for storms with reflectivity values above 35 and 45 dBZ. In addition, case studies qualitatively demonstrate that the proposed model predicts more realistic storm evolution and can facilitate early warning regarding impending severe storms.

Evaluation of Research Data Management (RDM) services in academic libraries of India: A triangulation approach

Research is a planned and scientific method of increasing knowledge that is typically funded by a country's government or funding agencies. Research activity produces valuable data. Research Data Services (RDS) or Research Data Management (RDM) services are considered vital services provided by an academic library and are focused on the management, archiving, processing, and reuse of critical research data. This study evaluates the current status of the adaptation of RDS or RDM services in Indian academic libraries (which includes a total of 186 institutions, including all of India's Central Universities (54) and Institutes of National Importance (132)). A method triangulation approach was used for the data collection, including a literature survey, library website study, online survey, and telephonic interview with LIS professionals from Indian academic libraries. Academic libraries in India are yet to keep up with those in developed countries in adopting RDM services owing to a lack of RDM policy, institutional support, and technological challenges, according to the data. The study also presents suggestions to decision-makers, higher authorities of academic institutions, and the government to develop a strong RDM policy at both the institutional and national levels defining the role and duties of the libraries in RDM.

The Relationship of Social Media Addiction With Internet Use and Perceived Health: The Moderating Effects of Regular Exercise Intervention.

The popularity of online social media in recent years has not only brought information and social convenience to people's lives, but has also given rise to many problems, among which social media addiction (SMA) has become a concern of many scholars and experts. Past research has shown that regular exercise (REx) can have many health benefits for the body, so numerous scholars and experts believe that this may be one possible strategy for reducing the health effects of online community addiction and Internet use (IU). Therefore, this study adopted a secondary data research approach to explore and predict the effect of age on social media use and personal health, and therefore included age as a control variable to investigate whether the intervention of REx, excluding the effect of age, moderates the effect of SMA on IU and on perceived health (PH). The participants of this study were adults aged 18 years or older in Taiwan, using the 2019 “Survey Research Data Archive,” Vol. 7, No. 5 data. A total of 1,933 questionnaires were retrieved, and after elimination of invalid responses, 1,163 data were analyzed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling, PLS-SEM. The results were as follows: (1) SMA positively affected IU, (2) SMA could negatively affect PH, (3) there was no statistical effect of IU on PH, (4) SMA did not indirectly affect PH through IU, (5) REx had a moderating effect on SMA and IU, and (6) REx did not regulate the effect of SMA on PH. First, from these results, it is clear that the negative health effects of SMA may not be simply due to prolonged IU. Secondly, while it is true that the moderating effect for people with low levels of SMA can reduce IU, for people with high levels of SMA, the moderating effect of REx becomes a catalyst for increased Internet usage behavior. Finally, we draw conclusions based on the results of the study and propose directions and recommendations for follow-up research.

The influence of weathering on index properties and undrained shear strength for the Charmouth Mudstone Formation of the Lias Group at a site near Banbury, Oxfordshire, UK

The Lias outcrop extends continuously from Dorset to Yorkshire in England, with outlying areas in Somerset and Wales. It underlies the transport routes between a number of major UK cities. Understanding the material properties of the Lias Group is therefore important for infrastructure construction and maintenance across England and Wales. This study examines the influence of weathering on the engineering properties of the Charmouth Mudstone Formation (Lias Group) in light of recent developments in ground-investigation practice including: (i) the use of modern visual weathering classifications for soils and rocks; and (ii) the availability of large ground-investigation datasets from the construction of the High Speed Two (HS2) railway. The variability in the undrained shear strength data was consistent with the moisture content, liquidity index and plasticity index of the samples, but they were poorer indicators than shown in previous studies. The visually-assessed weathering class and the depth below ground level were found to be more useful indicators of the undrained shear strength of the clay and mudstone samples of the Charmouth Mudstone Formation. Supplementary material: Dataset for the Undrained Shear Strength and Index Properties of Charmouth Mudstone Formation Samples Excavated Near Banbury, Oxfordshire, UK, is available from the University of Bath Research Data Archive at https://researchdata.bath.ac.uk/id/eprint/1012

The school environment and bullying victimization among seventh graders with autism spectrum disorder: a cohort study

BackgroundThere is strong evidence to support the association between bullying and the onset of mental health conditions in students with ASD (autism spectrum disorder). In Taiwan, the seventh grade marks the first year of middle school, following elementary school. This period is also when peers tend to perform bullying behaviours to establish status among the peer group. Therefore, seventh grade is considered one of the most challenging times for students with ASD due to several changes within the school environment and the developmental changes that arise at this age. This study aims to assess the association between the school environment and bullying victimization among students with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) enrolled in regular classes in their first year of middle school.MethodsData were obtained from the Special Needs Education Longitudinal Study database located in the Survey Research Data Archive of Academia Sinica. The analysis included one hundred eighty-four seventh graders with ASD who were in regular classes across Taiwan. The primary variables under study were whether the participants had experienced social exclusion, insults or teasing, extortion, or sexual harassment over the past semester.ResultsParticipants with a higher positive friendship quality (P = 0.027) and who had received more peer support upon encountering difficulties in school (P = 0.041) were less likely to experience social exclusion. Participants with a higher positive friendship quality (P = 0.001) and a more positive classroom learning environment (P = 0.031) were less likely to have experienced insults or teasing. However, participants with more friends were more likely to be extorted (P = 0.015) and sexually harassed (P = 0.001) than those with fewer friends. Furthermore, participants in regular classes on a part-time basis were 2.59 times more likely to report sexual harassment than those in regular classes on a full-time basis (P = 0.021).ConclusionsThis study suggests that a supportive school environment reduces the likelihood that seventh-graders with ASD will be bullied. Clinicians should consider the association between the school environment and bullying victimization among adolescents with ASD in regular classes during their first year of middle school.

Exploring achievement motivation, student engagement, and learning outcomes for STEM college students in Taiwan through the lenses of gender differences and multiple pathways

ABSTRACT Background This study, based on Astin’s input-environment-outcome (I-E-O) model, proposes a refined model that is helpful for understanding the STEM gender difference and learning process. The multiple pathways depicting the relationship among achievement motivation and learning experiences for STEM college students are currently unknown in this field. Purpose This study focused on two research questions: (a) Are there significant differences in achievement motivation, student engagement, and learning outcomes between male and female STEM college students? (b) How are male and female STEM college students’ achievement motivations, mediated by student engagement, associated with their learning outcomes? Sample This study used empirical data from the Survey Research Data Archive of Taiwan Academia Sinica in Taiwan. The participants were recruited from one highly selective science/engineering research university in Taiwan. There were 280 STEM students left after deleting students from social science and management majors. Methods A MANOVA and a structural equation model (SEM) were used in the analysis. Results The results found that male STEM college students reported significantly higher scores on practical STEM competence gains than female STEM college students. In addition, the results of multi-group SEM found that there were no significant differences in male and female students. The results indicated that IOAM (individual oriented achievement motivation) had a significant relationship to practical STEM competence gains via the engagement behaviors of active participation and interactions with instructors. However, SOAM (social-oriented achievement motivation) can only predict interactions with instructors, and cannot predict the learning outcomes. Conclusions The result of the MANOVA analysis indicated that male STEM college students perceived significantly higher practical STEM competence gains. This result was noteworthy because these male and female STEM college students receive the same curriculum, instructors, and learning environment, and there was no significant gender difference in current class rank. In addition, the result of SEM highlighted the importance of IOAM. More discussion and implications follow.

A new CAM6 + DART reanalysis with surface forcing from CAM6 to other CESM models

An ensemble Kalman filter reanalysis has been archived in the Research Data Archive at the National Center for Atmospheric Research. It used a CAM6 configuration of the Community Earth System Model (CESM), several million observations per day, and the Data Assimilation Research Testbed (DART). The data saved from this global, sim 1^circ resolution, 80 member ensemble span 2011–2019. They include ensembles of: sub-daily, real world, atmospheric forcing for use by all of the nonatmospheric models of CESM; weekly, CAM6, restart file sets; 6 hourly, prior hindcast estimates of the assimilated observations; 6 hourly, land model, plant growth variables, and 6 hourly, ensemble mean, gridded, atmospheric analyses. This data can be used for hindcast studies and data assimilation using component models of CESM; CAM6, CLM5, CICE5, POP2. MOM6, MOSART, and CISM; and non-CESM Earth system models. This large dataset (~ 120 Tb) has a unique combination of a large ensemble, high frequency, and multiyear time span, which provides opportunities for robust statistical analysis and use as a machine learning training dataset.

Management and maintenance of research data by researchers in Zimbabwe

PurposeThe concept of research data management (RDM) is new in Zimbabwe and other developing countries. Research institutions are developing research data repositories and promoting the archiving of research data. As a way of creating awareness to researchers on RDM, the purpose of this paper is to determine how researchers are managing their research data and whether they are aware of the developments that are taking place in RDM.Design/methodology/approachA survey using a mixed method approach was done and an online questionnaire was administered to 100 researchers in thirty research institutions in Zimbabwe. Purposive sampling was done by choosing participants from the authors of articles published in journals indexed by Google Scholar, Scopus and Web of Science. Interviews were done with five top researchers. The data was analysed using NVIVO. The results were presented thematically. The questionnaire was distributed using the research offices of the selected 30 research institutions. There was a 75% response rate.FindingsThe findings indicated that all the researchers are aware of the traditional way of managing research data. A total of 70% of the respondents are not aware of the current trends in RDM services, as they are keeping their data on machines and external hard drives, while 97.3% perceive RDM services as useful, as it is now a requirement when applying for research grants. Librarians have a bigger role to play in creating awareness on RDM among researchers and hosting the data repositories for archiving research data.Practical implicationsResearch institutions can invest in research data services and develop data repositories. Librarians will participate in educating researchers to come up with data management plans before they embark on a research project. This study also helps to showcase the strategies that can be used in awareness creation campaigns. The findings can also be used in teaching RDM in library schools and influence public policy both at institutional and national level.Social implicationsThis study will assist in building capacity among stakeholders about RDM. Based on the findings, research institutions should prioritise research data services to develop skills and knowledge among librarians and researchers.Originality/valueFew researches on RDM practices in Zimbabwe were done previously. Most of the papers that were published document the perception of librarians towards RDM, but this study focused mainly on researchers’ awareness and perception. The subject is still new and people are beginning to research on it and create awareness amongst the stakeholders in Zimbabwe.

Towards an Inventive Ethics of Carefull Risk: Unsettling Research Through DIY Academic Archiving

ABSTRACT In this article, we call for an inventive ethics of care-full risk for qualitative research. While methodological experimentation is widely welcomed across the social sciences, there is little talk of innovation in ethical principles and practice. We argue that research ethics is an ‘invented tradition’ (Hobsbawm 2012), which has become unquestioned convention. We take up the archiving and reuse of qualitative research data as a challenging, yet compelling, site of methodological innovation, where ethical considerations often appear as an insurmountable barrier. Ethical concerns about informed consent and anonymity, given unknown future use of data, and commitments to destroying data to protect research participants, appear undone by calls to share data. We take up the work of community archives, feminist and queer archivists and archival theory, as generative sites for developing an archival imaginary for researchers. We recount how we came to unsettle ethical practice through creating a ‘DIY academic archive’, a digital open access research archive, Clayoquot Lives: An Ecofeminist Story Web (https://clayoquotlives.sps.ed.ac.uk/). Against a paternalistic research culture of risk avoidance, we argue that care always involves risk. An inventive feminist ethic of care-full risk can resource new ethical research, reimagining research by embracing the risk of caring for data.

Use and users of a social science research data archive.

This study focuses on the use and users of Finnish social science research data archive. Study is based on enriched user data of the archive from years 2015-2018. Study investigates the number and type of downloaded datasets, the number of citations for data, the demographics of data downloaders and the purposes data are downloaded for. Datasets were downloaded from the archive 10346 times. Majority of the downloaded datasets are quantitative. Quantitative datasets are also more often cited, but the number of citations vary and does not always correlate with the number of downloads. Use of the archive varies by user's country, organization, and discipline. Datasets from the archive were downloaded most often for study work, bachelor's and master's theses, and research purposes. It is likely that reusing research data will increase in the near future as more data will become available, scholars are more informed about research data management, and data citation practices are established.

Baureka.online - Research Repository, Catalogue and Archive for Architectural History and Building Archaeology

Building archaeology (Historische Bauforschung) is an internationally renowned methodology for investigating historic buildings in research, heritage preservation and planning. It is a hands-on process which documents the geometry, construction, materiality, usage, form, and meaning of buildings and makes it possible to trace the processes of their creation throughout the various layers of time embodied in their fabric. Despite the extensive use of digital tools within its workflows building archeology has not yet embraced the digital age as firmly as other disciplines. While the research community has long been interconnected via societies and conferences, there still is no digital platform for the overarching valorisation of scientific building documentations. Baureka.online , a research data repository, catalogue and archive for building archeology in the German speaking area, seeks to provide an innovative answer to this urgent desideratum .

The National Open Access Research Data Archive (MIDAS) and Its Potential Benefits for Climate Research

The National Open Access Research Data Archive (MIDAS) and Its Potential Benefits for Climate Research