Publishing research data
Philippa Frame and Stephanie Jacobs
Getting started
Why publish research data?
Publishing data and citing its location in published works allows others to replicate, validate and ensure accuracy of results. Sharing data improves the scientific record and increases scientific integrity. The Australian Code for the Responsible Conduct of Research, 2018 advises that researchers should share their data wherever possible and appropriate.
To support best practice in sharing data, QUT has adopted the F.A.I.R data principles to make research data findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable. The benefits of sharing data publicly include:
- increase scientific integrity (replicate, validate and correct results)
- satisfy funding bodies/publisher requirements
- preservation for future use (reduce duplication efforts)
- increase impact and engagement (increased citation rates of up to 69%)
- defend validity (also new research methodologies)
- support applications for promotion, tenure and grants
- facilitate collaboration and networking with industry partners.
Care should be exercised when sharing data that is sensitive, confidential, or subject to privacy legislation. It may be possible to share such data through mediated access arrangements, however, relevant legislation and the conditions of any commercial agreements and ethics approvals must be adhered to.
Exercise: Watch a video on publishing research data.
‘Rethinking Research Data’ | Kristin Briney | TEDxUWMilwaukee
‘Have you published your research data?’ (MediaHub video, 8min) (QUT login required).
Registries vs repositories
When it comes to data publishing, researchers may use repositories or registries to publish their data (as well as through other methods). A data repository stores data along with metadata, whereas a data registry acts as a catalogue or index of research data and only stores metadata.
An example of a research data registry is the Australian Research Data Commons’ Research Data Australia, a national registry of research datasets, that harvests metadata (only) from institutional data repositories, including QUT.
institutional and discipline-specific repositories
QUT’s institutional data repository
QUT’s Research Data Finder is a digital repository for research data created or collected by QUT researchers. Researchers can publish data, code, software, spatial images and more.
Features include:
- DOIs and data citations generated for datasets
- Links to related research projects and people
- Creative Commons licence selection
- Machine and human readable records
- Meets funder and publisher requirements for publishing open access datasets.
Researchers can specify the level of access to their datasets – open (publicly available for access, use, re-use and redistribution) or mediated (access by others requires approval by the data owner).
Metadata and data stored in Research Data Finder is exposed to a wider research audience through selected external har