Reusing and citing research data

Photo by ASPhotohrapy, Pixabay.

Reusing research data

Sharing data when possible is wise. By sharing data:

  • You can reuse data produced by others in your own research.
  • You can provide your datasets for others to be utilised.

Further use of existing research data is economical and saves limited resources. It is good for researchers to reuse already existing research data in their study, because

  • It speeds up the process.
  • Existing data may work as reference material for their own data, or their own data can be merged with existing data.
  • It will save research resources, when they do not need to conjure up everything by themselves.
  • Shared datasets can be applied across disciplines, potentially opening up new opportunities for collaboration.

When using data produced by others, the terms of use for the data must be considered. Terms of use are usually defined by a license (e.g. CC license). Depending on the license, data can be used either completely freely or there may be restrictions on its use.

Research data can be searched for reuse purposes via various search services, data repositories, archives and portals. See previous section to (Sharing data – Where and how?) to find services available for searching existing datasets.

Data citation

Research data must be cited as all other sources produced in research. The Copyright Act and good scientific practice require that the author’s name is mentioned in a proper manner. Data citations work just like book or scientific article citations. Watch this video (2:06) to review how to cite data properly.

The data reference should consist of following elements:

  • Creator
  • Title
  • Host organisation (repository/archive)
  • Publication time and/or date
  • Persistent identifier

Useful additional elements are:

  • Version
  • Resource type
  • License
  • ORCID (persistent identifier for researchers)
  • Possible embargo information

If you’re interested in learning more about data citation practices, please explore this guide:

Remember:

  • Reuse of existing research data is smart. It saves limited resources and speeds up the research process.
  • Data must be cited in a similar manner to scientific articles and books.

You have now completed module 4.

< Module 4: Sharing data – Where and how?
Module 5: Open education >