Why share research data?
Making data FAIR and adopting a stance of open-research provides many benefits to the researcher and wider field. Sharing research data is becoming an increasing expectation from institutions, funders, and government bodies as it both supports the conclusions of publications and provides opportunities for further research to reuse existing data, which in turn provides greater return on investment for all stakeholders.
Grant/contract/policy requirements
- Many research funders and governments are increasingly demanding greater openness and data reuse to ensure greater return on their investment and enable impact measures.
- Publishers increasingly expect underpinning data to have persistent identifiers and to be made available when manuscripts are submitted. Some publishers will not except papers where data cannot be provided at lodgement to support conclusions
- The Australian Code for the Responsible Conduct of Research and the NHMRC's National statement on the ethical conduct in human research both expect research-data metadata to be made openly available with a specific timeframe. Researchers who do not comply may find themselves disadvantages in future grant rounds.
Benefits to researchers
- Having research data, or metadata made discoverable increases the likelihood of research impact and citations.
- Building a greater profile in your discipline.
- Provides opportunity for future collaboration with other researchers who are working in the field.
