Ensuring the data-rich future of the social sciences
Open accessAbstract
Massive increases in the availability of informative social science data are making dramatic progress possible in analyzing, understanding, and addressing many major societal problems. Yet the same forces pose severe challenges to the scientific infrastructure supporting data sharing, data management, informatics, statistical methodology, and research ethics and policy, and these are collectively holding back progress. I address these changes and challenges and suggest what can be done.
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Misgivings about confidentiality and transferability might further impede sharing of socio-economic information.
“whilst misgivings about confidentiality and transferability might further impede sharing of socio-economic information (King, 2011).”
From Policy-driven monitoring and evaluation: Does it support adaptive management of socio-ecological systems? (2019) · cites this paper as King, 2011
Calls for transparency are not always easily achieved.
“Firstly, the calls for transparency are not always easily achieved.”
From Policy-driven monitoring and evaluation: Does it support adaptive management of socio-ecological systems? (2019) · cites this paper as King, 2011
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Olteanu, A., Castillo, C., Diaz, F., & Kıcıman, E. (2019) · Frontiers in Big Data · doi:10.3389/fdata.2019.00013 · Cited by 763 · see citing works
“Yet, while the ability to capture large volumes of data brings along important scientific opportunities (Lazer et al., 2009; King, 2011), size by itself is not enough.”
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“The interaction with technological systems is generating massive datasets that document collective behavior in a previously unimaginable fashion [1, 2].”
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Social Data: Biases, Methodological Pitfalls, and Ethical Boundaries
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Waylen, K. A., Blackstock, K. L., van Hulst, F. J., Damian, C., Horváth, F., Johnson, R. K., Kanka, R., Külvik, M., Macleod, C. J. A., Meissner, K., et al. (2019) · Science of the Total Environment · doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.12.462 · Cited by 83 · see citing works
“Individual and systematic barriers hinder ecological information sharing (Michener, 2015) whilst misgivings about confidentiality and transferability might further impede sharing of socio-economic information (King, 2011).”
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- Authors
- King, G.
- Affiliations
- Harvard University (US)
- Corresponding author
- King, Gary
- ORCID
- King, Gary
- Venue
- Science
- Published
- 2011-02-11
- Volume
- 331
- Issue
- 6018
- Pages
- 719-721
- ISSN
- 0036-8075 (ISSN-L)
- 1095-9203
- OpenAlex
- W1979492569
- Cited by
- 394
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 8 · 2025: 9 · 2024: 11 · 2023: 14 · 2022: 14 · 2021: 24 · 2020: 28 · 2019: 27 · 2018: 25 · 2017: 39 · 2016: 42 · 2015: 46 · 2014: 42 · 2013: 34 · 2012: 22
- FWCI
- 98.42
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- nrs.harvard.edu
- Licence
- cc-by
- Locations
- Science (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Digital Access to Scholarship at Harvard (DASH) (Harvard University) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- DigitalGeorgetown (Georgetown University Library) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Information Systems › Research Data Management Practices
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Data Analysis and Archiving
- Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › Information Systems and Management › Big Data Technologies and Applications
- Keywords
- social science data, data sharing, data management, research infrastructure, research informatics, statistical methodology, research ethics, science policy, data availability
- MeSH terms
- Humans, Publishing, Social Sciences, Information Storage and Retrieval, Privacy, Information Management, Access to Information, Information Dissemination, Informatics
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