If you’re conducting your own quantitative research, managing and storing your data is a major component to the process. The UW Libraries has an entire team of data librarians ready to support you in finding relevant research data or identifying tools to make your research process more smooth.
Data at the UW Libraries
The Data Resources and Data Management Guides provide links to useful physical and virtual resources for finding, analyzing, visualizing, and managing data. Use the data campus support to learn more about creating and maintaining a data management plan, how to arrange and organize data into user-friendly formats, and how to share, store, and publish your data. For an antiracist lens on data use in research, check out the University of Minnesota’s Data is Not Objective Guide.
Common Research Tools for Data
UW provides support for a number of tools that can help you throughout the research lifecycle. The UW also offers a number of storage options for your data. Tools include:
DMPTool (Data Management Plan Tool): A web-based tool that provides researchers with the ability to create and share data management plans (DMPs), which are documents that outline how data will be handled during and after a research project.
Open Science Framework (OSF): A cloud-based platform for project management aimed at researchers. Researchers can connect third-party services that they already use (such as GitHub, Google Drive, and Amazon Web Services) directly to the OSF platform.
OpenRefine: A free, open-source spreadsheet application that cleans tabular data in an automated fashion rather than through manual labor like Excel or Google Sheets.
Tabula: A free, open-source application that allows you to extract tabular data from tables in PDF files or web pages.Â
ResearchWorks Archive: A digital repository of digital files created and disseminated by UW faculty, staff, and researchers, including students’ work.
REDCap: A web-based tool for the design and management of research databases.
Center for Statistics and the Social Sciences (CS&SS)
The CS&SS provides free statistical consulting to UW faculty and students working on statistical problems in a range of social science disciplines. You can receive guidance at any stage of a project from study design and planning to selection of methods to the interpretation of results. The CS&SS offers drop-in consultation hours as well as scheduled appointments.
For more information, visit the CS&SS website.
Departments of Biostatistics & Statistics
Faculty and graduate students in the Consulting Program of these departments offer free statistical advice to UW faculty, staff, and students. They have expertise in R and Stata but work using whatever statistical software is more convenient for clients.
For more information, visit the statistical consulting services website.
Humanities Data Lab
The Humanities Data Lab is an interdisciplinary hub for digitally-centered or data-driven projects in humanities disciplines. The lab offers free support and resources through consultations and workshops, and is devoted to fostering a welcoming and inclusive environment for all, regardless of skillset or prior experience. They offer drop-in and scheduled consultations.
For more information, visit the Humanities Data Lab website and resource page.