Research Guides: Criminology, Law & Society: DATA

Social Science Data Research Guide

Social Science Data Research Guide

OpenICPSR

Open ICPSR
"Institutional open ICPSR is a research data-sharing service developed to meet the needs of universities, journals, research centers, and departments. We offer a fully-hosted, economical, professionally-run, and trusted research data repository that demonstrates the research impact of your organization."

International Data

Correlates of War Project Facilitates the collection, dissemination, and use of accurate and reliable quantitative data in international relations.
Eurostat Eurostat is a Directorate-General of the European Commission located in Luxembourg. Its main responsibilities are to provide statistical information to the institutions of the European Union (EU) and to promote the harmonisation of statistical methods across its member states and candidates for accession as well as EFTA countries.
FAOSTAT FAOSTAT provides free access to food and agriculture data for over 245 countries and territories and covers all FAO regional groupings from 1961 to the most recent year available.
Global Financial Data Global Financial Data is a collection of financial and economic data provided in ASCII or Excel format.
International data base (IDB) U.S. Census Bureau Contains statistical tables of demographic data for countries and areas of the world with a population of 5,000 or more. Covers 1950 to present with projections to 2050
International Monetary Fund Data Provides operational advice to IMF member countries that are subscribers to the Special Data Dissemination Standard regarding how to complete the prescribed (mandatory) monthly Data Template on International Reserves and Foreign Currency Liquidity.
OECD iLibrary "OECD iLibrary is OECD's Online Library for Books, Papers and Statistics and the gateway to OECD's analysis and data. OECD iLibrary contains all the publications and datasets released by OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development), International Energy Agency (IEA), Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA), OECD Development Centre, PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment), and International Transport Forum (ITF) since 1998."
Polity IV Project Offers data on political regime characteristics and transitions, 1800-2013.
Stockholm International Peace Research Institute SIPRI provides data on conflict, armaments, arms control and disarmament.
UN Comtrade Database Access to detailed global trade data.
UNdata Offers a variety of statistical resources covering the following areas: Education, Employment, Energy, Environment, Food and Agriculture, Health, Human Development, Industry, Information and Communication Technology, National Accounts, Population, Refugees, Trade and Tourism.
World Bank DataBank DataBank is an analysis and visualisation tool that contains collections of time series data on a variety of topics. Users can create their own queries; generate tables, charts, and maps; and easily save, embed, and share them.

Select Data Sources

American Community Survey (ACS). Census Bureau, U.S. Department of Commerce
ACS provides annual data about demographic, social, economic, and housing characteristics of the United States (US) population.
American Time Use Survey (ATUS) - Bureau of Labor Statistics. U.S. Department of Labor
"The American Time Use Survey (ATUS) measures the amount of time people spend doing various activities, such as paid work, childcare, volunteering, and socializing."
Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
"The Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) is the nation's premier system of health-related telephone surveys that collect state data about U.S. residents regarding their health-related risk behaviors, chronic health conditions, and use of preventive services."
California Health Interview Survey (CHIS). UCLA Center for Health Policy Research
"The California Health Interview Survey (CHIS) is the nation's largest state health survey and a critical source of data on Californians as well as on the state's various racial and ethnic groups."
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"CHIS is the largest state health survey in the nation. It is a random-dial telephone survey that asks questions on a wide range of health topics. CHIS is conducted on a continuous basis allowing the survey to generate timely one-year estimates. CHIS provides representative data on all 58 counties in California and provides a detailed picture of the health and health care needs of California’s large and diverse population."
Consumer Expenditure Surveys (CE) - Bureau of Labor Statistics. U.S. Department of Labor
"The Consumer Expenditure Surveys (CE) program provides data on expenditures, income, and demographic characteristics of consumers in the United States. The CE program provides these data in tables, databases, news releases, reports, and public-use microdata files."
Early Childhood Longitudinal Programs (ECLS). Institute of Education Sciences (IES). National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES)
"The Early Childhood Longitudinal Study (ECLS) program includes three longitudinal studies that examine child development, school readiness, and early school experiences."
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"The is the statistics, research, and evaluation arm of the U.S. Department of Education."
NCCOR Catalogue of Surveillance Systems
An index online to 105 so called data "systems." This is an extraordinarily helpful directory of crucial data platforms.
Veganism Data - Faunalytics
"Study of Current and Former Vegetarians and Vegans. There are no restrictions on using these datasets outside of crediting that any findings are based on a study that was designed and carried out by Faunalytics."

COVID-19 in a Box

California - Los Angeles Times Site Tracking COVID-19 in California
"The coronavirus pandemic has spread rapidly across California. Experts say the true number of people infected is unknown and likely much higher than official tallies.To better understand the spread of the virus, The Times is conducting an independent, continuous survey of dozens of local health agencies across the state."
California - UCI's Latest Updates on COVID-19
Daily information shares from UCI on COVID-19.
California - UCI Coronavirus Hub
Coronavirus Updates for the UCI Community: UCI is closely monitoring the coronavirus ("COVID-19") situation and associated communications from the county, state and federal authorities. We will continue to provide updates through this website and email communications, and take steps to ensure the health and safety of our community.
California - University of California, Coronavirus
"The University of California is vigilantly monitoring and responding to new information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak, which has been declared a global health emergency."
California Coronavirus (COVID-19) Response Site
The State of California government clearinghouse for COVID-19 information.
California Department of Public Health - COVID-19 Updates
"The California Department of Public Health (CDPH) works to protect the public's health in the Golden State and helps shape positive health outcomes for individuals, families and communities. The Department's programs and services, implemented in collaboration with local health departments and state, federal and private partners, touch the lives of every Californian and visitor to the state 24 hours a day, 7 days a week."
Coronavirus (COVID-19) - Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
CDC's platform for COVID-19 related information. Major headings include How to protect yourself, What to do if you are sick, Symptoms, Cases in the U.S., Healthcare and Public Health, CDC Guidance, Keeping communities safe, Latest [Daily] Updates, and more.
Coronavirus.gov
A federal government information clearinghouse site maintained by CDC, the White House, and FEMA. Includes specific resources for travelers, households, pregnant women & children, people who are sick, small business owners, schools, businesses, healthcare professionals, health departments, laboratories, emergency management. Updates on cases of coronavirus in the U.S. and latest COVID-19 news.
COVID-19 Databases and Journals (CDC)
Selected databases and journals to help researchers find scholarly articles about COVID-19 (2019 Novel Coronavirus).
COVID-19 Open Research Dataset (CORD-19)
"A Free, Open Resource for the Global Research Community: In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Allen Institute for AI has partnered with leading research groups to prepare and distribute the COVID-19 Open Research Dataset (CORD-19), a free resource of over 45,000 scholarly articles, including over 33,000 with full text, about COVID-19 and the coronavirus family of viruses for use by the global research community."
COVID-19 Research Articles Downloadable Database (CDC)
The Stephen B. Thacker CDC Library is collecting COVID-19 (2019 Novel Coronavirus) research articles and compiling them into an easily accessible and downloadable database to help researchers find the latest COVID-19 research.This database is updated by systematically searching various bibliographic databases and hand searching selected grey literature sources.
COVID-19 Secondary Data and Statistics (CDC)
Below are selected secondary data and statistics sources to help researchers find data on COVID-19 (2019 Novel Coronavirus). Materials listed in these guides are selected to provide awareness of quality public health literature and resources.
European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) - European Union
"ECDC is an EU agency aimed at strengthening Europe's defences against infectious diseases. The core functions cover a wide spectrum of activities: surveillance, epidemic intelligence, response, scientific advice, microbiology, preparedness, public health training, international relations, health communication, and the scientific journal Eurosurveillance."
LitCOVID
Database compiled by the National Library of Medicine from COVID-19 articles in PubMed: "LitCovid is a curated literature hub for tracking up-to-date scientific information about the 2019 novel Coronavirus. It is the most comprehensive resource on the subject, providing a central access to 2431 (and growing) relevant articles in PubMed. The articles are updated daily and are further categorized by different research topics and geographic locations for improved access."
Map of Coronavirus COVID-19 Global Cases - johns Hopkins Center for Systems Science (GSSE)
"CSSE takes a multidisciplinary approach to modeling, understanding, and optimizing systems of local, national, and global importance. These include medicine, health care delivery, national infrastructure, information security, disaster response, and education."
Map of COVID-19 Growth - UCLA Institute for Digital Research and Education (IDRE)
A graphical demonstration of global disease dispersion. "The Institute for Digital Research and Education (IDRE) is a cooperative of faculty and technologists working to advance the existing body of computing knowledge and expertise at UCLA."
OECD iLibrary. Tackling coronavirus (COVID‑19)
"Contributing to a global effort. What are the impacts and consequences of the coronavirus pandemic on our lives and our societies – and what are some of the solutions we can find to boost our healthcare systems, secure our businesses, maintain our jobs and education, and stabilise financial markets and economies?"
ProQuest Coronavirus Research Database
"The Coronavirus Research Database is a collection of journal articles, preprints, conference proceedings, dissertations and more related to COVID-19 and other coronaviruses. It includes comprehensive research background coverage of past pandemics and epidemics, like MERS and SARS, to give researchers and students context around the current global crisis"--Publisher's brochure
USA.gov - Coronavirus Index
The USA.gov mission is to "create and organize timely, needed government information and services and make them accessible anytime, anywhere, via your channel of choice." Includes index headings like "Government Response to Coronavirus, COVID-19," "What is the Federal Government Doing in Response to COVID-19?" "Travel, Immigration, and Transportation," "Money and Taxes," "Education," "Scams and Fraud," "Benefits and Grants," "Housing," "Voting and Elections," "Courts," and more.
WHO Global research on coronavirus disease (COVID-19)
"WHO is gathering the latest scientific findings and knowledge on COVID-19 and compiling it in a database. WHO updates the database daily from searches of bibliographic databases, hand searches of the table of contents of relevant journals, and the addition of other relevant scientific articles that come to our attention. The entries in the database may not be exhaustive and new research will be added regularly... The WHO database is searchable by author, key word (title, author, journal), journal, or by general topic."
World Health Organization (WHO) - Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) Pandemic
"WHO works worldwide to promote health, keep the world safe, and serve the vulnerable. WHO's goal is to ensure that a billion more people have universal health coverage, to protect a billion more people from health emergencies, and provide a further billion people with better health and well-being." This WHO site collects and disseminates global data and information resources related to the outbreak of Coronavirus disease (COVID-19).

ICPSR YouTube Channel

ICPSR YouTube Uploads
"Established in 1962, ICPSR is the world's largest archive of digital social science data. We acquire, preserve, and distribute original research data and provide training in its analysis. We also offer access to publications based on our data holdings."

Google Data

Google Dataset Search
"Dataset Search enables users to find datasets stored across thousands of repositories on the Web, making these datasets universally accessible and useful...
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"Datasets and related data tend to be spread across multiple data repositories on the web. In many cases, information about these datasets is neither linked nor has it been indexed by search engines, making data discovery tedious or, in some cases, impossible.

By providing our users with a single interface that allows them to search across multiple repositories, we hope to transform how data is being published and used. We also believe that this project will have the additional benefits of a) creating a data sharing ecosystem that will encourage data publishers to follow best practices for data storage and publication and b) giving scientists a way to show the impact of their work through citation of datasets that they have produced."

Key Sources of Data

ICPSR: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research*
Mission Statement: "ICPSR advances and expands social and behavioral research, acting as a global leader in data stewardship and providing rich data resources and responsive educational opportunities for present and future generations."
Census Data Site Index
"Access data through products and tools including data visualizations, mobile apps, interactive web apps and other software."
Cornell Institute for Social and Economic Research (CISER)
"The Cornell Institute for Social and Economic Research was founded in 1981. Our mission is to anticipate and support the evolving computational and data needs of Cornell social scientists and economists throughout the entire research process and data life cycle."
CQ Press Voting and Elections Collection : Expert Analysis, Demographics, and Data*
"Voting and Elections Collection integrates a wealth of data, authoritative analyses, concise explanations, and historical material to provide a powerful research and reference tool on the American voter, major and minor political parties, campaigns and elections, and historical and modern races for Congress, the presidency, and governorships."
Data.gov
Data.gov is managed and hosted by the U.S. General Services Administration, Technology Transformation Service.
EIU: Economist Intelligence Unit*
Search or browse by country or geographic entity, or by reports (Country Report, Country Commerce, or Country Finance).
General Social Survey
Online analysis for this important survey
IMF eLibrary Data
See also this earlier data page: Data.
iPoll*
Roper Center collects, preserves, disseminates public opinion data."
Measuring Worth
MeasuringWorth is a service for calculating relative worth over time of: several factors including ...
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Annualized Growth Rates
Relative Values - US $
Relative Values - UK £
Relative Values - China
Relative Values - Japan ¥
Conversion ($ and £)
Purchasing Power - US $
Purchasing Power - UK £
Savings Growth - US $
Inflation Rates
Stock Growth Rates (DJIA, SP500, & NASDAQ)

The site also offers historical data on GDP, wages etc.
Murray Research Archive DataVerse
Harvard-based data archive covering a variety of social science subjects
National Bureau of Economic Research: Data
Datasets used by researchers at the NBER
NCCOR Catalogue of Surveillance Systems
An index online to over 100 so called data "systems." This is an extraordinarily helpful directory of crucial data platforms.
OECD iLibrary*
Click on Statistics tab for links to data series etc.
Polling the Nations*
"Polling the Nations is an online database of public opinion polls containing the full text of 700,000+ questions and responses, from 18,000+ surveys and 1,700+ polling organizations, conducted from 1986 through the present in the United States and more than 100 other countries around the world."
ProQuest Statistical Abstracts*
Access to tabular statistics across countries and topics.
Sociometrics*
The Sociometrics Social Science Electronic Data Library (SSEDL) is a health and social science resource that consists of data sets from six topically-focused collections.
World Development Indicators
Part of World DataBank from the World Bank: Statistical tables on development from countries around the world, from World Bank. Includes: More than 550 development indicators, with time series for 208 countries and 18 country groups from 1960 to the current year.

Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR)

ICPSR - Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research - Data* is the largest social science data archive in the United States. UCI's institutional membership allows direct downloading of datasets.

ICPSR Home
"ICPSR advances and expands social and behavioral research, acting as a global leader in data stewardship and providing rich data resources and responsive educational opportunities for present and future generations."
ICPSR Member Institutions
"ICPSR is a consortium made up of hundreds of universities, foundations, government institutions, nonprofits and more." The UCI Libraries administer UCI's institutional membership.
Find Data
ICPSR studies are discoverable by browse and keyword search. Studies are sorted in several useful ways including "most downloaded". Users can browse by Topic, Series, Thematic data collection, or Global data.
Help
Questions about login/password, restricted data, and member-only data? This page is designed to demystify ICPSR. Additional assistance is available at ICPSR User Support (user support staff are available from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., ET, Monday to Friday): Phone: 734-647-2200; ICPSR-help@umich.edu
OPEN ICPSR
"Institutional open ICPSR is a research data-sharing service developed to meet the needs of universities, journals, research centers, and departments. We offer a fully-hosted, economical, professionally-run, and trusted research data repository that demonstrates the research impact of your organization."
Resource Center for Minority Data (RCMD)
"RCMD is a recent initiative of ICPSR. The changing demographic composition has expanded the scope of the U.S. racial and ethnic mosaic. As a result, interest and research on race and ethnicity has become more complex and expansive. Initially."
Restricted Use Data Management at ICPSR
"Public-use data, which constitute the majority of ICPSR's holdings, are those for which disclosure risk to research participants and of confidential information is minimal. When necessary, ICPSR protects respondent confidentiality by removing, masking, and/or collapsing variables in the deposited data to produce a public-use version of the dataset."
Sharing Data (Start Deposit)
"ICPSR welcomes and encourages deposits of digital data. Deposits are made using a secure Data Deposit Form to describe the data collection and upload content. You will need a MyData account to create, access, and authenticate your deposit."
Teaching & Learning Resources
"These resources were created especially for undergraduate faculty and students. While any of ICPSR's data and tools can be used in the classroom, the ones provided here make it easy for instructors to set up data-driven learning experiences."
YouTube - ICPSR
"ICPSR (Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research) has a number of video presentations on YouTube that address a variety of topics including step by step instructions on using and troubleshooting set-up files and creating a MyData account, and learning about some of the archives housed at ICPSR, such as RCMD and Research Connections or using ICPSR resources in your classroom, such as Inquiry-Based Learning."

Citing Data

ICPSR How To Cite Data
"Proper citation ensures that research data can be: discovered; reused; replicated for verification; credited for recognition; and tracked to measure usage and impact... Citing data is straightforward. Each citation must include the basic elements that allow a unique dataset to be identified over time: Title, Author, Date, Version, Persistent identifier (such as the Digital Object Identifier, Uniform Resource Name URN, or Handle System)."
IASSIST (International Association for Social Science Information Services & Technology) Quick Guide to Data Citation
"Citing datasets used in published research is just as important as citing journal articles, books, and other sources that contributed to the research. By citing your use of a dataset, you are supporting the reproducibility of your research and attributing credit to those who provided the data-including datasets that you have created yourself. Citations also allow for tracking reuse and measuring impact."
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"Instructions for citation styles do not consistently provide examples for dataset citations. This guide will help you determine the citation elements to include. Refer to your author guidelines or style guide to properly arrange and format these citation elements. Many data providers also recommend their preferred citation or supply an example. Be sure to provide enough information in your citation so that the reader can identify, retrieve, and access the same unique dataset you have used."
Digital Curation Centre (DCC): How to Cite Datasets
"The Digital Curation Centre (DCC) is an internationally-recognised centre of expertise in digital curation with a focus on building capability and skills for research data management. The DCC provides expert advice and practical help to research organisations wanting to store, manage, protect and share digital research data."
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"This guide will help you create links between your academic publications and the underlying datasets, so that anyone viewing the publication will be able to locate the dataset and vice versa. It provides a working knowledge of the issues and challenges involved, and of how current approaches seek to address them. This guide should interest researchers and principal investigators working on data-led research, as well as the data repositories with which they work."
APA Style: How to Cite a Data Set in APA Style
"Whether you’re a "numbers person" or not, if you’re a psychology student or an early-career psychologist, you may find yourself doing some data mining. Psychologists are increasingly encouraged to provide their data online for other researchers to use and analyze. And big-data psychologist is one of the hot new jobs in the industry. Because big data is a big deal, you’ll want to know how to cite a data set."