Data and more

Welcome to the Data and Statistics Guide. Here you will find resources related to data, Statistics, software, visualization, and more. The purpose of this guide is to provide the community with places to seek and retrieve data and or statistics. Please contact us if you find an error or want to add something to the page.

What is Data?

Data are (and a single datum is) a basic form of information that may be used to make meaning through activities such as calculating, summarizing, or analyzing. (See the Merriam-Webster dictionary definition).  For the purposes of academic research, scholarship, and creative endeavors it is most useful to consider that data are whatever foundational bits that researchers use to create meaning. (From UNLV Library)

To put it simply Data,

• is raw, unprocessed information collected or generated  (numbers, words, images, symbols, etc)

• can be used to create new information and knowledge via analysis 

Below are examples of research data (from NCSU Libraries' Guide)

• Documents (text, Word), spreadsheets 
• Laboratory notebooks, field notebooks, diaries
• Questionnaires, transcripts, codebooks
• Audiotapes, videotapes
• Photographs, films
• Protein or genetic sequences
• Spectra
• Test responses
• Slides, artifacts, specimens, samples
• Collection of digital objects acquired and generated during the process of research
• Database contents (video, audio, text, images)
• Models, algorithms, scripts
• Contents of an application (input, output, logfiles for analysis software, simulation software, schemas)
• Methodologies and workflows
• Standard operating procedures and protocols