- University Libraries
- Research Guides
- Scholars' Collaborative
- Data Services
- Data Documentation & Description
Data Services: Data Documentation & Description
This guide provides information on managing data and obtaining secondary data for research.
Data Documentation & Description
Research data must be thoroughly described so you or someone else in the future can decipher what they are. Metadata does this for you. Metadata is descriptive information about a project, the experiments, the equipment used, the researchers, and the data themselves. It aids in long term access to and comprehension of the data from a project. For example, if someone uses the data, metadata will help them understand what the project was all about, how the data were obtained, who collected them, and what they mean.
Metadata Standards
The following are some examples of metadata standards that can be used to describe your data.
- Dublin Coregeneral metadata for digital resources
- Darwin Coremetadata for biological sciences data
- Content Standard for Digital Geospatial Metadatametadata for geographical sciences data
- DDI (Data Documentation Initiative)metadata for social sciences data
- EML (Ecological Metadata Language)metadata for ecological sciences data
- National Library of Medicine (NLMDC)metadata for medical science data