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UCL LIBRARY SERVICES INSTITUTE OF ARCHAEOLOGY75 YEARS OF LEADING GLOBAL ARCHAEOLOGY201

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Anastasia Sakellariadi and Brian Hole

JISCMRD Workshop: Meeting (Disciplinary) Challenges in Research Data Management Planning

March 23rd 2012


1. Project overview2. Case studies feedback3. Infrastructure integration walkthrough4. Recommendations

Coming up


Project overview

• A 6-month pilot project to introduce RDM to the UCL Institute of Archaeology

• Tests whether using familiar workflows and tools makes archiving data less burdensome

• Use of institutional repository• Publishing a paper


Main deliverables

1. Data Management Planning• 2 internal workshops• Trialing DMP Online

2. Case Studies• 7 case studies from different areas and data types

3. Infrastructure integration• UCL Discovery and JOAD

4. External workshop/hackathon


1. Spatial Approaches to the Political and Commercial Landscapes of the Old Assyrian Colony Period – GIS

2. Spatial and Temporal Models of Jomon Settlements – GIS3. The Relationship Between Popular Science and Public Archaeology in

Early Nineteenth Century Britain – History of Archaeology4. Tourism and the Economic Capital of Archaeology: Measurement and

Management for Preservation – Heritage Management5. From Plastic Drain Pipes and Satellite Dishes to Coastal Flooding:

Archaeological Heritage within Standing Buildings: Why Do People in England not Comply with the Legislative and Regulatory Framework for the Protection of Archaeological Heritage in Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas – Heritage Management/Visual Data

6. The Muisca Metallurgist in Context – Archaeological Material Science7. Communicating Archaeology: Public Perceptions and Experience in a

Changing Media Environment – Heritage Mgmt/Quantitative Data

Case studies


• Researchers in heritage studies were not as familiar with terminology around data types and formats as those in material science and computational modelling

• Researchers in heritage studies tended to neglect documentation

• Researchers in early stages of their careers place more value on collection of new data than on reuse of existing datasets

• Researchers in computational modeling and heritage studies were more likely to share data due to familiarity with data sharing within their own community/with research participants

• Social data were considered as less likely to be of value for other than historical reasons in the long run because they constitute snapshots of social phenomena only

Case study findings (1)


• All researchers demonstrated great reluctance to permanently discard data

• Researchers had not considered long term preservation, costing and resourcing

• In spite of the institutionalisation of Data Protection and IPR, researchers were still unsure of requirements

• There was general lack of awareness regarding data licenses • Researchers had difficulties in discussing the broader relevance

of their research• Researchers are increasingly using web-based storage solutions,

e.g. Dropbox • They were all willing to share and considered citation as an

adequate incentive



• Time constraints in preparing qualitative data, e.g. interview transcripts and data resulting from material science lab work

• Legal issues in sharing images with potentially incriminating evidence related to not abiding with protection and conservation legislation

• Lack of belief in broader relevance and robustness of data in social research as compared to computational modeling data

• Perplexity of IPR in the legislation of countries of provenance of data


Issues to be overcome before data could be shared:


• Researchers found it a useful tool for DMP especially for collaborative research projects.

• Researchers thought it was slow.• Very few researchers used the support provided and as a result

there was some misunderstanding of questions. This could potentially be a bigger problem with foreign researchers.

• Some believed that the DMP Online would be more useful if it was field-specific.

• Some believed that a different version that allowed more flexibility would be more appropriate for PhD research that often starts generic and ends up entirely different.


On the DMP Online tool:


Infrastructure integration

http://openarchaeologydata.metajnl.com/


Feedback on UCL/JOAD datasets:

“I used the data published by Andrew Bevan and James Connolly in the latest issue of JOAD in an Archaeology and Material Culture class in KCL's MA in Digital Humanities programme…

All in all, the ease with which the data could be accessed, its availability in CSV format and the clarity of the metadata schema meant that I had to put little effort into preparing it as a teaching material: it truly was plug and play. In fact I found myself having to warn the class that archaeological data is most often *not* available in such a user friendly format.

The world would be a better place if more AR archaeological data were available in this way.”

Dr Stuart DunnSenior lecturer, Kings College London


Integration findings / challenges

1. EPrints and Elements can be easily modified to take data, and researchers find this adjustment easy to make.

2. Library staff may however not have much time or resources to make even simple changes.

3. Library staff may not be skilled in curating data(e.g. familiarity with identifiers, file types etc.).

4. Institutions need to take responsibility for minting identifiers.


Some recommendations

• A local RDM guidance page, which collates UCL policies, outlines best practices and links to resources.

• Induction seminar on RDM• Creating an RDM TA position• Support and advice on RDM from Library Services• Allocation of resource for Data curation in Library Services• Institutional repositories should look at working with subject

repositories in terms of metadata exchange, automated ingest etc.

ucl library services

Documents

heritage studies

data types

archiving data

data sharing

data licenses researchers

collection of new data

public archaeology

case studies7 case studies