Research data management at the IRS

At the IRS, research data are the basis for scientific work and knowledge gain. They are collected through observations, interviews, surveys, data collection and further processing with the purpose of generating and validating research results. The IRS is committed to a responsible and transparent handling of research data within the framework of a sustainable and quality-conscious research process. The IRS has adopted "Guidelines for Handling Research Data" and established a research data management system. This includes:

• the structured and data protection-compliant handling of research data throughout the entire data lifecycle, supported by data management plans,
• ensuring interoperability through the documentation of metadata and the use of unique identifiers,
• the protection of personal data, including by obtaining informed consent in empirical surveys,
• ensuring the reproducibility of data by retaining raw data, analysis data and metadata for at least 10 years,
• making suitable qualitative and quantitative research data available for re-use via the IRS data archive or external repositories.

The Research Data Manager

To support scientists in dealing with research data, the IRS has created a position for research data management. The research data manager advises applicants for research projects on topics relevant to research data. The manager creates and updates templates, for data management plans and informed consent forms, among other things. She/he promotes the quality-conscious handling of research data with advisory and further training offers. Furthermore, the manager supports the protected archiving of research data and thus ensures the reproducibility and re-usability of the data.