The Timescapes Archive Incremental Project and the Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities (CRASSH) Digital Forum 19 January 2011 Cambridge Libby Bishop University of Leeds – Timescapes University of Essex – UK Data Archive

Timescapes Themes Relationships, identities, family life, intimacy, care and support The dynamics of personal lives : key turning points and transitions People’s biographies set against a backdrop of inter-generational and historical change

Projects that span the lifecourse Projects: Siblings and Friends: children’s lateral relationships Young Lives and Times: teen to adulthood transitions The Dynamics of Motherhood: an intergenerational project Masculinities, Identities and Risk: lives of men and fathers Work and Family Lives: the changing experiences of ‘young’ families Intergenerational Exchange: grandparents, exclusion and health The Oldest Generation: events, relationships identities in later life Data: Qualitative longitudinal (10+ years) multi-media data 400+ participants

ProjectWaves/Years and Geographic Location of Data Samples P1 Siblings and Friends Wave 1: National (52 yp;63F37M) Wave 2: 2007 National Wave 3: 2009 National P2 Young Lives and Times Wave 1: 2007 N.England (29 yp; c.age 15) Wave 2: 2008 N.England Wave 3: 2009 (sample boost-ethnic, parent (38 yp; c.age 16) Wave 4: 2010 (sample boost) P3 Dynamics of Motherhood Wave 1: 2005 Large City and New Town Wave 2: 2006 (same geog, added intvws) Wave 3: 2007 (same geog, added intvws) Wave 4: 2008 (same geog, added intvws) Wave 5: 2009 (same geog, added intvws) P4 Men as Fathers Waves 1-3: Norfolk Wave 4: 2008 Norfolk Wave 5: 2008 South Wales Wave 6: Oct Feb 2009 South Wales Wave 7: May-Nov 2009 South Wales P5 Work and Family Lives Wave 1: Oct 2007-Jan 2008 Scotland Wave 2: Sept Jan 2009 Scotland Wave 3: March Scotland P6 Inter- generational Exchange Wave 1: Northern City Wave 2: Sept 2007 to May 08 Northern City Wave 3: June-Sept 2008 Northern City Wave 4: Nov Feb 2009 Northern City Wave 5: March-June 2009 Northern City P7 The Oldest Generation Wave 1: 2007/2008 National Wave 2: 2008/2009 National

Three strands braiding research, archiving and reuse Declared goal to engage researchers as stakeholders The Timescapes Programme structure

Integration of research, archiving and reuse Multi-media, longitudinal data with documentation Explicit focus on ethical reuse of QL data Accessible and secure Linkages with other longitudinal data Striving to engage researchers as stakeholders Distinctive aspects of the Timescapes Archive

The data is from three waves of interviews with the respondent and includes transcripts and photographs taken by the respondent. If you click on the fourth entry for Wave Three you see this image. The viewer allows you to zoom in and out of the image, rotate left and right and to see the image at its full size or as a best fit for the screen. Going back to the results will allow you to access more information about the data. The data is from three waves of interviews with the respondent and includes transcripts and photographs taken by the respondent. If you click on the fourth entry for Wave Three you see this image. The viewer allows you to zoom in and out of the image, rotate left and right and to see the image at its full size or as a best fit for the screen. Going back to the results will allow you to access more information about the data.

These essays can be matched to the NCDS survey data of 11 year olds done in Extensive quantitative data is available, along with the young people’s essays.

Depends in part on confidentiality and agreements made at the time of data collection Archived data should always conform to ethical and legal guidelines with respect to not disclosing participants’ identity when this has been requested by informants Achieve this by various strategies: –consent for archiving (as well as participant, publication) –editing the original data (e.g., anonymisation) –controlling access (e.g., licences, case-by-case basis) Is it ethical to reuse data?

Early, informed consent from participants to share data Consistent data management-transcription, anonymisation Rich and extensive contextual documentation Researchers as partners in design of access system-to ensure proper balance of sharing and protection Collaborative models for reuse rather than “handoff” To give participants greater voice To ensure precious, hard-to-collect data is used Why ask researchers to engage with archiving?

6: Can I ask a, I mean, I’m absolutely fascinated by this whole idea that you archive as you go along. I mean, I couldn’t begin to imagine doing that. 4: Neither can we. (Member of Timescapes team) Seemed like good ideas at the time…

Consent  (mostly) standardised form, c. 95% consented  225 participants so far – 17 no consent/embargo Transcription and documentation What worked well (mostly)

Guidelines jointly developed, but Uneven implementation. Anonymisation – mixed picture… Revised system for marking sensitive and anonymised text-PLEASE READ These guidelines document an important shift from the previous (18 April version) for marking anonymised text. The previous version called for use of an XML tag “ ”. That system is no longer recommended and a new system has replaced it. Timescapes recommends using the following system to indicate anonymised text. At the start of the text to be anonymised, use the punctuation marks At the end of the text, use the marks ##...

Definitions for Levels of Access to Timescapes data Libby Bishop 15 July 2009 Type of use/user Key purposeExamples of data available* Authentication system Requirements for use Issues/Clarifications Publicto showcase data on public areas of LUDOS and Ts websites metadata and anonymised "taster" research data nonewill request and details to track usage none Registered users (includes Ts team and affiliates) to enable data sharing and reuse by Timescapes team members, affiliates and other registered users anonymised project data; some unanonymised data with participant consent, e.g., images, video; researcher notes database of user accounts authentication; user registration; and sign end user licence** 1. ensure data are anonymised sufficiently to be shared with this group 2. Ben to manage registration system 3. former Ts team members to have access via the same registration procedures as current members Approved users (Case- by-case) to enable registered users to also access sensitive data subject to vetting by Ts team members or their designated representatives disclosive data, unanonymised data, visual and audio data case-by-case review of individual applications; plus database of user accounts each user application reviewed; and authentication; user registration and sign end user licence 1. make clear to all that an approved researcher will gain access to full dataset in addition to the specially requested data; 2. need to establish a system for reviewing and approving applications; 3. review system must accommodate the longer term (after key project staff no longer involved or accessible***). Embargoed data to enable preservation of data too sensitive for sharing now, and to enable data to be shared at later dates. most sensitive data; data with ambiguous consent AND with researcher approval not applicable 1. ensure that a limited number of embargo periods is adequate; 2. establish system for release of data after embargo has expired.

What worked (less) well “I think at the moment the issue for me, for us, is that we didn’t anticipate how long it would take to prepare the data for archiving. And because… it is current and we’re aware that the data that we’re working with, are people’s current situations, that makes us even more concerned about anonymising, perhaps...But because of the time- consuming process, it can feel like a lot of our time is preparing the data for other people to use, rather than us, who collected the data, getting the chance to work on it, which is not really what we, the kind of situation that we want to be in.” (Timescapes researcher)

Some very real costs –Triple burden – collection, archiving, reuse –Burden fell disproportionately on early career researchers But major successes as well –Consent – high success rate with difficult data –Demonstrated key role for fine-grained access controls –Innovations in researchers’ engagement with archiving Working papers; researchers’ accounts in the archive Stakeholder model has pros and cons

Practices to address researcher exposure: Growth in more powerful access control tools Archive “parallel” accounts from researchers, in addition to other contextual documentation Accounts can also help to showcase under- acknowledged skills of preparing data for archiving Finally, just as participants don’t (usually) reveal more than they want to, researchers may learn skills from “the other side of the microphone” Emerging bright spots…

The Timescapes Archive: ESDS Qualidata: