Accessing the NCDS and the BCS70 via the

Economic and Social Data Service

Jack KneeshawNCDS/BCS70 workshop 17 October 2006

ESDS Longitudinal

Economic and Social Data Service

• provides access and support for key economic and social data

• distributed service, bringing together centres of expertise in data creation, dissemination, preservation and use

• core archiving services plus four specialist data services

ESDS LongitudinalJoint enterprise:

• UK Data Archive (UKDA)• UK Longitudinal Studies Centre (ULSC)

based at ISER

• supports a range of longitudinal data collections but five ‘core’ collections in particular:

• 1970 British Cohort Study (BCS70) • British Household Panel Survey (BHPS) • Millennium Cohort Study (MCS) • National Child Development Study (NCDS)• English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA)

Data Deposit, Processing, Retrieval and Access

The data themselves - NCDS

The data themselves – BCS70

Data not held at the UKDA

• some additional data, derived from further minor data collections, data cleaning etc., only available via CLS at present

• these data are added to the UKDA collection from time to time

Ensuring confidentiality

• cohort members promised confidentiality

• datasets deposited with UKDA are fully anonymised

• datasets go through further process of checking at the UKDA

• UKDA users undertake not to identify individuals

Documentation

A variety of NCDS/BCS70 documentation is available, including:

• guides to datasets• lists of publications• annotated questionnaires• interactive data dictionaries• ‘Data Notes’ series• other survey-related documentation, inc. working

papers etc.

Available both from CLS and UKDA web sites.

Retrieval and access

• web access, via UKDA site, to data and metadata

• documentation (codebooks, questionnaires) freely available to any UKDA user (registered or unregistered)

• data can be browsed and frequencies run by any user (registered or unregistered) using Nesstar

• full datasets are freely available for download for the majority of our registered users

• data supplied in a variety of formats– SPSS – STATA– tab-delimited text

Online access for registered users

Registered users can:

• download full datasets

• order data via online order system

• browse/analyse/download data in Nesstar

To register:

• obtain an Athens ID

• sign and return data access agreement (legal undertaking)

• (to access data) register a usage (formerly a project)

Demo

ESDS Longitudinal

+44 (0)1206 872143www.esds.ac.uk/longitudinal

www.data-archive.ac.uknesstar.esds.ac.uk/webview/index.jsp

help@esds.ac.uk