Data makers’ and users’ views on useful paradata’

A talk in ENLIGHT and Arqus Alliance Ambassador Webinar Series on Open Science on paradata research and the paper Huvila, I., Andersson, L., Friberg, Z., Liu, Hs., & Sköld, O. (2025). Paradata: Documenting Data Creation, Curation and Use. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009366564

More information about the talk and free registration on ENLIGHT/ARCUS website.

Abstract

Understanding and making data (re)usable requires adequate documentation of the data but also information on how it has been created, curated, manipulated and used, termed in data documentation literature as paradata. Prof. dr. Isto Huvila will share results of his and his colleagues’ recent publication, reporting results of a survey study of data creating and (re)using archaeologists’ views of what data creation, curation, manipulation and use related information (termed here as paradata) they consider important when they are working with data. Data makers’ and users’ perceptions align to a considerable degree.

The findings underline that there is a need to continue developing and testing ideas how to capture and document paradata, and to find ways how to help data makers adopt proven practices to facilitate paradata making. Simultaneously, it is crucial that the paradata aimed at facilitating data use is relevant for data users rather than, for instance, technical or administrative details considered useful primarily by data makers.