IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/osf/socarx/u8spj_v1.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Improving metadata infrastructure for complex surveys: Insights from the Fragile Families Challenge

Author

Listed:
  • Kindel, Alexander

    (Princeton University)

  • Bansal, Vineet
  • Catena, Kristin
  • Hartshorne, Thomas
  • Jaeger, Kate
  • Koffman, Dawn
  • McLanahan, Sara
  • Phillips, Maya
  • Rouhani, Shiva
  • Vinh, Ryan

Abstract

Researchers rely on metadata systems to prepare data for analysis. As the complexity of datasets increases and the breadth of data analysis practices grow, existing metadata systems can limit the efficiency and quality of data preparation. This article describes the redesign of a metadata system supporting the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study based on the experiences of participants in the Fragile Families Challenge. We demonstrate how treating metadata as data—that is, releasing comprehensive information about variables in a format amenable to both automated and manual processing—can make the task of data preparation less arduous and less error-prone for all types of data analysis. We hope that our work will facilitate new applications of machine learning methods to longitudinal surveys and inspire research on data preparation in the social sciences. We have open-sourced the tools we created so that others can use and improve them.

Suggested Citation

  • Kindel, Alexander & Bansal, Vineet & Catena, Kristin & Hartshorne, Thomas & Jaeger, Kate & Koffman, Dawn & McLanahan, Sara & Phillips, Maya & Rouhani, Shiva & Vinh, Ryan, 2018. "Improving metadata infrastructure for complex surveys: Insights from the Fragile Families Challenge," SocArXiv u8spj_v1, Center for Open Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:osf:socarx:u8spj_v1
    DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/u8spj_v1
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://osf.io/download/5ba1348b57c3e4001b3a43c7/
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.31219/osf.io/u8spj_v1?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:osf:socarx:u8spj_v1. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: OSF (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://arabixiv.org .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.