The origin of SASD is connected with the year 2004. It was built within
the frame of a state project of science and research "Social Data Archive
and its Use in Cross-national Comparative Research" (enunciator - The
Slovak Academy of Sciences (SAS), project number: 2003 SP 51/028 09 00/028
09 07).
The establishment and servicing of the SASD was defined for the period from
December 2003 until December 2005. Miroslav Tížik was acting as the head
of the establishing team and Ján Bunčák, Martina Bausová and Roman Džambazovič
as co-workers.
Institutionally, SASD originated at the Department of Sociology on the Faculty
of Philosophy of the Comenius University in Bratislava, in cooperation with
the Slovak Academy of Sciences. The Slovak Archive of Social Data archive
arose out of the need to build a methodology of systematization, data processing
together with documentation from empirical social research in electronic
and printed form according to international standards. During the nineties,
many researches was conducted in Slovakia, of which number, contents and
focus we have no satisfactory overview. The services of SASD are intended
for the non-commercial use of the general public, for the needs of socioscientific
research, for journalists, and for governmental and non-governmental institutes.
Hence the aim is not only archiving, but also an increase in the quality
of public level information about life and changes within Slovak society.
At the same time, the data archive is also intended for the commercial and
other research agencies and institutions as a basis of communication with
the public through the publication of their research according to the SASD
conditions.
- to archive empirical
data and documentation from accessible sociological research performed
in Slovakia in electronic and printed form (ISSP data: National Identity
2003 and Citizenship 2004 form the basis of data archive)
- to create a data source
for the requirements of secondary analysis in the field of sociological
research and teaching on all types of university education
- to offer and make archive
data and data in general accessible for the needs of scientific research,
non-commercial subjects and individuals in electronic and printed form
- to increase the efficiency
of work with the results of sociological research and as a result reduce
the expenditure on research and for a standardization research procedures
shorten the time of research execution
- to safeguard the protection
of data and documentation against loss and corruption by means of electronic
and printed form archiving
- to support the work with
new technologies (PC, Internet, specialized software) in social sciences
- adaption of working methods
and infrastructure for standards common in USA and in western Europe
- to enable the full participation
of Slovakia in international sociological research
- to entrench in Slovakia
the DDI (Data Documentation Initiative) standard of electronic research
data archiving , which is compatible with world archives
- to create a technical
and infrastructural basis for the foundation of national data services
centre, which could become a member of CESSDA
(Council of European Social Science Data Archives), EDAN
(East European Archives Network) and other associations enabling the
access to social data also of other countries
- to publish and make accessible
the basic data from sociological research realised in Slovakia or in
Czechoslovakia since 1967
The ambitions of Slovak academic workplaces and the efforts of universities
are to develop not only educational but also scientific and research activities.
The partaking of an international research requires apart from standard
methods of data processing also standard archived research documentation
and continuity in execution of regular research findings. The participation
in international research guarantees the access to comparable data from
other countries, which allows the comparison of conditions and the development
of the Slovak society. This at the same time demands the exercise of international
standards on research, data collection and data archiving including technological
compatibility of data archives. The existence of a social data archive
creates also wider possibilities for the processing of quality diploma
works and dissertations from the field of social and humanistic sciences
throughout all of Slovakia. The openness and accessibility of collected
data supports the increase in the level of information of the public about
the conditions in Slovak society and ensures public control over research
quality and data interpretation of social phenomena. Last but not least
it sustains the public discussion on tendencies and development possibilities
of social research in Slovakia.
- Archiving of research
data and of methodological research characteristics
- Collection of contextual
information (on important events in the time of research execution and
their possible influence on the collected data), which help at the interpretation
of the results
- The possibility to execute
analytical services to the selected questions of social life
- The information source
search and the providing of information services in the area of national
and international representative sociological research
- Education in statistical
data analysis and in the employing of information technology and computer-assisted
techniques in sociological research
Archive data and basic chart outputs are easy to access, the operation
is adapted to user possibilities, so to the students, journalists and
also to the public, which has no particular training on the operation
of statistical programmes. Online access to selected data is available
for the needs of non-commercial and scientific research. All data is accessible
for free. Data is distributed in the SPSS format, the documentation in
format DDI.
Data is divided into categories according to the extent of accessibility
on the basis of restrictions put upon them by author rights owners or
data depositor. (See Data
Access Form)
NESSTAR catalogue
is an instrument based on DDI standard and the access for the CESSDA
members is free of charge. DDI documentation standard together with the
DTD standard enable to convert electronic coders of data files into all-purpose
format XML. The standardization of procedures is in accordance with projects
of larger archives, which create instruments offering user friendly services.
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