Data Playground - database of political attitudes and choices

The Data Playground enables you to analyse the political opinions of tens of thousands of British people surveyed between February 2014 and May 2015. The data, which has been made available by the British Election Study, can be accessed by anyone who has an interest in politics. It can be used to create graphs and charts without the need for statistical expertise or specialist software. Find out the British public’s attitudes to a range of political issues, such as public spending and immigration, and compare these attitudes to the demographic details of the people surveyed. Please credit the British Election Study when using any of the data.

Visit www.britishelectionstudy.com/data and try it yourself

More information about the Data Playground is available here

Business Source Premier

Business Source Premier is a resource for global business literature and data, such as country and industry reports. It also provides company profiles for the world’s 10,000 largest companies (see top left of screen), which will be useful for any student preparing for job applications or interviews.

The database has Text-To-Speech functionality (in English) for articles in HTML format. The search interface can be translated into a number of different languages, and articles in HTML format can also be translated.

If you create a personalised account within the database, you can organise your search results in folders and add notes to documents that you save. You can also save searches, create alerts and RSS feeds. Apps for iPhone and Android devices are available.

This database will be of interest to students and researchers in a range of disciplines across the University.

Access

Open StarPlus from the My services menu in MUSE. Type “Business Source Premier” into the University Collections search box and follow the link to the database. Alternatively, it can be accessed from here by connecting to the Business Source Premier website (See Quick links on the right) - you'll be prompted to log in to MUSE as necessary.

Business Source Premier

Business Source Premier is a resource for global business literature and data, such as country and industry reports. It also provides company profiles, which will be useful for any student preparing for job applications or interviews.

The database has text to speech functionality (in English) for documents in html format. The search interface can be translated into a number of different languages, and articles in html format can also be translated.

If you create a personalised account within the database, you can organise your search results in folders and add notes to documents that you save. You can also save searches, create alerts and RSS feeds. Apps for iPhone and Android devices are available.

This database will be of interest to students and researchers in a range of disciplines across the University. To get access, open StarPlus from the myServices menu in  MUSE and sign in by clicking the University members link in the top right corner. Type Business Source Premier into the University Collections search box and follow the link to the database.

Research data for Social Scientists

We just had an email alerting us to 5 free webinars on research data and resources for social scientists, which the UK Data Service are running from 13th-17th May. Here are the details:

Webinar week at UK Data Service: Five free online sessions

Social scientists from all sectors are invited to participate in a series of webinars designed to introduce the data and resources available through the newly formed UK Data Service.

All webinars are free of charge and open to anyone in the UK and overseas. Spaces are limited and available on a first-come, first-served basis. Please reserve your spot by booking at the links below.

An introduction to data available from the UK Data Service
Monday 13 May 2013 at 11.00

An overview of the types of data available, including UK government surveys, cross-national surveys, data from the UK Census and qualitative data. The webinar will include some case studies demonstrating how the data have been used in research.

Attendees are also encouraged to attend the Thursday webinar to learn how to find and access specific data collections.

Broadening access: Improving the impact of social data
Tuesday 14 May 2013 at 16.30

Panel discussion with Keith Dugmore, a private-sector data consultant and owner of Demographic Decisions, and Sharon Witherspoon, Director of the Nuffield Foundation and one of the original researchers on the British Social Attitudes Survey.

The discussion is moderated by David Martin, Deputy Director of the UK Data Service and former coordinator of the ESRC Census Programme.

Looking after and managing your research data
Wednesday 15 May 2013 at 16.00

A practical session for anyone actively creating social science research data. You will learn about practices, resources and support available to create well organised, well documented, high-quality research data through the course of your research so that your data continues to generate impact after you have analysed it yourself.

UnDISCOVERed riches: Finding and accessing data via the UK Data Service
Thursday 16 May 2013 at 15.00

A practical overview, focusing on the service's new search-and-browse portal, Discover, which allows users to search for datasets, support guides, case studies, ESRC outputs, variables and questions.

A useful follow-up to the Monday webinar introducing data available through the UK Data Service.

An introduction to 2011 census geography
Friday 17 May 2013 at 15.00

An introduction to census output geographies, outlining five key differences between 2001 and 2011 census output geographies.

The UK Data Service is a comprehensive resource funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) to support researchers, teachers and policymakers who depend on high-quality social and economic data.

The UK Data Service website provides a single point of access to a wide range of secondary data previously held by the Economic and Social Data Service (ESDS), the ESRC Census Programme and the Secure Data Service. All are backed with extensive support, training and guidance to meet the needs of data users, owners and creators.

Book galaxy

Fed up with the limitations of keyword searching on Star? An imaginative University of Southampton undergraduate computer science student has just won a JISC-funded competition with his 'Book Galaxy' entry.  The JISC website explains the idea behind it:

"Alex Parker’s space-age entry presents library data in three different ‘galaxy’ views where library books are represented as moving stars that change speed and location according to how popular they are within a given course.  They also join together in constellations to show books on connected topic, while orbited by meteors representing the courses of the students using those books...He explains:  'The main reason I entered this competition is that I think that doing a keyword search and presenting lists of books to users is not always the best way to find what you want in a library, especially if you're not sure what you're looking for.  I had an idea that if you linked similar books together in a 'web' and did that for every book in the library interesting patterns would emerge.' "

Find out more and explore the Book Galaxy from the JISC website.