The Challenge of the New Data

Mark Elliot, Social Sciences

University of Manchester

January 2013mark.elliot@manchester.ac.uk

Data, data everywhere…

• Dramatic changes in the type and scope of data available for social research

• New types of data and new controllers/archives • Social media data growth • Commercial data

• New data linkage developments – New data being linked. – New forms of Combining, enhancing, fusing, linking,

merging data• More detail

Opportunities

• Big data and commercially owned data• Strong and enriched traditional data sources:

cohort studies, surveys combining attitude and physiological data.

• Analysing the data layer/web 3.0 represents a significant challenge.– Accounting for the links?– Accounting for contradictions?– What does sampling mean?– It might well have more in common visual image

processing than orthodox data analysis.

Data

Research FindingsPolicy

Analysis

Impact

Behaviour

An Socio-ethical Turning Point?

An Socio-ethical Turning Point?

An Socio-ethical Turning Point?

An Ethical Headache

• Access and ownership– charges and rights– Citizens and data ownership

• Confidentiality privacy and data protection:– lack of clarity. – Risks to third parties.

• Best practice:– New codes of practice? – New forms of consent?

• Privacy/Disclosure remain important– All surveys on the topic indcate this

Privacy and Disclosure

“There is a close connection between our ability to control of who has access to our information and our ability to create and maintain different sorts of social relationships with different people”; Rachels(1970)

So Disclosure is:

• The mechanism by which we operate our privacy.– This rather than the information itself is why non-

consensual disclosure is problematic.– Non-consensual disclosure subverts the

psychologically critical process of self-disclosure.

And privacy is....

• Critical to our the formation of our identities

• Analysing the data layer web 3.0 represents a significant challenge.

• Retaining a functioning privacy is in the world of linked data is a challenge.

• We can do this but– It will require significant research effort and

policy will

The Role of Identity

• Social Philosophy:– Identity is represented to others through

self disclosure; Goffman– OTOH our identity is in part formed through

our interactions with others and their representations to us; Mead

So joining the dots....

• Privacy concerns personhood:– My/Our identity– My/Our sense of self

• To understand the meaning of privacy in a cultural context one must refer to processes of – Autonomy – Locus of Control

Identity

PrivacyDisclosure

• I would argue therefore– That our data and our “selves” are intrinsically

intertwined.– That what happens in the data layer will have a

transformative effect on how we think about ourselves as individuals and collectively.

– And therefore the need for a sociology of data is paramount.

Sociologies of Data

• Our Data Our Selves: – How does data impact on how we view our selves,

our identity, our society? – How do our attitudes affect how we view data?– How do new forms of (ubiquitous) data impact on

a norms, attitudes and values? – Is informational privacy the main contact point

between our digital and socio-physical identities?

• Our Data Our Society: – How do the control processes for data reflect and affect

existing social structures? – How are data shaped by the institutions and objectives

that produce them?– How are institutions affected by data about/within

them? – Where are the main sources of data outside the

academy?• How are they used?• How does ownership affect use?

Sociologies of Data

• Our Data Our Research: – How do we define ‘data’ in the social sciences?

• Can social science adapt to use any form of social data? • Can a meaningful data ontology be developed?

– Where are data becoming ‘big data’? • Are these transformative, or just ‘old wine in new bottles’? • Where are data now providing new departures in the

social sciences?

– How does ubiquitous data affect the centrality of theory?

Sociologies of Data

To Conclude:

• Analysing the Data Layer/Web 3.0 represents a challenge.

• Retaining a functioning privacy in the world of linked data is a significant challenge.

• We can do this but– It will require significant research effort and

policy will