Meeting the FAIR Principles with DDI Metadata

Making data FAIR, i.e. findable, accessible, interoperable, and re-usable, has recently become an important goal for research data documentation. DDI metadata can support FAIR documentation of research data along the complete research data lifecycle. Specific products of the DDI Alliance help to achieve the FAIR principles. For example, by supporting persistent identifiers and documenting conceptual components, research data becomes more findable. By documenting data products in DDI on conceptual as well as on physical levels, in the case of DDI-CDI including the datums itself, data is more accessible to users. From the beginning, DDI has the approach of being readable for both humans and machines, which makes data and metadata interoperable. Using standardized re-usable components like code lists, controlled vocabularies, and questions and variables from the DDI product suite, re-usability is greatly improved. The poster will highlight how DDI standards and specific products help to improve the FAIRness of research data and thus contribute to open science and better research data management.