Studia universitatis hereditati supports open access to research data, which is the foundation of modern scientific research.
About Research Data
Research data are data obtained by different methods that serve to learn about, test or confirm hypotheses and draw conclusions that have been generated or processed in research. They come in a variety of formats: from notes, interviews, photographs, transcriptions, numerical survey data, etc. If the data are not in digital form, it is useful to assess whether such material can be digitised to facilitate its preservation in a data repository. A data repository provides storage and access to different types of data, e.g. research, public sector data, and related documentation.
Data accessibility increases the transparency and verifiability of research findings and enhances their usability in future research, thus increasing the value for money of the data already collected. Sharing data can help to develop researchers’ careers by raising the profile of their work and enabling them to collaborate with new partners.
Policy on Mandatory Reporting of Research Data
In accordance with the Regulation on the Conduct of Scientific Research, the co-sponsor of the journal (the Public Agency for Scientific Research and Innovation of the Republic of Slovenia) requires the journal’s editorial board to ensure that authors have open access to the research data used in the preparation of the article before the article is published. The data must be prepared in accordance with the FAIR principles (findability, accessibility, compatibility, reusability).
Exceptions to Full Open Access
However, there are also cases where data cannot be shared fully openly for legal, ethical or other legitimate reasons, for example when dealing with personal data subject to protection (see EU General Data Protection Regulation), when dealing with material involving trade secrets or other commercial information regulated by law, or when dealing with data posing security risks. The Regulation understands open access to research data and other research results from co-funded research in line with the principle of ‘open as far as possible, closed as far as necessary.’
List of Trusted Repositories
Authors should publish research data in trusted data repositories, archives or centres that provide appropriate access regimes. The trusted repositories recommended by the journal’s co-sponsor are published here.
The journal’s editorial board recommends Slovenian researchers to publish their research data in Slovenian trusted repositories such as:
- Social Science Archive Data
- University of Repository Ljubljana
- University of Digital Library Maribor
- University of Primorska Repository
- Repository of the University of Nova Gorica
- Slovenian Research Infrastructure for Language Resources and Technologies (CLARIN.SI)
- Digital Repository of Research Organisations of Slovenia (DiRROS)
Other authors can search for a relevant data repository using online tools such as https://fairsharing.org or https://www.re3data.org. It is only necessary to check that the data repository is also published on the list of the Slovenian Public Agency for Research and Innovation, which is a co-sponsor of the journal.
We recommend that the Creative commons CC BY 4.0 or CC00 1.0 or equivalent licences are used when publishing research data.
Citation of Research Data
Authors should cite all data sources used appropriately, according to the repository guidelines and the citation style used by Studia universitatis hereditati (Chicago Style), or describe the data appropriately in the Access Statement if the data are not digitised or not published due to other restrictions (e.g. Personal Data Protection Act (PDPA-2)). A link to published research data (e.g. DOI) should necessarily be included in the reference list of the paper and also in a footnote, if appropriate.
Obligations of Authors, Editors and Reviewers
During the submission process, authors will be required to ensure that the research data is accessible at least to editors and reviewers. When the article is published, the final version of the research data must be published in an appropriate data repository. It is the responsibility of the editor to assess whether the article is based on research data (the author’s own or others’). If the editor judges that such data exist and have not been properly cited by the author, the editor is obliged to warn the author to complete his/her article. The same obligation applies to the reviewer of the journal.
Additional Information
For further clarification, authors may contact the data administrator at their institution or the journal editorial office or the relevant research data management support institutions.
