I. The CLASSIC Network Overview
The Consortium for Longitudinal behavioral and Social Science data Integration and Coordination (CLASSIC) ( U24AG081810 ) is an NIH-funded initiative aimed at facilitating and stimulating collaboration among deeply phenotyped longitudinal studies of aging. While NIH has successfully built infrastructure for large, population-based studies (e.g., HRS, NHATS), many studies with rich measures of social and behavioral data—including intensive studies of cognitive function in daily life—have not been featured in existing catalogs. Our experience and interviews with study teams confirm that significant roadblocks make collaboration and data sharing burdensome and time-consuming.
II. Introducing OpenDRaWeR: The Meta-data Catalog
We are developing a web-based, publicly available meta-data catalog called OpenDRaWeR (Open, Deep, Rich, and Within-person Resource) with the help of our collaborators at Sage Bionetworks.
What is OpenDRaWeR? OpenDRaWeR features meta-data ("data about the data") about studies. This includes information regarding the study's design, description, variables, and codebooks.
Key Benefits and Features for Participating Study Teams:
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Discoverability and Recognition: Studies are featured on a professional, common platform alongside other psycho-social datasets and biomedical portals like ADKnowledge .
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DOI Minting: Studies gain the ability to mint DOIs (Digital Object Identifiers) for their meta-data, allowing teams to cite these in manuscripts and report these as research products.
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Reduced Administrative Burden: OpenDRaWeR provides clear governance and a data request dashboard that manages all incoming data requests through a uniform process.
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Request Tracking and Reporting: Teams can generate reports regarding study views, data requests, and products, which can be included in annual reports.
Important Note on Data Control: OpenDRaWeR features only the meta-data. Your study data will remain at your institution or other archive. Your study team remains the sole decision maker in determining which data requests are approved, and all data sharing occurs through your team’s established procedures following your institution’s policies.
III. Supporting Study Teams for Coordination and Collaboration
CLASSIC supports teams in integrating their study information into the catalog to assist prospective analysts in identifying studies for coordinated analysis via searches across harmonized meta-data variables.
Meta-data Preparation Support: We offer comprehensive support to assist studies in integrating their existing materials into the catalog:
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Meta-data Preparation Workshop: In-person training designed to assist studies in the integration process, led by the Data Science Academy at NC State.
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1:1 Consulting Support: Individualized support provided prior to and following the workshop as teams prepare their study meta-data and ingress into OpenDRaWeR.
By joining as an early member of the CLASSIC network, your team will help refine the design of OpenDRaWeR to reduce burden on teams like yours and allow more researchers to learn about your study.
IV. Join CLASSIC and OpenDRaWeR
To learn more about CLASSIC or register for an upcoming OpenDRaWeR meta-data preparation workshop, contact us at classic_network@ncsu.edu