Data curation: A conceptual framework for the study of data quality

Abstract

This Working Paper introduces the concept of data curation as a framework for the study of data quality from a social science perspective. Data curation can be understood as a specific set of data practices that is geared towards making and maintaining the trustworthiness of data and explicates how data require continuous care-taking. Analytically, it offers several advantages to the study of data quality. First of all, it draws attention to the fact that data quality is predicated on distributed forms of labour among various social actors and technical means. Secondly, it explicates the multiple interaction points between humans and data along the lives of data and their journeys through the world. And finally, it introduces a terminology that speaks to the needs of practitioners as well as to academic theory -building.