Sharing of Data as It Relates to Human Subjects Issues and Data Management Plans

Researchers often wish to make knowledge publicly available, especially through publication, but may not wish to share their raw data. Human Subjects offices (IRBs) sometimes wish to keep all information private or even to have raw data destroyed. Funding agencies may hope for the data they finance collection of to be made publicly available to increase its impact. These motivations often conflict. This paper discusses how current Human Subjects regulations impact sharing of corpus data among researchers, how funding agencies influence this, and how researchers react to these forces. The paper also discusses potential future changes to the current outcomes, through changes to Human Subjects Protection regulations and changes to funding agency requirements on data sharing.