Get Help with Data
FAQs
- How does ICPSR handle access to its data and members-only content?
- How do I know if I am an ICPSR member?
- How do I access ICPSR data if I am not at a member institution?
- How can my organization become a member of ICPSR?
- Can I have a trial ICPSR membership for my institution? What about a personal membership?
- What do I do if I'm having trouble logging in with my MyData Account? What about changing my email address or password?
- I'm trying to download data, but I'm not getting any data files. Why can't I download data?
- How can I get the non-restricted version of a restricted dataset?
- The dataset I wish to analyze is restricted. What do I have to do to get the data?
- What is a proxy server? Why am I getting an odd message about proxy servers when I log in?
- Why am I being asked to enter a MyData password when I try to login via Google?
- What kind of data formats do you distribute? Do you have SPSS Portable files? SAS transport? Stata?
- What are setup files? How do I use them?
- There are no setup files available for my dataset. How do I create a setup file?
- Can I use Excel to analyze the data?
- What is R? How do I use it?
- How can I use your data with GIS software, such as ArcView or MapInfo?
- What is a Codebook?
- How do I convert all variable names to lowercase in Stata?
Video Presentations
ICPSR has a number of video presentations on YouTube that address a variety of topics including step by step instructions on using and troubleshooting set-up files and creating a MyData account, and learning about some of the archives housed at ICPSR, such as RCMD and Research Connections or using ICPSR resources in your classroom, such as Inquiry-Based Learning.
Contact ICPSR User Support
If the FAQs and video tutorials do not answer your questions, our user support staff are available from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., ET, Monday to Friday.
Phone: 734-647-2200
ICPSR-help@umich.edu
Our goal is to respond to inquiries on the same day they are received.
Contact Local Support
Data users at ICPSR member institutions can contact their local ICPSR Representative for assistance in finding, accessing, and working with ICPSR data. In some cases, your Representative may refer you elsewhere on campus if they cannot answer your question. For users at nonmember institutions, your local support might be a data librarian in your library system or a consultant in a social science data center or statistical consulting center.
Terminology
You may encounter unfamiliar acronyms and specialized terms used in the social sciences. These resources can provide clear definitions:
- Glossary of Social Science Terms
- Index of Frequently Used Acronyms
- Social Sciences Research and Instructional Glossary
Need a study converted to a different format?
You can contact ICPSR User Support to inquire about the possibility of ICPSR creating setup files for the study. If it is determined that ICPSR cannot create them or cannot create them within your time frame, then you are advised to seek assistance from someone on your campus with experience in the statistical package that you have chosen to use.
Alternately, we may be able to provide assistance in converting one of our studies into a statistical format other than the one in which it is offered. Generally, ICPSR offers data in SAS, Stata, and SPSS statistical packages, but if one of those formats is not available for a specific study, we can convert any of these formats into any other. However, we do not typically provide data in analysis-ready formats when a setup file for the required format is offered. We offer tutorials on using setup files in all statistical packages on our YouTube Channel.