People often share data to enable verification of their findings, promote cost-effective new research using existing data, support research education, and foster public trust in science. Data sharing is required by some journals and funding agencies such as the National Institutes of Health. The Qualitative Data Sharing (QDS) project was funded by the NIH National Human Genome Research Institute (R01HG009351). Our team developed this toolkit to provide qualitative researchers with resources for preparing and sharing qualitative data, as well as complying with the NIH Data Sharing Policy.

This Toolkit offers the following:

• Guidelines and Resources for researchers preparing and depositing qualitative data
• Action ideas for:
  • Researchers about writing data sharing plans, budgets, and making your data more visible.
  • Institutions about the ethical, legal, and budgetary considerations of sharing qualitative data. 
  • Journals that would like to encourage qualitative data sharing.
  • Repositories about how to support qualitative researchers with sharing qualitative data.
  • Qualitative textbook authors about qualitative data sharing and data protections.
• QuaDS: Qualatative Data Sharing Software, which can assist researchers with data de-identification to comply with regulations and maintain context for secondary users
• Answers to frequently asked questions from researchers

Questions or comments? Contact us at QDS@wustl.edu.