Home - Data & Statistics - LibGuides at University of California San Diego

About Datasets & Statistics

This guide is meant as a starting point for finding commonly requested statistics and datasets. Please feel free to suggest additional useful sources as you find them.

Datasets are collections of numeric data that can be analyzed using specialized software such as Stata, SPSS, or R.

Statistics are numerical data that has been organized and interpreted, usually displayed in tables.

Resources marked [UCSD Only] must be accessed from either on the UC San Diego campus network or else via Remote Access.

Please feel free to email me if you get stuck, have additional research questions, would like to set up an appointment, or have other sources to include in the guide.

~Annelise

Comments (0)

Tips for Finding Data

1. Think about who might collect the data.

Could it have been collected by a government agency?
A nonprofit/nongovernmental organization?
A private business or industry group?
Academic researchers?

2. Look for publications that cite the dataset, e.g. scholarly articles or government reports.

3. Once you know that what you want exists, it's time to hunt it down.

Is it freely available on the web?
Part of a package to which the library already subscribes?
Is it something we can buy? (And is it within the library's budget and can the purchase be made quickly enough to fit your timeframe?)
Can it be requested directly from the researcher?

Comments (0)

Note

Please note: This guide is currently a work in progress. Apologies in advance for strange organization or broken links. Please let me know if you find a problem.

Comments (0)

Most Frequently Used Statistics Databases

ProQuest Statistical Insight
Provides quick statistical tables and also indexes a large number of statistics from federal government, international and state sources. Search by topic.
ProQuest Statistical Datasets
Enables researchers to build statistical tables and charts from multiple sources in a single interface, aggregating over 610 licensed and public domain datasets provided by over 55 sources, making 16 billion data points accessible within a single interface. Includes IMF data. Note:Java v. 6 or higher recommended. Note: alternate access via PQ Statistical Insight (use the 'related databases' drop down on top nav bar).
Statista
Access the most relevant and important statistics and studies gathered by market researchers, trade organizations, scientific publications, and government sources on over 600 industries. Some info is free, some requires free login, some requires a subscription.
Rand State Statistics
Contains nearly 80 databases in the following categories: Business and economics; Community; Education; Energy and environment; Government finance; Health and socioeconomic; and: Population and demographics
UNdata
Comprehensive database which includes most major statistical resources of international statistics from the United Nations.
World dataBank (World Development Indicators + Global Development Finance)
From the World Bank
OECD.Stat

These monthly, quarterly or annual time series cover the OECD's major economic and social indicators.
Statistical Abstract of the United States
Comprehensive collection of statistics from all U.S. government agencies and select international and state statistics.
Historical Statistics of the U.S.
Government agency statistics going back to colonial times.
American FactFinder- 1990 and 2000 Census data

Comments (0)

Multidisciplinary Data Finders

ProQuest Statistical Insight [UCSD Only]
Provides access to statistics produced by federal agencies, states, intergovernmental organizations, and private enterprise with its advanced Search Tables functionality. Also includes access to ProQuest Statistical Datasets, which allows researchers to build statistical tables, graphs, and maps from multiple sources. It aggregates over 100 licensed and public domain datasets and makes 750 million data points accessible within a single interface.
Statista [UCSD Only]
Access the most relevant and important statistics and studies gathered by market researchers, trade organizations, scientific publications, and government sources on over 600 industries. Some info is free, some requires free login, premium content is UCSD Only.
Zanran
"Your source for data & statistics - graphs, charts and tables." Like Google for numeric data.
Infochimps
Infochimps is a place for people to find, share and sell formatted data. Both users and Infochimps employees scrape, parse and format data so that it's easily accessible to you. We take the chimp work out of working with data so you can literally start building cool stuff in minutes.
UC San Diego Dataverse
Miscellaneous datasets housed at UC San Diego
ICPSR Data Archive [UCSD Only]
The Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research. World's largest archive of social science data. Election data, opinion polls, more. Special collections on Health, Education, Aging, Crime, Substance Abuse. Raw data; no tables.
IQSS Dataverse
Access the world's largest collection of social science research data here by searching across or browsing through one of the virtual data archives (called "dataverses") listed below. Data is uploaded by researchers from around the world.
Odum Institute Dataverse Network - data catalog
Data catalog for the Odum Institute, which maintains one of the oldest and largest catalog of machine-readable data in the U.S., plus harvest data catalogs for the Dataweb, NARA, IQSS, Roper, and ICPSR.
Databib
Registry of research data repositories
DataFinder from the Population Reference Bureau
A database with hundreds of variables for the US and the world.