This post was authored by Philippa Sterlini,

Library Open Research and Publishing.

UKRI is developing a new research data policy, which will update and streamline their expectations for sharing and managing research data and other research-relevant digital objects. 

Dundee survey

Between April and August of 2025, UK stakeholders were invited to feedback on a draft version of the UKRI research data policy. The Open Research & Publishing (OR&P) team at the library ran a survey from May to July, asking the University of Dundee research community about their current research data management practices.  We would like to share with you some of our findings and feedback to UKRI. 

Findable, Accessible, Interoperable Reproducible (FAIR) research data

Whilst the pursuits of FAIR data are accepted as worthwhile by the research community, we found that the language of FAIR is still not familiar or well adopted at Dundee. We have advised UKRI we would like to see better worked examples of FAIR within funder templates for data management plans, and we have published a guide to making your data FAIR.  

Contributor Role Taxonomy (CRediT)

Our survey revealed researchers value the opportunity to give appropriate recognition to contributions to research data. We advised UKRI that the ability to fulfil this policy requirement largely depends on the cooperation of publishers and the capacities in publication software, both of which are outwith the control of universities. The OR&P team produced a CRediT Taxonomy: Recognising Research Contributions guide to help researchers meet this policy objective. 

Data access/availability statements (DAS)

In line with the UKRI open access policy, peer-reviewed publications must include a data access statement. Researcher survey responses indicated that current usage and understanding of DAS is mixed. Data Access Statements are not yet standardised in a way that would enable universities or funders to use them as a measure of a researcher’s intent or willingness to share data. In truth there may be issues beyond the researcher’s control, 1 in 10 researchers reported encountering difficulties with a publisher when trying to include a DAS.  

OR&P have been collecting information on DAS via the repository since 2021 and have noted instances where a DAS does not appear to be adequate, or is not present, however, further investigation revealed data had indeed been shared and cited appropriately, but not within a dedicated DAS section on the paper. It is worth noting, one third of researchers surveyed at Dundee advise readers ‘contact the author’ in their DAS, however, this statement is not regarded as open data sharing.    

Please use the DAS section of an article template to appropriately cite your data, there is more information on how to create a Data access statement on the Library webpages. 

Data Management Plans (DMPs)

Our survey revealed that researchers at Dundee do not always use the DMP process as it was designed to be used. Just half of the researchers surveyed at Dundee create a DMP for every new project and only a third of researchers update their DMP during the project lifecycle. Less than 1 in 5 use the DMP to allocate resource to data management tasks. We want to encourage researchers to use their data management plan effectively. The OR&P team are here to support you to do this, we offer a DMP review service, contact discovery@dundee.ac.uk

New UKRI research data policy guidance due 2026

UKRI will publish the final policy and guidance, alongside an explanation of any key changes and how these were informed by feedback, at the start of 2026. It will replace current UKRI and research council data sharing policies later in 2026, following an implementation period.