Through the ACCESS Upgrade infrastructure, researchers and students will gain access to updated and upgraded longitudinal life course data for more than 11,000 Norwegians born between 1922 and 1966.
Life course studies constitute an important research area for social- and health sciences. In Norway, studies that follow the same individuals over a longer period of time, have been relatively scarce.
Data from the Norwegian Life course, Ageing and Generation panel study (NorLAG) form the basis of this infrastructure. NorLAG combines survey data with information from public registers addressing key life domains: work and retirement, family relations, leisure time, health and health behaviour, care, quality of life etc.
The data provide unique opportunities for tracing individuals through different life phases and for analysing role changes and life events over time. This way, ACCESS Upgrade will strengthen the foundation for empirical ageing and welfare research and provide an important tool for research that can feed into policy goals, such as active ageing, combating social inequalities across the life course, intergenerational solidarity and family-work balances.
The upgrade will ensure that researchers have access to data through new systems that are flexible, secure and user-friendly. The infrastructure will also establish meeting grounds where researchers, students and other stakeholders can come together and discuss topics of relevance for the infrastructure.
Data access
Researchers and students have free access to NorLAG-data through a portal (norlag.nsd.no) that was launched in 2020.
Quality assurance and documentation have been ongoing since the launch and has resulted in several updated versions of the data in the portal. The latest version includes complete survey data (from three waves of data collections: 2002, 2007 and 2017) and annual registry data, updated until 2022.
Establishment and operation of the infrastructure
In the establishment phase of the project, the main focus was on quality assurance and documentation of the study and data, in addition to user testing, evaluation, improvement and development of technical solutions.
Users and other stakeholders of the NorLAG study are kept informed about the progress and development of the infrastructure through workshops, presentations, and newsletters, in addition to the website.
The launch of the fourth version of the database in the spring of 2023 marked the end of the project's establishment phase and the transition to the operational phase. In the operational phase, user support and communication, and maintenance of the technical solutions that ensure continued preservation and sharing of the data will continue.
ACCESS Upgrade is hosted by NOVA at OsloMet - founder of the NorLAG study, and SIKT: The Norwegian Agency for Shared Services in Education and Research.
Participants at OsloMet
Partner institution
- Sikt – Norwegian Agency for Shared Services in Education and Research
