Trustworthiness: What influences perceived trustworthiness of statistics or data being used as evidence, and how can those across the statistical system increase it? To what degree do people trust official statistics or other data used as evidence, and how much do perceptions of trustworthiness influence this?

Background

OSR’s regulatory work revolves around the Code of Practice for Statistics (the Code), where we set the standards that producers of official statistics should commit to. The Code itself rests on three pillars: trustworthiness, quality, and value. To continue increasing our capability as a regulator, we are constantly seeking to grow our understanding of what these pillars mean and how they can be supported.

When creating the Code our perspective was informed by research, such as by the work of Onora O’Neill who has highlighted how for an organisation (or a statistic) to be trusted it must first be trustworthy. Since then, we have continued to engage with relevant research, such as the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) on its exploration of value and how the value of official statistics might be measured. Going forward, we intend to continue to consolidate and expand on this valuable research, drawing on knowledge both specific to the statistical system and more broadly. We want our advice, guidance, and regulatory work to be evidence-based and pragmatic, to best support statistics producers and users.

Next steps

If you would like to share evidence or collaborate with us on any of these areas, please contact us at research.function@statistics.gov.uk.

Source

This question was published as part of the set of ARIs in this document:

Produced Office for Statistics Regulations Areas of Research Interest Office for Statistics Regulation

Related UKRI funded projects

  • TIER2: ENHANCING TRUST, INTEGRITY AND EFFICIENCY IN RESEARCH THROUGH NEXT-LEVEL REPRODUCUBILITY IMPACT PATHWAYS

    Lack of reproducibility of research results has become a major theme in recent years. As we emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic, economic pressures (increasing scrutiny of research funding) and exposed consequences of lack...

    Funded by: Horizon Europe Guarantee

    Lead research organisation: UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD

    Why might this be relevant?

    The project focuses on enhancing trust in research through reproducibility, which is a factor influencing perceived trustworthiness of data and statistics.

  • Semi-Automated Checking of Research Outputs

    Trusted Research Environments (TREs) play a vital role in enabling researchers to analyse confidential data such as health records then report findings. The Five-Safes Framework is used to ensure data confidentiality and...

    Funded by: DRI

    Lead research organisation: University of the West of England

    Why might this be relevant?

    Partially relevant as it focuses on reducing operating costs and time for releasing research results, but does not directly address perceived trustworthiness of statistics.

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