Core D - External Network Core

EXTERNAL NETWORK CORE: Revised Project Summary/Abstract The Life Course Center’s Network for Data-Intensive Research on Aging (NDIRA) supports an emerging interdisciplinary community of scientists using novel collections of cross-sectional, longitudinal, and contextual data for research on population aging. NDIRA brings established scholars of aging together with scholars new to the field and introduces them to data that are fundamental to understanding health outcomes at older ages. By fostering communication and collaboration, as well as providing hands-on assistance in data management and analysis, this Core contributes to both the talent pool and the data resource pool for addressing the demography and economics of aging. Innovative NIA-supported data infrastructure built by LCC members is opening new opportunities for understanding trends and disparities in population aging, the impact of early life experiences on later life outcomes, and the effect of changing economic, familial, environmental, geographic, cultural, and institutional contexts on the older population. Many of these new data sources pose significant challenges for researchers because of their large scale, complex structure, or restricted access. NDIRA is designed to mitigate these challenges by fostering a community of scholars that will draw on novel data sources for research on aging. The Core promotes research that addresses key priorities of the NIA’s Division of Behavioral and Social Research. NDIRA promises to (1) build a broad community of researchers engaged in data-intensive research on aging; (2) identify and address common problems faced by those researchers; (3) engage new users; and (4) engage other NIA Centers and networks to share data resources we have built and to promote the interoperability of data resources.