Subject Guides: Data & Statistics: Home

Quick links

Here are a few quick links to commonly-used sources of data & statistics:

BC Data

BC stats The central statistical agency of the Province of British Columbia, includes demographic, economic, labour, and social statistics and reports based on those statistics.
DataBC Catalogue Freely available BC Government machine-readable data.
Abacus: British Columbia Research Libraries data services Collection includes data from Statistics Canada, DMTI Spatial, and other sources. **Abacus is now on a new platform; to log in, choose "University of Northern British Columbia" from the drop-down menu, and enter your UNBC username and password.
Prince George Open Data Catalogue Freely available City of Prince George machine-readable data.

Canadian Data

Statistics Canada Main source for Canadian statistics
Data (Statistics Canada) Catalogue of data available from Statistics Canada, including data tables, data profiles, thematic maps, public use microdata files, and data visualizations.
Canadian Census by Year Explore census data for each census year.
Historical Statistics of Canada Containing Canadian statistical tables from 1867 to mid-1970s.
<odesi> Source of Statistics Canada public-use microdata files (PUMFs), aggregate statistics tables, and various public opinion poll datasets. Also includes metadata for ICPSR and Statistics Canada master files.
CANSIM @ CHASS Canadian time-series data. UNBC login required
Open Data Portal - Government of Canada Data about Government of Canada services, financials, national demographic information, high resolution maps, etc.
Canadian census analyser @ CHASS The Canadian Census Analyser provides access to the following Canadian census profile data: 1981-2011 at the dissemination/enumeration area, census subdivision, and census division levels; 1961-2011 at the census tract level; and 1991-2011 at the federal electoral district, provincial/territorial, and Canada levels. The following National Household Survey (NHS) profile data is also included: 2011 at the dissemination area, census tract, census subdivision, census division, federal electoral district, forward sortation area, Canada, and provincial/territorial levels. The Canadian Census Analyser also provides access to 1971-2006 Census of Canada public use microdata files (PUMFs). Output formats for census and NHS data: html, CSV, MS Excel ready, SAS, and SPSS
CHASS microdata analysis and subsetting with SDA CHASS microdata analysis and subsetting with SDA allows users to analyze data from Statistics Canada surveys (Public Use Microdata files available through the DLI). The following functions may be executed: frequencies or crosstabulations, comparison of means, correlation matrices, comparison of correlations, multiple regressions, logit or probit regressions, and value lists of individual cases. Data may also be extracted and downloaded for analysis in a statistical package such as SPSS.

International Data

ICPSR Inter-university Consortium of Political and Social Research - archives of mostly US social science survey microdata
IFS International Financial Statistics
OECD Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) books, papers, and statistics, including health data.
United States Data/Statistics Gateway to US government agencies providing statistics
UN data Gateway to data generated and/or distributed by United Nations statistical agencies
World Bank Free and open access data about development in countries around the world
Arctic Data Center The Arctic Data Center is the primary data and software repository for the Arctic section of National Science Foundation’s Office of Polar Programs (NSF OPP).

Welcome

Welcome to the Geoffrey R. Weller guide to finding data and statistics, with a focus on Canadian information.

Quick search: Use the following search box to quickly search for data and statistics across Canadian and American sources using the <odesi> search. This collection includes Statistics Canada, Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research, and popular opinion polls

Data vs. Statistics

What are statistics?

Statistics are aggregated data, that is data that have already been analyzed and processed into percentages, averages, totals, etc. (often arranged in tables) and can be used immediately in your papers and presentations. Examples of statistics include average income for a specific city, percentage of the population who speak French, etc.

What are data?

Data are information or characteristics collected through observation. Given this broad definition there are many different types of data including:

aggregated data or statistics (defined above)
microdata: or raw data that have yet to be interpreted and analyzed. Examples of microdata are individual survey responses or observations. Microdata collected about people need to be anonymized before it can be published for public use so specific individuals cannot be identified.
geospatial data: data that include geographic positioning information relative to a coordinate system. Geospatial data usually need to be interpreted using GIS software.
time series data: observations of the same variable made over time, such as climate data
textual data: comprise of speech and text databases, lexicons, text corpora, and other metadata-added textual resources used for language and linguistic research.

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Susie Wilson

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Subjects: Research Data Management