Candidate
Joana Patrícia de Sousa Rodrigues
Date, Time and Location
June 17, 14:00, Sala de Atos FEUP
President of the Jury
António Fernando Vasconcelos Cunha Castro Coelho, PhD, Associate Professor with Habilitation, Faculdade de Engenharia, Universidade do Porto.
Members
Cláudia Maria Bauzer Medeiros, PhD, Professor, Departamento de Sistemas de Informação, Instituto de Computação, Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Brasil;
Maria Manuel Lopes de Figueiredo Costa Marques Borges, PhD, Associate Professor with Habilitation, Departamento de Filosofia, Comunicação e Informação, Faculdade de Letras, Universidade de Coimbra;
José Luís Brinquete Borbinha, PhD, Full Professor, Departamento de Informática do Instituto Superior Técnico da Universidade de Lisboa;
Cândida Fernanda Antunes Ribeiro, PhD, Full Professor, Departamento de Ciências da Comunicação e da Informação, Faculdade de Letras, Universidade do Porto;
Maria Cristina de Carvalho Alves Ribeiro, PhD, Associate Professor, Departamento de Engenharia Informática, Faculdade de Engenharia, Universidade do Porto;
Carla Alexandra Teixeira Lopes, PhD, Assistant Professor, Departamento de Engenharia Informática, Faculdade de Engenharia, Universidade do Porto (Supervisor).
Abstract
The evolution of the use and production of images is notorious. Technological development favors the emergence of images. This scenario is also applicable in the field of scientific research, where more and more instruments are used to facilitate image capture. With this context as a motto, and knowing that images have particular characteristics, this work explores the dynamics of images in research according to two scenarios: images as data and images as metadata. From a perspective of images as data, the aim is to understand how they can sufficiently represent the data obtained, favoring description. From the perspective of images as metadata, the aim is to understand how they can be used as a tool capable of faithfully describing a dataset and promoting its adequate contextualization and interpretation. Through exploratory research, several experiments with images as data and as metadata wereconducted, based on the dynamics and principles of Research Data Management (RDM). The work begins with an overview of the literature on the subject, in which the management of research data and its relationship with the use and production of images is explored, namely a study of the evolution of the image in the context of scientific, going through its challenges and opportunities, to the way it is treated by researchers, always with RDM as a guiding line. Subsequently, we move on to a view of the informational behavior of those who use and produce images in the context of research, namely in the search to identify behavior patterns in four studies. The first study starts from the perspective of a specific research project and the remaining three studies take a perspective that includes more stakeholders from different research domains. Thus, the scenarios of images as data and as metadata are explored, through the presentation of experiences that mostly involved researchers. For the case of images as data, four studies are presented, with specific contributions, starting with the proposal of a new metadata model for describing data in image format and their respective controlled vocabularies. The remaining three studies focus on automatic image processing, the publishing and sharing of data, and, finally, the definition of guidelines for using and producing images in the context of research. For the case of images as metadata, we conducted two studies, the first exposing a new perspective on data description, through the use of images as metadata. It is this new perspective that challenges us to take a new approach, which culminates in the second study, which is based on an experience developed with researchers and aims to alert and raise awareness of the use of other types of documents in the scientific process. This work has made it clear that images do not always have a formal, standardized role in research data management. However, researchers are open to including images more formally in the scientific process. Furthermore, it is clear that researchers can identify advantages in the use and production of images. The general trend of exponential growth in the production and use of images (motivated by technological developments and new sharing and dissemination tools) is also seen in the context of research, as the various participants in the studies carried out identified it as such, which points to an imminent need to make the role of images representative in the context of research data collection. The contributions obtained from this work are reflected in the response to the need for including images in the RDM. Starting from a more conceptual approach, a consistent overview was obtained about the habits of those who use and produce images through the analysis carried out in the literature, namely through the systematic review carried out and which includes several analysis variables, up to studies carried out through questionnaires and surveys and which allowed direct contact with researchers, thus allowing us to relate what theory tells us with what practice does. In the context of images as data, the metadata model and controlled vocabularies are a significant contribution, as they explore new possibilities of description, much more focused on the type of data in question (images). Furthermore, studies of sharing platforms, as well as the possibilities of automatic description of images, made it possible to generate a starting point and determine the path to follow. Still, in the context of images, it is important to highlight the guidelines for the use and production of images that appear as a contribution to the scientific community, in the sense that they guide specific image practices and needs. In the context of images as metadata, the great contribution lies, precisely, in the presentation of an innovative approach to data description, where the particular characteristics that images have are highlighted and that position them as allies of researchers in the data description process and present practical examples of how this description through images could occur.
Keywords: Image; Image as Data; Image as Metadata; Information Behavior; Research Data; Management.