Data Policies

Understand eligibility requirements and policies for using these data.

Data Eligibility

Tenured and tenure-track faculty, PhD students, and postdoctoral researchers from an accredited academic institution are eligible to have direct access to data from the Kilts Center. Each eligible researcher accessing the data must register and have approval from the Kilts Center.

Each individual eligible to access the data must have a subscription at her/his own home institution and be registered and approved by the Kilts Center.

All coauthors must be employed full-time by and/or enrolled as a student in an academic institution. Coauthors outside of an accredited academic institution are prohibited.

Approved researchers (e.g., faculty, PhD students, and postdocs) may work with support staff (e.g., research assistants, research professionals) from their own institution. Support personnel do not register. Instead, the approved researcher is responsible for obtaining and ensuring security of the data.

Access by PhD students or postdoctoral researchers requires a subscription by the student’s or postdoc’s advisor. The advisor must be a full-time tenured or tenure-track professor from the same institution. The PhD student or postdoc and the faculty advisor are each required to register.

Registered and policy-compliant PhD students who graduate and take a job at an unsubscribed accredited academic institution may within six months of graduation apply for a three-year, no-cost extension contract for projects that meet the following criteria:

Each working paper must be registered with the Kilts Center as a separate project
Project(s) must be approved 12 months prior to the graduation date
At least six (6) months prior to the graduation date, the student must have posted a working paper to the Kilts Center’s SSRN series or have submitted it to a journal.

PhD students who graduate and take a job outside of an accredited academic institution are no longer eligible to access data; however, they can be a coauthor (without access to the data) on a project that meet the following criteria:

Each working paper must be registered with the Kilts Center as a separate project
Project(s) must be approved 12 months prior to the graduation date
At least six (6) months prior to the graduation date, the student must have posted a working paper to the Kilts Center’s SSRN series or have submitted it to a journal.

Project Criteria

Researchers must register with the Kilts Center a detailed description of each project. Each paper a researcher anticipates writing should be its own project.
Researchers must disclose any changes to their project scope, coauthors, or funding sources during the course of their research.
Researchers may use the data for strictly academic research projects focused on important issues of wide and general interest.
Research projects commissioned, sponsored, or funded by an industry source, government organization, industry group, nonprofit organization, or private company must be reviewed and approved by Nielsen as part of the registration process. Unapproved research of this nature is strictly prohibited.
Narrowly focused projects on subjects of interest only to specific industries or firms may be declined.
Use of the data for consulting purposes of any kind, including litigation support, is strictly prohibited. Projects with the primary purpose of evaluating Nielsen's data-collection approach or methodologies will not be approved.
Researchers must not disclose any personally identifiable information (PII) about consumer panelists or details that would permit the re-identification of Nielsen's panelists.
Researchers must agree that they will not name or infer brands or manufacturers if researching topics related to anti-trust, collusion, mergers, and illegal activities.

Use Requirements

Every researcher must register and submit an annual status update and disclose changes to my project scope, new funding sources, coauthors, and other updates as requested.
Data must be stored only on devices and computers owned by the subscribed institution or permissible Third Party Hosting Systems. The permissible Third Party Hosting Systems must have at least one of the following information security certifications: (a) federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA); (b) SSAE16 SOC2; and/or (c) ISO27001 security certifications. No amount of data should ever be stored on a personal computer.
Within 15 days of a subscription end date or deactivation, each researcher must provide all papers, complete a final report, and provide signed verification that she/he destroyed and purged all copies of the data during deactivation.

Papers and Publication Policies

Researchers must submit all copies of proposed papers, reports, presentations, abstracts, dissertations, manuscripts, journal articles, and any other publication type to the Kilts Center at least 30 days prior to any public dissemination, including SSRN and submission to journals. Any distributed materials may include only limited excerpts of NielsenIQ and Nielsen information—“limited excerpt” means such portion of the NielsenIQ and Nielsen data that would not ordinarily substitute for a purchase of access.

Thirty (30) days after providing Kilts Center a copy of a working paper, researchers must submit such papers to the Kilts Center at Chicago Booth Marketing Data Center Paper Series at Social Science Research Network (SSRN).

Researchers are required to notify the Kilts Center of publications resulting from their work with the data, even after they have stopped using the data.

Data providers require specific citation and disclaimer details in all presentations, working papers, journal articles, dissertations, and publications. Citations vary according to what data you use. Please see below.

Citations for papers only using NielsenIQ data

NielsenIQ data include Consumer Panel, Retail Scanner, Custom Panel Views, and Annual Ailments, Health, and Wellness

Researcher(s)' own analyses calculated (or derived) based in part on data from Nielsen Consumer LLC and marketing databases provided through the NielsenIQ Datasets at the Kilts Center for Marketing Data Center at The University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

The conclusions drawn from the NielsenIQ data are those of the researcher(s) and do not reflect the views of NielsenIQ. NielsenIQ is not responsible for, had no role in, and was not involved in analyzing and preparing the results reported herein.

Citation details for papers only using Nielsen data

Nielsen data include Ad Intel

Researcher(s)' own analyses calculated (or derived) based in part on data from The Nielsen Company (US), LLC and marketing databases provided through the Nielsen Datasets at the Kilts Center for Marketing Data Center at The University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

The conclusions drawn from the Nielsen data are those of the researcher(s) and do not reflect the views of Nielsen. Nielsen is not responsible for, had no role in, and was not involved in analyzing and preparing the results reported herein.

Citation details for papers both using NielsenIQ and Nielsen data

NielsenIQ data include Consumer Panel, Retail Scanner, Custom Panel Views, and Annual Ailments, Health, and Wellness. Nielsen data include Ad Intel.

Researcher(s)' own analyses calculated (or derived) based in part on (i) retail measurement/consumer data from Nielsen Consumer LLC ("NielsenIQ"); (ii) media data from The Nielsen Company (US), LLC ("Nielsen"); and (iii) marketing databases provided through the respective NielsenIQ and the Nielsen Datasets at the Kilts Center for Marketing Data Center at The University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

The conclusions drawn from the NielsenIQ and Nielsen data are those of the researcher(s) and do not reflect the views of Nielsen. Nielsen is not responsible for, had no role in, and was not involved in analyzing and preparing the results reported herein.

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