About
The GeoLAB is a product of the REGIO DATA project of the Leibniz ScienceCampus RegioHub of Bielefeld University and DIW Berlin.
The Campus is funded by the Leibniz Association, was established in 2020 and was granted a second four-year funding period beginning in October 2024. Its data basis is the Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
1. Thematic focus of the Leibniz ScienceCampus RegioHub
Living conditions in Germany today show evidence of increasing and rapidly changing regional disparities in structural, demographic and economic domains. These disparities often take the form of adverse access to health care facilities, childcare provision, education and other public services as well as regional labour market opportunities, business climate, housing and transportation infrastructures. The Leibniz ScienceCampus researchers investigate how these regional social and economic opportunities influence social cohesion, expectations, political attitudes, preferences and behaviour and thereby exacerbate or mitigate social inequality, social cohesion, political conflicts and radicalization.
2. Thematic focus of the REGIO DATA project
The REGIO DATA project aims to enhance data access and support for researchers using regionalised SOEP data. Building on a successful first phase, which established an initial teaching and research infrastructure, the second phase launched the GeoLAB. This portal will serve as a central node, enabling remote, secure access to regionalised SOEP data from anywhere, overcoming previous security and logistical challenges tied to physical access restrictions.
Beyond data access, the GeoLAB offers comprehensive support for research involving geospatial and survey data. Key features include
- the GeoDB Geodata Index for exploring regional indicators,
- Best Practices documentation with research manuals and code for data integration,
- and an expanded software toolbox with R packages for geospatial analysis.
3. Who built the GeoLAB
The GeoLAB is built in the REGIO DATA project at the Faculty of Sociology of Bielefeld University, in the working area Methods of Empirical Social Research, working group Social Data Science.
Prof. Dr. Simon Kühne
Professorship for Social Data Science · principal investigator of REGIO DATA · scientific coordinator of the Leibniz ScienceCampus
Dr. Kerstin Ostermann
Postdoctoral researcher, Methods of Empirical Social Research · spatial, labour and neighbourhood sociology · also at the IAB
The Leibniz ScienceCampus SOEP RegioHub, linked at the top of this page, lists everyone working in the Campus, including the researchers whose projects this data infrastructure serves. The code of both finders is open source and archived with a DOI; the software toolbox collects the R packages that come out of the Campus.