Wittlund, Sina
Lorentzen, Thomas
Funding for this research was provided by:
UiT The Arctic University of Norway
Article History
Received: 24 March 2023
Accepted: 5 July 2023
First Online: 28 July 2023
Declarations
:
: Our study used population-level administrative data sets collected and linked by Statistics Norway, a Government Agency responsible for providing statistics on Norwegian society. Our data encompass the entire Norwegian population and contain extensive information on demography, welfare benefits, income and educational activity.The activity in Statistics Norway is based on the provisions of the Statistics Act, which impose a requirement on Statistics Norway to produce official statistics. Statistics Norway’s statistics are mainly prepared using raw data from two main sources: 1) administrative register-based surveys and 2) survey questionnaires.
: Statistics Norway collects data from public bodies, such as the Directorate of Taxes and NAV. Large data sets are transferred to Statistics Norway, and according to the Statistics Act, individuals do not have the opportunity to opt-out (i.e. individual consent is not required).
: In addition Statistics Norway has the authority to impose a requirement on individuals to take part in surveys (i.e. individual consent to participate is not required). Written information is always provided to respondents prior to any such survey, with details of what the survey is about, what other data will be linked to the data collected, what the data will be used for, who will have access to the data and when it will be deleted. Details of who has taken part in the survey remain confidential.According to Sect. 15. of the Statistics Act, Public use of anonymous data—Statistics Norway can give researchers access to data for use in research, and public bodies access to data for statistics and analyses, but only in a de-identified or anonymous form. Statistics Norway is a member of and follows the guidelines of the European Statistical System (ESS). Regulation (EC) No. 223/2009 of the European Parliament and of the Council on European statistics is also known as the European “Statistics Act”. The regulation is also incorporated into the Norwegian Statistics Act. The overarching principles for the production of European statistics are detailed in guidelines (the European Statistics Code of Practice).Our study does not include data from Norwegian Health registries and therefore we did not require The Norwegian Regional Committee for Medical and Health Research Ethics (REC) to grant exemption from individual consent.We confirm that all methods were performed in accordance with the guidelines and regulation of the Norwegian National Research Ethics Committees, the Norwegian Centre for Research Data and the Declaration of Helsinki.
: Not Applicable.
: The authors have no competing interests to declare.