Understanding Society User Support

Dear Tenghao,

Many thanks for your enquiry. The team is looking into it and we will get back to you shortly.

Best wishes, Victoria.

On behalf of the Understanding Society Data User Support Team

Dear Tenghao,

We are slightly confused about the dataset(s) that you are using, and were hoping you could clarify. We don't use the age variables you specify above with the GWAS data - to access the GWAS data along with the survey/ phenotype data you would need to have applied via our MetaDAC for access to genetics data combined with survey data (as we advised you previously: https://www.understandingsociety.ac.uk/support/issues/510) - however you may have tried this and found it was not possible because you are based outside the UK? You will not be able to conduct your research effectively simply but having the GWAS data and trying to combine it yourself with the standard survey data from the UK Data Archive.

However, as the MetaDAC process is not available to researchers outside the UK, we do offer another solution for international researchers so that they can make use of the combined genetic and survey data. We can run the analysis you require here (within the Understanding Society team at the University of Essex), and then provide you with the results to use for your research. The caveat here is that the three team member here would need to be listed as co-authors on your resulting paper. Please let me know if you would like to go down this route and I can put you in touch with my colleagues here.

Apologies if we have misunderstood the data that you are using but it would be great if you could clarify so we can help you further.

We hope this helps, best wishes, Victoria.

Dear Victoria,

Thanks for your quick response.

We have applied the GWAS data (only genetic data) from the European Genome-phenome Archive according to the information on your website:
https://www.understandingsociety.ac.uk/about/health/data

After we were approved and then got the GWAS data, a co-variate file was also included containing age and top 10 PCs, nothing more phenotype information.

This is also explained in one of the official file "UNDERSTANDING SOCIETY DATA ACCESS STRATEGY" (can be downloaded in http://www.metadac.ac.uk/understanding-society/).

In page 12, last paragraph (point 8), the following words can be found:

"Where an application relates to genome wide scan data from the Illumina human core exome array, with the addition of an age band variable but with no other data from the survey, applications should be made to the WTSI DAC."

I hope this could explain our situation.

Please let us know if there is any doubt.

Best regards,
Tenghao

Dear Tenghao,

I'm very sorry about the confusion here, and many thanks for clarifying, that was very helpful.

Here are the links to the two age variables that you have. The reason some have the same value is because one variable is 10 year age bands and the other is 20 year age bands.

https://www.understandingsociety.ac.uk/documentation/health-assessment/dataset-documentation/wave/xwave/datafile/xindresp_ns/variable/ag16g10

https://www.understandingsociety.ac.uk/documentation/health-assessment/dataset-documentation/wave/xwave/datafile/xindresp_ns/variable/ag16g20

We hope this helps - do let me know if you need anything else. We look forward to hearing about your research and any forthcoming publications using Understanding Society data.

Best wishes, Victoria.