Federation partner
DataCite
DataCite registers DOIs for research data and software. Its contributorType vocabulary is the analogue of CRediT for the dataset and software world, and the two cross-walk where the work types meet.
What DataCite provides
DataCite is the principal DOI registration agency for research data, software, samples, instruments, and other non-article research outputs. Its metadata schema — currently in the kernel 4 series — is the canonical place to describe a dataset's authors, contributors, related identifiers, and provenance.
The DataCite metadata schema includes a contributorType attribute on each contributor entry. The vocabulary is a controlled list — values such as DataCurator, DataManager, HostingInstitution, ProjectLeader, Researcher, RightsHolder, Supervisor, and others — designed for the contributors typically named on a dataset record rather than on a journal article.
How contributorType cross-walks with CRediT
CRediT and contributorType were designed for different objects: CRediT for articles, contributorType for datasets. They overlap in the middle, and that overlap is where the cross-walk lives.
The most commonly used correspondences:
- DataCite DataCurator maps to CRediT Data curation.
- DataCite ProjectLeader and ProjectManager map to CRediT Supervision and Project administration respectively.
- DataCite Researcher is broad and may correspond to several CRediT roles depending on what the person actually did; in practice it is the contributorType most likely to need decomposition into specific CRediT roles when the same contribution is described on a related publication.
- DataCite Supervisor maps to CRediT Supervision.
- DataCite RightsHolder has no CRediT equivalent; it is a legal designation, not a contribution role.
The full table is on the cross-walks reference page. The mapping is not a bijection — some contributorType values have no CRediT analogue (and vice versa) — but it is good enough to round-trip the contribution narrative when a dataset and the paper that uses it are both registered.
Joint Crossref / DataCite metadata guidance
Crossref and DataCite jointly published a metadata guide that addresses the boundary cases where research outputs straddle both agencies' remits — data papers, software with an associated article, registered reports tied to datasets. The guide is the canonical reference for implementers building tooling that has to deposit to both agencies. See DataCite's announcement of the joint guide.
How CASRAI federates with DataCite
- The cross-walk page records the current CRediT to contributorType correspondences and is revised when either vocabulary changes.
- Implementation examples for dataset deposits use the DataCite kernel 4 schema and reference the matching CRediT roles where the same contribution appears on a related publication.
- Where a CASRAI Catalogue element references both publication and dataset contributors, the alignment with DataCite contributorType is recorded alongside the alignment with CRediT.
