Investigation of ChatGPT Use in Research Data Retrieval

In recent years, huge amounts of research data have been generated, and it has become important to search them efficiently and accurately in order to make use of research data. Existing search engines and keyword-based search methods require users to enter appropriate keywords or phrases, and it is difficult to obtain satisfactory results if users do not have detailed information about the desired data. In this study, we investigated whether ChatGPT could be used to reach the desired research data by users who are not familiar with them. Specifically, we investigated whether users could find the research data cited in a research paper by entering the abstract of the paper into ChatGPT and then asking for the data necessary to write the research paper. The results showed that research data could be found in 65% of the cases, confirming that the use of ChatGPT increases the discoverability of research data.