Harnessing the power of FAIR data to advance sex/gender insights in psychotraumatology.

Background: Sex and gender impact trauma exposure, as well as trauma-related outcomes and treatment efficacy. Still, knowledge about the extent of these sex/gender differences, as well as the distinct mechanisms that contribute towards these differences in psychotraumatology, is limited.Objective: This article outlines how the use of Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable (FAIR) research data can further enhance our insights into sex and gender aspects in trauma research.Method and Results: We present and discuss four ways in which FAIR trauma data can facilitate sex/gender-sensitive trauma research: (1) FAIR trauma data may overcome the current lack of sex/gender-sensitive reporting in our field by enabling secondary sex-stratified analyses; (2) FAIR trauma data may facilitate data pooling across studies and thereby increase the statistical power of sex/gender-related analyses into trauma-related outcomes and its underlying mechanisms; (3) FAIR trauma data may promote the reliability and robustness of sex/gender-related trauma research; and (4) FAIR trauma data may aid in creating an evidence base for currently understudied sex and/or gender minorities by means of data pooling across studies. Additional benefits, potential challenges, and further considerations are discussed.Conclusions: FAIR data provide an important and feasible avenue to address pressing and timely questions on sex/gender-related aspects in trauma research. Such knowledge will contribute towards refined sex/gender-sensitive interventions and advance health equity in the psychotraumatology field.