Understanding static reference to new object

[Mark O' Sullivan]

Hi,
I'm a bit confused about the use of the static keyword in the following case:
In 1 class I see this declared at the top of the class say called Data:

private static RoomRecordsFileAccess database = null;

in constructor of same class:

public Data(String dbPath)
{
        database = new RoomRecordsFileAccess(dbPath);
}

What exactly does above do? I know the general stuff about:
(1) making a static reference to an object at start of class.
(2) making a static reference to a static method and initializing variables there.
I understand that

private static RoomRecordsFileAccess database = null;

is a static reference and only 1 copy exists for the class, but in the constructor is 1 creating a new object each time it's called for this static reference? Is there a point to this? Any help much appreciated as I find this confusing.
Thanks.

[Francisco Montes]

What i see here is that the value of the static variable (for which, indeed, there is only one copy at class level) will always be changed everytime a new instance of that class is created.

Like you said, maybe it is not so useful to do something like that. Then again, maybe it is for that particular project. :-)

[Campbell Ritchie]

It might be better to initialise a static variable like that in a static initializer block.

[John de Michele]

Campbell:

Agreed. I would also argue that the original code is an example of how not to use static variables.

John.