A Strategy for Assessing Science Behavioral and Social Research on Aging (2007) / Chapter Skim
Currently Skimming:
2 The NIA Behavioral and Social Science Research Program
2 The NIA Behavioral and Social Science Research Program
Pages 20-39
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Pursuant to its mission, NIA supports research in a variety of biomedical and social science areas. Box 2-1 lists the institute's major research goals, which are described in greater detail in the strategic plan.
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Maintain health and function 3. Enhance older adults' societal roles and interpersonal support and reduce social isolation Goal B: Understand healthy aging processes 1.
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BSR supports research, training, and the development of research resources and methodologies to produce a scientific knowledge base for maximizing active life and health expectancy. This knowledge base is required for informed and effec tive public policy, professional practice, and everyday life.
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by Research Topic, FY 1997-2000 Topic 1997 1998 1999 2000 Cognitive functioning 13.4 14.9 16.6 16.8 Personality and social psychology 5.2 4.9 5.2 8.4 Old people in society 5.3 7.5 7.6 7.7 Psychosocial geriatrics 11.5 14.8 17.1 19.5 Health care organizations 11.6 9.5 8.8 8.4 Demography 12.3 14.4 15.2 20.4 Population epidemiology 5.9 6.1 7.6 9.7 Health and retirement economics 13.1 13.8 9.1 11.3 Databases (e.g., Health and Retirement Survey) 0.6 0.6 7.7 9.3 TOTAL 79.0 86.6 94.9 111.3 TABLE 2-2B Distribution of BSR Program Funds (in millions of current dollars)
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. A few examples taken from recent BSR reports of "scientific advances" illustrate the diversity of the topics on which BSR supports research as well as the variety of ways in which BSR support advances the mission of NIA "to improve the health and well-being of older Americans through research." • Understanding causes of longevity: Studies showing that late childbearing has positive effects on survival of the oldest old shed more light on the likely longevity of populations now in middle age (Zeng and Vaupel, 2003)
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. • Health disparities among social groups: Studies have explored possible explanations for the association between socioeconomic status and mortality and considered the policy implications (e.g., Wong et al., 2002; Adams et al., 2003; Adda et al., 2003; Deaton, 2002)
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Findings from these studies are designed to help older Americans in various ways, from changing national policy to suggesting ways that everyday behaviors can improve well-being in later life. Methodologically, BSR supports research that varies from applied analyses of secondary data (e.g., modeling future nursing home populations from past data)
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These investments are designed to stimulate research and discussions in order to sharpen research questions in existing disciplinary fields, consider the applicability of new analytical methods and databases, explore and refine research questions at the interstices and overlaps among disciplines, and open up new fields for research. BSR supports the development and archiving of multidisciplinary databases, such as the Health and Retirement Study, the National Long Term Care Survey, the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study, and many others (for a list, see Behavioral and Social Research Program, 2004)
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DECISION-MAKING PROCESSES AT BSR With so many objectives and so many ways that social and behavioral research contributes to the understanding of processes of aging and the
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Changes in the national conditions of older Americans, government priorities, and science also require that BSR continually reassess these allocations. The tasks become more challenging when research funds tighten in relation to the number of proposals being received and the number of researchers working in the fields in which BSR supports research.
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. Concern with Relative Quality Ferment exists in several federal science agencies about the adequacy of existing priority setting and proposal selection procedures for selecting high-payoff, transformative, and high-quality research proposals.
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In this respect, BSR appears to apply disjunctive criteria of value, such that a research activity may be judged as having resulted in an advance or a discovery if it satisfies any one or two of a relatively long list of implicit criteria. Our collective experience with BSR, coupled with the expressed concerns of program managers and leading researchers, lead us to take seriously the possibility that existing priority setting and proposal selection processes may not be doing an adequate job of ensuring that the program supports research of a uniformly high "quality" across the fields the program supports.
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Of course, the fact that a piece of research calls previous findings into question does not imply that it meets other quality criteria. • Generating widely applicable research findings: Scientific research is also judged by the extent to which its results stimulate researchers, particularly outside its immediate field, to carry out new research.
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RESEARCH REVIEW IN NIH NIH research review practices set a context for any effort to reconsider the practices for setting research priorities. They do this in at least two ways: they affect the pace at which review and advisory panels and their decision rules can change, and they provide opportunities and constraints for the discretion of research managers.
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These assignments are based on referral guidelines, updated periodically, in which institutes and programs have outlined their scope of interests. These grant applications are also assigned to review groups, almost always established study sections, for merit review.
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Although program management has discretionary authority to forward recommendations that differ from those of the study sections, NIH has built a reputation for adherence to recommendations of scientific peer review. By reputation, program managers infrequently seek to make decisions that deviate from the assessments of the study section.
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Specific review criteria may be issued for a Request for Applications or Program Announcement solicitation, and special criteria may also be established for certain types of research, such as that involving the preparation of natural products (see Center for Scientific Review notice, 23 July, 2003) or the use of human subjects, children, animals, etc.
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Thus, the PA and the RFA are two powerful and efficient ways in addition to contract research that NIH communicates about priorities and interests with the scientific community. All solicitations are published on the NIH web site, and there is a weekly email listing of all announcements issued that week.
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In NIH study sections, members normally come from several disciplines, even if they have in common concern and expertise in a particular research area or field. If researchers in different disciplines have different standards in these terms, the differences in standards are unlikely to perturb the overall decision process unless panel members habitually defer to the judgments of panel members rating proposals from their own disciplines.
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One effect of this procedure is that study sections are normalized to account for any systematic differences among them in how members rate proposals.
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