Competitive Research Grants and Their Impact on Career Performance

Bloch, Carter; Graversen, Ebbe Krogh; Pedersen, Heidi Skovgaard

doi:10.1007/s11024-014-9247-0

Cited by 71 publications

(50 citation statements)

References 36 publications

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“…A conditional DID method is used to address the potential endogeneity issue (e.g. Aerts and Schmidt 2008;Bloch, Graversen, and Pedersen 2014). This procedure combines the benefits of the simple DID approach with those of propensity score matching (PSM) to provide more reliable results (Blundell and Dias 2002).…”

Section: Methodsologymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Each treated observation is paired with the non-treated that has the closest propensity score. We made sure that the difference between propensity scores for treatments and matched controls was below 0.001 (Bloch, Graversen, and Pedersen 2014); otherwise, they were excluded from the sample, thus eliminating poor matches. The matching is performed with replacements to avoid biasing the estimates through the observations' sort order and sample size (Dehejia and Wahba 1999).…”

Section: Methodsologymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Competitive research grants have also been recognized to exert a significant influence over researchers' careers. For example, research grants awarded by the Danish Agency for Science, Technology, and Innovation were found to create conditions that enhanced academics' chances of career advancement, up to full professorship (Bloch, Graversen, and Pedersen 2014). However, the research outcomes of projects funded by the US National Science Foundation (NSF) were found to be heterogeneous among team members, varying significantly according to the members' role and gender (Feeney and Welch 2014).…”

Section: Literature Review: Funding and Research Performancementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Some scholars argue that research undertaken during the PhD can contribute more effectively to address global challenges, and that it is necessary to better understand PhD students' contribution to scientific development (Walker, Ouellette, and Ridde 2006). This includes a better understanding of PhD funding mechanisms, as the funding of research (particularly competitive) is known to impact researchers' decision-making, behaviour, and research output throughout their careers (see Gaughan and Robin 2004;Bozeman and Gaughan 2007;Arora and Gambardella 2010;Lefgren 2011a, 2011b;Kelchtermans and Veugelers 2011;Ubfal and Maffioli 2011;Benavente et al 2012;Grimpe 2012;Bloch, Graversen, and Pedersen 2014;Feeney and Welch 2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

PhD funding as a determinant of PhD and career research performance

Horta

Cattaneo

Meoli

2016

Studies in Higher Education

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This article focuses on the effects of PhD funding on research performance both during the degree and throughout researchers' careers as measured through publications and citations. This analysis draws from a representative sample of researchers holding a doctorate based in Portugal and finds that those funded by grants during the PhD perform better than the self-funded ones. It also finds that different PhD funding sources produce different outcomes. PhD grants positively affect research performance during the PhD and throughout the career, when compared with research project grants. We argue that the latter funding scheme has more limited effects because of the constraints typical of early stage researchers involved in research project dynamics.

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Section: Methodsologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Literature Review: Funding and Research Performancementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

PhD funding as a determinant of PhD and career research performance

Horta

Cattaneo

Meoli

2016

Studies in Higher Education

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“…If possible, the effect of funding itself needs to be addressed in these tests, possibly by utilizing review scores to compare the amount of funded applicant's ex post funding success, although no such studies have been done. Other metrics along the same vein have been used as well, including career satisfaction and faculty positions attained, both of which have been observed to be higher among funded applicants compared to similarly high ex-ante performing unfunded applicants (Hornbostel et al, 2009;Bloch et al, 2014;Van den Besselaar and Sandstrom, 2015). However, while Pion and Ionescu-Pioggia (2003) also found funded applicants of the Burroughs Welcome Career Award were more successful than unfunded in securing faculty positions and in acquiring future NIH funding (Pion and Cordray, 2008), these effects were diminished when adjusted for the ex-ante qualifications of the applicants.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

External Tests of Peer Review Validity Via Impact Measures

Gallo

Glisson

2018

Front. Res. Metr. Anal.

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Peer review is used commonly across science as a tool to evaluate the merit and potential impact of research projects and make funding recommendations. However, potential impact is likely to be difficult to assess ex-ante; some attempts have been made to assess the predictive accuracy of these review decisions using impact measures of the results of the completed projects. Although many outputs, and thus potential measures of impact, exist for research projects, the overwhelming majority of evaluation of research output is focused on bibliometrics. We review the multiple types of potential impact measures with an interest in their application to validate review decisions. A review of the current literature on validating peer review decisions with research output impact measures is presented here; only 48 studies were identified, about half of which were US based and sample size per study varied greatly. 69% of the studies employed bibliometrics as a research output. While 52% of the studies employed alternative measures (like patents and technology licensing, post-project peer review, international collaboration, future funding success, securing tenure track positions, and career satisfaction), only 25% of all projects used more than one measure of research output. Overall, 91% of studies with unfunded controls and 71% of studies without such controls provided evidence for at least some level of predictive validity of review decisions. However, several studies reported observing sizable type I and II errors as well. Moreover, many of the observed effects were small and several studies suggest a coarse power to discriminate poor proposals from better ones, but not amongst the top tier proposals or applicants (although discriminatory ability depended on the impact metric). This is of particular concern in an era of low funding success, where many top tier proposals are unfunded. More research is needed, particularly in integrating multiple types of impact indicators in these validity tests, as well as considering the context of the research outputs relative to goals of the research program and concerns for reproducibility, translatability and publication bias. In parallel, more research is needed focusing on the internal validity of review decision making procedures and reviewer bias.Keywords: research funding, peer review, impact metrics, validity, grant GRANT PEER REVIEW AND IMPACT ASSESSMENTMost would generally agree the purpose of biomedical research is to advance knowledge for societal benefit, with the hope of favorably impacting disease outcomes and improving global health. Indeed, the National Institutes of Health (NIH ), the world's largest funder of biomedical research, characterizes their mission as to "seek fundamental knowledge about the nature and Gallo and GlissonReview Validity via Impact Measures behavior of living systems and the application of that knowledge to enhance health, lengthen life, and reduce illness and disability" (NIH, 2017). To help select which research projects to fund to achieve...

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Gender Disparity in National Institutes of Health Funding Among Surgeon-Scientists From 1995 to 2020

et al. 2023

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ImportanceSurgical diseases account for approximately 30% of the global burden of disease. Gender diversity in biomedical research is critical to generate innovative patient-centered research in surgery.ObjectiveTo examine the distribution of biomedical research funding by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) among women and men surgeon-scientists during a 25-year period.Design, Setting, and ParticipantsThis cross-sectional study used publicly available data from the NIH RePORTER (Research Portfolio Online Reporting Tools: Expenditures and Results) database for research project grants awarded to women and men surgeon-scientists who were principal investigators between 1995 and 2020. Data were retrieved between January 20 and March 20, 2022. The representation of women surgeon-scientists among academic surgeons was compared with the representation of men surgeon-scientists over time.Main Outcomes and MeasuresDistribution of NIH funding to women and men surgeon-scientists was examined via 2 metrics: holding a large-dollar (ie, R01-equivalent) grant and being a super principal investigator (SPI) with $750 000 or more in total annual research funding. Statistical analysis was performed between April 1 and August 31, 2022.ResultsBetween 1995 and 2020, 2078 principal investigator surgeons received funding from the NIH. The proportion of women academic surgeons who were surgeon-scientists remained unchanged during this same period (1995, 14 of 792 [1.8%] vs 2020, 92 of 3834 [2.4%]; P = .10). Compared with their men counterparts, women surgeon-scientists obtained their first NIH grant earlier in their career (mean [SD] years after first faculty appointment, 8.8 [6.2] vs 10.8 [7.9] years; P &lt; .001) and were as likely to obtain large-dollar grants (aRR, 0.99 [95% CI, 0.95-1.03]) during the period 2016 to 2020. Despite this success, women surgeon-scientists remained significantly underrepresented among SPIs and were 25% less likely to be an SPI (aRR, 0.75 [95% CI, 0.60-0.95] during the period 2016 to 2020).Conclusions and RelevanceThe findings of this cross-sectional study of NIH-funded surgeons suggest that women surgeons remained underrepresented among surgeon-scientists over a 25-year period despite early career success in receiving NIH funding. This is concerning and warrants further investigation to increase the distribution of NIH funding among women surgeon-scientists.

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Competitive Research Grants and Their Impact on Career Performance

Cited by 71 publications

References 36 publications

PhD funding as a determinant of PhD and career research performance

PhD funding as a determinant of PhD and career research performance

External Tests of Peer Review Validity Via Impact Measures

Gender Disparity in National Institutes of Health Funding Among Surgeon-Scientists From 1995 to 2020

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