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NIH Peer Review: Challenges and Avenues for Reform

Author

Listed:
  • Pierre Azoulay
  • Joshua S. Graff Zivin
  • Gustavo Manso

Abstract

The National Institute of Health (NIH), through its extramural grant program, is the primary public funder of health-related research in the United States. Peer review at NIH is organized around the twin principles of investigator initiation and rigorous peer review, and this combination has long been a model that science funding agencies throughout the world seek to emulate. However, lean budgets and the rapidly changing ecosystem within which scientific inquiry takes place have led many to ask whether the peer-review practices inherited from the immediate post-war era are still well-suited to twenty first century realities. In this essay, we examine two salient issues: (1) the aging of the scientist population supported by NIH and (2) the innovativeness of the research supported by the institutes. We identify potential avenues for reform as well as a means for implementing and evaluating them.

Suggested Citation

  • Pierre Azoulay & Joshua S. Graff Zivin & Gustavo Manso, 2012. "NIH Peer Review: Challenges and Avenues for Reform," NBER Working Papers 18116, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:18116
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    Cited by:

    1. Chiara Franzoni & Paula Stephan & Reinhilde Veugelers, 2022. "Funding Risky Research," Entrepreneurship and Innovation Policy and the Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 1(1), pages 103-133.
    2. Johan Bollen & David Crandall & Damion Junk & Ying Ding & Katy Börner, 2017. "An efficient system to fund science: from proposal review to peer-to-peer distributions," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 110(1), pages 521-528, January.
    3. Park, Hyunwoo & Lee, Jeongsik (Jay) & Kim, Byung-Cheol, 2015. "Project selection in NIH: A natural experiment from ARRA," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(6), pages 1145-1159.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
    • O32 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Management of Technological Innovation and R&D

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