Original_To:  PGLIST
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.psycgrad
Date:         Thu, 1 Oct 1992 21:25:00 CST
              <PSYCGRAD@UOTTAWA.BITNET>
From:         Betty Harris <B1H6017@TAMVENUS.BITNET>
Subject:      Funding...

For you who haven't been keeping up on legislation
which relates to funding of psychological research,
here is a summary of what's been going on that I put
together for a legislative action network that I
chair.

Over the last few months there has been been a very
distressing situation developing in our U.S. Congress
and Senate. A Senate committee led by Sen Byrd had
proposed that funding be rescinded for 34 research
projects that had already been peer-reviewed and
awarded funding.  On the House side, Reps. Robert
Traxler (D-MI) and Bill Green (R-NY) have been staunch
defenders of the NSF merit review system, and have held
firm opposing the naming of specific grants in the
final, conference bill.  The actions of the Senate
represent a fundamental threat to the integrity of the
merit/peer review system and, more broadly, to the
integrity of the federal research programs themselves.

House and Senate Conferees did finally eliminate the
listing of grant titles from the text of the
legislation.  The part addressing NSF now directs the
agency to reduce its current year spending by $2
million, but only suggests where those cuts should
occur.  Senate conferees fought long and hard to retain
the listing of NSF grants they felt were "frivolous."
While Senate conferees lost the battle to keep the
grant titles in the bill, they did place the listing in
the conference report, and urged NSF to achieve the
targeted $2 million spending reduction by eliminating
these grants.  The conference report suggests that
those specific grants are not a "prudent use of
taxpayer funds."  As of this writing, Walter Massey,
Director of NSF has decided to take an across the board
cut rather than eliminating funding for specific
studies.

The conference report also directly criticizes the
process by which NSF makes its award decisions and
urges NSF to review its grant selection process and
report back to the conferees on how the Foundation can
modify its process to assure that only research that
"is focused on the fundamental laws and systems of
science, that supports the nation's technological base,
that supports the nation's economic competitiveness,
and that improves the nation's mathematical and science
education endeavors" be supported.  This directive
implies that basic research in the behavioral and
social sciences is not a priority and thus should not
be funded.

Prior to this fiasco, funding was revoked for a national
survey on sexual behavior which had made it through peer
review and for which funds had already been awarded.  This
study was designed to collect data on adult sexual behavior
which puts people at risk for AIDS.  Basically this reseach
was killed because conservative elements of our congress
thought it would promote promiscuity and homosexual behavior.
At one point in time there was actual lauguage in a bill
which would prohibit funding of any further research on sexual
behavior!!!

This information was derived from several APA funding alert
bulletins which were posted on the APA funding listserv
(APASD-L) and information from the Consortium of Social
Science Organizations Washington Update Newsletter.

Now my opinions on all this...
The bottom line for me is that it is NOT the place of our
legislators to decide what specific research proposals are or
are not funded with federal money.  To look at the title of
a grant proposal and decide from that the merit of the study,
is NOT the way to decide which research should be funded.
The funding agencies themselves have a peer review system
in place that currently funds only a few of the many grant
proposals which are submitted.  I can agree that a national
policy should guide the funding research priorities.  However,
when personal biases of our elected officials result in
methodologically sound, and important research being flushed
down the tubes, something is not quite right in my opinion.
I suppose the real question here is to what extent should our
legislators be allowed to interfere with peer reviewed research
process?

Betty Harris
b1h6017@tamvenus
b1h6017@venus.tamu.edu
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU