Although the workgroup leaders and advisory committee agreed that basic behavioral and social science is central to the NIH mission, advisory committee members including NIH Director Elias Zerhouni, M.D. were skeptical that the behavioral sciences were in as dire straits as the report suggests, according to accounts of the meeting. A Dec. 10, 2004 article in the journal Science describes the “tepid reception” given to the report by Zerhouni and others, who questioned the need for any structural reorganization at the Institutes and said the behavioral sciences were already relatively well funded within NIH.

In their review of NIH’s existing basic behavioral social sciences research, the workgroup calculated $936 million in basic social and behavioral research and another $1.75 billion in clinical research in NIH's 2003 budget of $26.4 billion. However, a recent decision to cut basic behavioral research funding at the National Institute of Mental Health (HABIT, May 25, 2004) is “causing a particular sense of urgency in the research community,” the report says.

The workgroup recommends that behavioral science programs that are “functioning well” within individual institutes and centers continue without change, but suggests a new “secure and stable home” for investigator-initiated behavioral research that does not have a specific disease focus. The new program could exist within the National Institute of General Medical Sciences or the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, the report concludes.

The Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research should have more planning and budget authority over basic behavioral research within the individual institutes, but this change will probably require more funding from Congress, the report authors say.
To read the complete draft report, go to here.

To read the article in Science, go here. (subscription required).