Proposal Analytics, Inc., Wayne, PA, United States of America.
SciTech Strategies, Wayne, PA, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2022 Jul 1;17(7):e0270612. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0270612. eCollection 2022.
The analysis of existing institutional research proposal databases can provide novel insights into science funding parity. The purpose of this study was to analyze the relationship between race/ethnicity and extramural research proposal and award rates across a medical school faculty and to determine whether there was evidence that researchers changed their submission strategies because of differential inequities across submission categories.
The authors performed an analysis of 14,263 biomedical research proposals with proposed start dates between 2010-2022 from the University of Michigan Medical School, measuring the proposal submission and award rates for each racial/ethnic group across 4 possible submission categories (R01 & Equivalent programs, other federal, industry, and non-profit).
Researchers from each self-identified racial/ethnic group (Asian, Black/African American, Hispanic/Latino) pursued a different proposal submission strategy than the majority group (White). The authors found that Black/African American researchers experienced negative award rate differentials across all submission categories, which resulted in the lowest R01 & Equivalent and Other Federal submission rates of any racial/ethnic group and the highest submission rate to non-profit sources. The authors did not find support for the hypothesis that researchers changed submission strategies in response to award rate inequalities across submission categories.
Biomedical researchers from different racial/ethnic groups follow markedly different proposal submission strategies within the University of Michigan Medical School. There is also a clear relationship between race/ethnicity and rates of proposal award. Black/African American and Asian researchers appear disadvantaged across all submission categories relative to White researchers. This study can be easily replicated by other academic research institutions, revealing opportunities for positive intervention.
分析现有的机构研究提案数据库可以为科学资助平等提供新的见解。本研究的目的是分析医学院教师的种族/族裔与外部研究提案和奖励率之间的关系，并确定是否有证据表明研究人员因为提交类别之间的不平等而改变了他们的提交策略。
作者对密歇根大学医学院 2010-2022 年期间提出的 14263 项生物医学研究提案进行了分析，衡量了每个种族/族裔群体在 4 种可能的提交类别（R01 及同等计划、其他联邦、工业和非营利组织）中的提案提交和奖励率。
每个自我认定的种族/族裔群体（亚裔、非裔美国人、西班牙裔/拉丁裔）的研究人员都采用了与多数群体（白人）不同的提案提交策略。作者发现，非裔美国人研究人员在所有提交类别中都经历了负面的奖励率差异，这导致他们的 R01 及同等计划和其他联邦提交率是任何种族/族裔群体中最低的，而向非营利组织提交的比例最高。作者没有发现支持研究人员根据提交类别中的奖励率不平等改变提交策略的假设。
密歇根大学医学院不同种族/族裔的生物医学研究人员在提案提交策略上存在明显差异。种族/族裔与提案奖励率之间也存在明显的关系。与白人研究人员相比，非裔美国人和亚裔研究人员在所有提交类别中似乎都处于不利地位。这项研究可以由其他学术研究机构轻松复制，为积极干预提供机会。
