Director's Voice
NIH Launches UNITE Initiative to Address Structural Racism in Biomedical Research. On Monday (March 1), NIH launched the UNITE initiative to end structural racism and racial inequities in the health research enterprise. In his public statement announcing this initiative, Dr. Collins noted that while NIH has supported various programs to improve diversity of the scientific workforce, these efforts have been insufficient, and that the “NIH is committed to instituting new ways to support diversity, equity, and inclusion, and identifying and dismantling any policies and practices that may harm our workforce and our science.” The success of any such effort needs to begin with acknowledging our individual and collective roles, whether intentional or unintentional, in perpetuating the disadvantages resulting from structural racism in the research enterprise, and I share Dr. Collins’ sentiment that “I am truly sorry.”
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Community-based Research Webinar (March 16)
Do you conduct community-based research? NIH's Center for Scientific Review (CSR) is hosting a webinar on the peer review of community-based research. Drs. Jacinta Bronte-Tinkew, Tasmeen Weik, and Lauren Fordyce will provide a general overview of how applications are assigned and reviewed at CSR; the study sections that focus on community-based research; and how to find the right study section for your application.
The webinar will be held on March 16 at 2 p.m. EDT (1 p.m. CDT, 12 p.m. MDT, 11 a.m. PDT). Audience members can ask questions during the live webinar.
To access the webinar go to:
https://csrnih.zoomgov.com/j/1613966328?pwd=TDd1NEdORThrQ0h1UHpkaitrUkpyZz09
Registration is not required and there is no cost. To submit questions in advance of the webinar email: [email protected].
Training in Advanced Data Analytics for Behavioral and Social Sciences (TADA-BSSR) Webinar on March 18
Event
Translating Domain Knowledge into Mechanistic Process Models: Illustrating the Need with a Just-in-Time Adaptive Intervention
Date and Time
March 18, 2021, 12–1 p.m. EDT / 9–10 a.m. PDT via Zoom
Speakers
Eric Hekler, University of California San Diego
Misha Pavel, Northeastern University
Donna Spruijt-Metz, University of Southern California
Overview
With digital technologies, radically new possibilities have emerged for studying and developing new insights related to advancing both fundamental understanding of social and behavioral processes and, simultaneously, improving behavioral interventions built upon said knowledge. These new possibilities though force us to find more robust ways to translate domain knowledge about processes (e.g., insights from operant and classical learning, cognitive science, and affective learning) into robust process models that rigorously specify temporal understanding of the dynamics and context-dependencies of said processes. The possibilities and challenges are particularly evidence when seeking to develop just-in-time adaptive interventions (JITAI), which seek to provide support during states when a person would have the opportunity to engage in a positive behavior, be receptive to receiving support, and, engagement would result in positive internalized adaptation towards engaging in the desired behavior, eventually, without the need for the JITAI. In this webinar the team will describe efforts to establish more robust approaches for translating domain knowledge about processes into computational models that account for theorized dynamics and to offer some initial steps to advance the field.
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NIH OBSSR Director's Webinar: Behavioral Health and Injury Prevention: The Emergency Department as a Window to Community and Population Health (March 23)
Join Rebecca Cunningham, M.D., Professor, Emergency Medicine, Director, Injury Prevention Center, Principal Investigator, Firearm Safety Among Children and Teens (FACTS), University of Michigan Medical School, for a Director’s Webinar presentation on March 23, from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. EDT.
This presentation “Behavioral Health and Injury Prevention: The Emergency Department as a Window to Community and Population Health” will provide overview of violence prevention among Emergency Department patients including the CDC best practice program SafERteens. Participants will understand the longitudinal outcomes of Emergency Department youth regarding substance use and violence including how to utilize the SAFETY score to predict risk for firearm injury.
Dr. Rebecca Cunningham is vice president for research at the University of Michigan, where she is responsible for fostering the excellence and integrity of research across all three campuses. Dr. Cunningham’s career has focused on injury prevention, opioid overdose, substance misuse prevention, firearm injury prevention and public health. She is the former Director of the U-M Injury Prevention Center, established a national consortium to improve firearms safety, served as associate vice president for research-health sciences, and is the former associate chair for research for the U-M Department of Emergency Medicine.
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Inaugural Meeting of the NIH/FNIH Project: Developing Evidence-Based Music Therapies for Brain Disorders of Aging (March 31)
Cognitive disorders in older adults, such as dementia, affect millions of people worldwide. However, current pharmacological treatments are not always effective at alleviating behavioral and psychological symptoms. Music therapy has recently gained popularity as a method to treat disorders of aging because it has shown great promise for improving behavior and mood. However, due to the personalized methodology and interdisciplinary nature, this growing scientific field does not have an established set of evidence-based standards for study factors, such as outcome measures and biomarkers.
NIH, in collaboration with the Foundation for the NIH and the Renée Fleming Foundation, will host the inaugural event for the NIH/FNIH project “Developing Evidence-Based Music Therapies for Brain Disorders of Aging.” This webinar will be the first of a series of three virtual meetings involving expert panelists, NIH staff, and community partners and is titled “Laying the Foundation: Defining the Building Blocks of Music-Based Interventions.” Panelists from five areas of expertise—behavioral and social science intervention development, clinical trials methodology, music therapy and music medicine, neuroscience, and patient advocacy and arts organizations—will contribute to the roundtable discussions during the meeting series.
The meeting will focus on developing common data elements and tools that can be applied to music-based interventions, with a focus on brain disorders of aging. After consideration of input from the three virtual meetings, NIH plans to create and pilot test a standardized toolkit for music intervention research, including considerations of outcome measures and biomarkers specific to brain disorders of aging. Please join us for the inaugural meeting on March 31 to be part of this discussion from the beginning.
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Slower Publication Rates from Social and Behavioral Researchers Compared to the Biomedical Researchers Supported by NIH
This article is authored by OBSSR Director William T. Riley, Ph.D. The article in PLOS One is co-authored by Katrina Bibb, Sara Hargrave and Paula Fearon.
In November 2020, we published an article in PLOS ONE on “Publication rates from biomedical and behavioral and social science R01s funded by the National Institutes of Health.” In that article, we reported that the percent of R01s—a standard grant mechanism in NIH—with zero publications five years from the project start date was low overall (2.4 percent) but higher for behavioral and social sciences research (BSSR) grants (4.6 percent) than for non-BSSR grants (1.9 percent). We also reported that the time to first publication was slower for BSSR than for non-BSSR grants. Differences remained even after controlling for factors such as conducting human research or clinical research.
We did not generate this research question about publication differences between BSSR and non-BSSR R01 grantees de novo. NIH has been concerned about publication productivity, particularly for clinical trials, for some time, and the NIH clinical trials policies were developed in part to ensure that results reporting occurred, regardless of null results or publication bias. More recently, NIH is performing an ongoing quality review of its Center for Scientific Review study sections. This review, called ENQUIRE, includes, among the metrics considered, the productivity and impact of the research published from the grants reviewed and funded by each study section, specifically the number of grants within a study section that fail to produce a single publication in a timely manner.
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2021 NIH Behavioral and Social Sciences Research Festival
SAVE THE DATE: Friday, November 19, 2021.
The Annual NIH Behavioral and Social Sciences Research Festival will be hosted by OBSSR and the NIH Behavioral and Social Sciences Research Coordinating Committee. The purpose of the festival is to highlight recently funded behavioral and social sciences research that the NIH supports; bring together behavioral and social scientists within the NIH extramural and intramural communities to network with each other and share scientific ideas; and explore ways to advance behavioral and social sciences research.
View Past Research Festival Materials
Firearm Injury and Mortality Prevention Research
(R21/R33 Clinical Trial Optional)
FOA Number
PAR-21-191
Key Dates
Open Date (Earliest Submission Date): March 30, 2021
Expiration Date: May 1, 2021
Purpose
Nearly 40,000 people in the U.S. die from firearm-related deaths each year, primarily from suicide (60 percent) or homicide (37 percent), and many more have experienced non-fatal firearm injuries, both intentional and nonintentional. The Joint Explanatory Statement accompanying the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021 (Public Law 116-260) included funding for the NIH to conduct research on firearm injury and mortality prevention and recommended that NIH take a comprehensive approach to studying the underlying causes and evidence-based methods of prevention of firearm injury, including crime prevention. Within the legislative mandates and limitations of NIH funding (NOT-OD-21-058, NOT-OD-21-056), the NIH encourages research to improve understanding of the determinants of firearm injury, the identification of those at risk of firearm injury (including both victims and perpetrators), the development and piloting of innovative interventions to prevent firearm injury and mortality, and the examination of approaches to improve the implementation of existing, evidence-based interventions to prevent firearm injury and mortality.
View PAR-21-191
Firearm Injury and Mortality Prevention Research
(R01Clinical Trial Optional)
FOA Number
PAR-21-192
Key Dates
Open Date (Earliest Submission Date): March 30, 2021
Expiration Date: May 1, 2021
Purpose
Nearly 40,000 people in the U.S. die from firearm-related deaths each year, primarily from suicide (60 percent) or homicide (37 percent), and many more have experienced non-fatal firearm injuries, both intentional and nonintentional. The Joint Explanatory Statement accompanying the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021 Public Law 116-260) included funding for the NIH to conduct research on firearm injury and mortality prevention and recommended that NIH take a comprehensive approach to studying the underlying causes and evidence-based methods of prevention of firearm injury, including crime prevention. Within the legislative mandates and limitations of NIH funding (NOT-OD-21-058, NOT-OD-21-056), the NIH encourages research to improve understanding of the determinants of firearm injury, the identification of those at risk of firearm injury (including both victims and perpetrators), the development and evaluation of innovative interventions to prevent firearm injury and mortality, and the examination of approaches to improve the implementation of existing, evidence-based interventions to prevent firearm injury and mortality.
View PAR-21-192
NIH Faculty Institutional Recruitment for Sustainable Transformation (FIRST) Program: FIRST Coordination and Evaluation Center (U24 Clinical Trial Not Allowed)
FOA Number
RFA-RM-21-019
Key Dates
Open Date (Earliest Submission Date): March 23, 2021
Expiration Date: April 24, 2021
Purpose
The purpose of the NIH Faculty Institutional Recruitment for Sustainable Transformation (FIRST) Coordination and Evaluation Center (CEC), is to coordinate and facilitate the development of strategies with FIRST Cohort awardees to conduct a comprehensive evaluation of the FIRST program.
View RFA-RM-21-019
Prevention and Intervention Approaches for Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (R34 Clinical Trial Optional)
FOA Number
PAR-21-097
Key Dates
Open Date (Earliest Submission Date): January 19, 2021
Expiration Date: October 18, 2023
Purpose
This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) for R34 planning grant applications focuses on prevention and intervention strategies for fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD) throughout the lifespan. The intent of this FOA is to support research that advances (1) prevention approaches to reduce prenatal alcohol exposure and incidence of FASD and (2) interventions for FASD.
It is expected that research conducted via this mechanism will consist of studies that are a pre-requisite for preparing and submitting subsequent applications for larger scale FASD prevention or intervention studies.
Applicants interested in exploratory phased projects may consider FOA (PAR-21-098, the R61/R33 option).
View PAR-21-097
Prevention and Intervention Approaches for Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (R61/R33 Clinical Trial Optional)
FOA Number
PAR-21-098
Key Dates
Open Date (Earliest Submission Date): January 19, 2021
Expiration Date: October 18, 2023
Purpose
This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) focuses on prevention and intervention strategies for fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD) throughout the lifespan. The intent of this FOA is to support research that advances (1) prevention approaches to reduce prenatal alcohol exposure and the incidence of FASD and (2) interventions for FASD. These objectives will be accomplished with the Exploratory/Developmental Phased Award (R61/R33) mechanism, clinical trial optional. The R61 phase will support pilot studies or secondary data analysis for hypothesis development and feasibility, and research testing the hypotheses can be expanded in the R33 phase. The transition to the R33 phase will be determined by NIAAA program staff after evaluation of the achievement of specific milestones set for the R61 phase. Highest priority will be given to applications with clinical trials. Applicants interested in planning clinical trials or adding to current projects may also consider FOA (PAR-21-097, the R34 option).
View PAR-21-098
Notice of Special Interest: Administrative Supplements and Urgent Competitive Revisions for NIH Grants to Add or Expand Research Focused on Maternal Health, Structural Racism and Discrimination, and COVID-19
FOA Number
NOT-OD-21-071
Key Dates
First Available Due Date: April 14, 2021
Expiration Date: April 21, 2021
Purpose
The Office of the Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), on behalf of the NIH Maternal Mortality Task Force, announces the opportunity for investigators with relevant active NIH-supported grants to address the following scientific priorities for Implementing a Maternal health and PRegnancy Outcomes Vision for Everyone (IMPROVE) in the context of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic for pregnant persons and up to one year postpartum:
- Understand the effects of SARS-CoV-2 infection and the COVID-19 pandemic on maternal mental health, well-being, functioning and quality of life
- Identify psychosocial and behavioral health risk factors related to the COVID-19 pandemic that affect maternal mental health and functioning outcomes
- Address the impact of structural racism and discrimination (SRD) on maternal health outcomes in the context of COVID-19
IMPROVE aims to understand the biological, behavioral, environmental, sociocultural, and structural factors that affectpregnancy-related and pregnancy-associated morbidity and mortality by building an evidence base for improved care and outcomes. This initiative will promote research to address health disparities associated with pregnancy-related and pregnancy-associated morbidity and mortality (MM).
View NOT-OD-21-071
Notice of Special Interest: Advancing Health Communication Research on HIV Prevention, Treatment, and Cure
Notice Number
NOT-MH-21-105
Key Dates
First Available Due Date: May 8, 2021
Expiration Date: May 9, 2024
Purpose
The National Institute of Mental Health is issuing this Notice to highlight interest in research applications to optimize health communication strategies that advance HIV prevention, treatment, and cure.
Health communication science has made pivotal contributions to HIV prevention and treatment efforts. Early media campaigns that promoted condom use and HIV testing proved to be positive influences on knowledge, attitudes and social norms. Increased use of client-centered communication in HIV treatment settings, contributed to greater antiretroviral therapy (ART) adherence and retention in care. Communication strategies that leveraged strengths-based messages about resilience, empowerment and “living with HIV,” helped dispel harmful stereotypes and stigmatizing messages that connoted HIV with a death sentence. A better understanding of how various communication channels influence HIV behavior change at the individual, interpersonal and community levels, as well as how effective health communication is deployed at each stage of the HIV care continuum, continue to be critical scientific competencies for advancing HIV prevention, treatment and cure efforts across the lifespan.
View NOT-MH-21-105
