The University of Michigan leads the nation in spending on social science research,
Where is the main social science research conducted in the United States? Which universities are leading the way in fields such as anthropology, economics, political science, sociology and psychology? A key indicator to answer these questions can be found in the Higher Education Research and Development Survey.
Because many of the most pressing issues facing the nation today concern patterns of human behavior and the social forces that affect them, psychological and social science research continues to be a vital source of information on these questions.
Whether it is the proliferation of disinformation, the spread of conspiracy theories, the increase in intergroup and international tensions, the rise of anti-democratic ideologies, the causes and consequences of economic inequalities, the development of diseases preventable, environmental conservation or crime control. , social and behavioral sciences provide an important means of understanding and potentially reducing these problems.
The latest HERD survey, sponsored by the National Science Foundation’s National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics, presents R&D spending data for fiscal year 2023. These are the most recent spending figures, collected from 914 universities and colleges that award a bachelor’s degree. degree or higher and spent at least $150,000 on R&D in the previous fiscal year.
Total R&D spending at U.S. colleges and universities exceeded $108.8 billion in fiscal year 2023. Of that total, universities spent just over $3.6 billion on science research and $1.6 billion for psychological research. Both categories increased from the previous year, with social science research spending up 14% and psychology research spending up 13%.
Below are the top 10 universities ranked by their combined research spending in four social science disciplines (anthropology, economics, political and government science, and sociology/demography/population studies) plus a miscellaneous social science category). The figures are in millions of dollars.
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor: $217.5
Harvard University: $169.2
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill: $95.7
Arizona State University: $93.1
University of California, Berkeley: $87.8
University of California, Los Angeles: $86.0
Princeton University: $83.8
University of Southern California: $81.7
University of Wisconsin, Madison: $76.0
George Mason University: $73.1
The data can also be broken down by the top five schools in individual disciplines making up the overall social sciences funding category.
- Anthropology: Arizona State University; University of Michigan; City University of New York Graduate Center; Harvard University; and Colorado State University.
- Economy: George Mason University; University of Michigan; Massachusetts Institute of Technology; University of California, Berkeley; and the University of Southern California.
- Political science and government: Harvard University; Georgetown University; University of Michigan; Princeton University; and Arizona State University.
- Sociology, demography and demographic studies: University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; Pennsylvania State University/Hershey Medical Center; Harvard University; University of Michigan; and the University of Pennsylvania.
- Various social sciences: University of Michigan; UCLA; University of Maryland; Harvard University; and the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
The top 10 universities in psychology research spending were (in millions):
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill: $56.6
Uniform Services University of Health Sciences: $47.9
Penn State University/Hershey Medical Center: $41.3
Florida International University: $41.1
University of Minnesota, Twin Cities: $33.7
University of Connecticut: $30.9
University of Georgia: $30.1
New York University: $26.6
Boston University: $26.4
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor: $23.5
Looking more closely at the results by discipline, here are some other findings:
- First, public universities were dominant. In both the social sciences and psychology, eight of the top ten institutions were public universities.
- Across categories, the University of Michigan topped the list, ranking in the top 10 in psychology and social sciences combined. It also placed in the top five in all six social science areas.
- The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill was in the top 10 for psychology and social sciences combined.
- Harvard University and Arizona State University rank in the top five in at least two social science disciplines.
The quality of academic research can be measured in several ways: publications in peer-reviewed journals, number of doctorates awarded, various types of citations, scholarly awards and memberships in learned societies, commercialization of intellectual property and post-mortems. diploma courses of students of an establishment. All of these measures are important indicators of research impact.
However, research expenditures are of particular value in judging an institution’s overall efforts and contributions to a research area for several reasons.
First, because most research grants are awarded through a competitive peer review process; R&D spending reveals expert consensus on the perceived value of the proposed work. Second, spending allows a direct and objective comparison of the vitality of a given research area at different universities. Beyond the money a university-sponsored research program represents, the most important consideration is ultimately the amount of new knowledge it helps generate.