The Research Funding Gap

In 2020, data published by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) showed that the proportion of Black scientists receiving funding as a PI or fellow fell below the proportion of Black people in academia. Similarly, a 2011 report had revealed that Black and Asian scientists were less likely to receive National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding compared to their white counterparts (13% and 4% respectively). This gap persists after controlling for factors such as educational background, previous research awards and publication record.

The NIH decided to investigate this funding gap in more detail and realised that most of this gap can be attributed to three of the six stages of the application process: decision to discuss, impact score assignment and topic choice, all of which revolve around decisions made by reviewers. Topic choice alone accounts for 20% of the funding gap, with the report explaining that Black applicants tended to choose topics relating to research at a community and population level, which tend to have lower award rates compared to topics relating to mechanistic and basic research. In fact, nearly 40% of proposals from Black researchers focused on eight topics deemed less likely to be funded. Some keywords used in these applications included: ‘socioeconomic’, ‘patient’ and ‘disparity’. The lowest award rate was for those using the terms ‘ovary’, ‘fertility’ and ‘reproductive’.

So it seems that research into women’s and reproductive health is undervalued, as is research on patient/community focused healthcare, which isn’t entirely surprising when we consider how value is assigned to research. As an example, to receive funding from UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), proposals are assessed ‘for excellence and, where applicable, impact’. Excellence being such a vague criterion, there is room for bias to creep in, as reviewers are likely to be influenced by their own cultural frame of reference. Often, reviewers on the panel belong to the same professional network. At the higher rungs of the academic ladder and advisory boards, there is less non-white representation. A quick look at the UKRI Board and Executive Committee shows a lack of diversity, creating a problematic situation where a predominantly white group is judging the value of Black researchers’ work.  

The National Institute of Health Research (NIHR) has a similar process, whereby applications are peer-reviewed for their significance, innovation and approach. If it is deemed meritorious, it is discussed in detail and scored. However, in some cases, applications undergo a public review beforehand, whereby a member of the public with relevant personal experience judges whether the proposed research topic should be advertised. This may help counteract the biases of the academic ivory tower, however this step is reserved for medical sciences research. For more basic research, applicants are exclusively peer-reviewed, usually by predominantly white panels.

It’s worth noting here that for Black co-investigators the figures were more proportional, raising the question: why are Black scientists more likely to receive funding when working with others? Even when ethnic minority researchers are awarded funding, they receive less than their white counterparts. Unfortunately, this data is not disaggregated by ethnicity, the stated reason for this being that the figures are so low that disaggregating the data would result in researchers being identifiable.

A blog post from the National Institute of Aging explains the importance of achieving diverse review panels in alleviating racial disparities in the review process. However, it also details the difficulty of doing so:

‘If I didn’t know reviewers personally, it was difficult to ascertain if they were from ethnic minority groups or not…usually [databases] merely tell me that the person is an ethnic minority; I never know what kind. It’s as if the category "ethnic minority" says it all, when actually it says very little.’

It is unsurprising that diversity on review panels is difficult to achieve. In the UK, representation of Black students plummets at the transition of undergraduate to PhD students. This accelerated loss of talent continues along the pipeline, leaving the UK with just 10 Black researchers who received funding as a principle investigator in 2018-19 (0.5% of the total number). This disproportionately low number of black scientists may be masked by terminology that groups all non-white individuals together. The UKRI reports that the proportion of fellowship awardees from ethnic minorities has increased from 12% to 18%, but behind this figure lies the fact that less than 1% of fellows are Black. Yet Asian researchers receive a higher proportion of funding compared to the wider proportion of Asian people in academia. Grouping ethnic minorities in this way disguises the disparities that exist between these different groups and creates further challenges in developing our understanding of the underlying issues and creating solutions.

The issue of the funding gap is therefore a cyclical one. It’s an issue that impacts a scientist’s career progression and creates a choke-hold in the career pipeline, preventing Black academics and researchers from achieving senior positions and causing a loss of Black talent. This under-representation of Black talent in the industry contributes to a lack of diversity in review panels, which in turn compounds a flawed system of review that is vulnerable to bias and continues to penalise Black researchers.

How do we break this cycle? Firstly, there needs to be a more robust review process that better roots out and eradicates bias and awards funding based on firmer, specific criteria that does not disadvantage Black researchers. We are currently hindered by a culture that privileges cellular, mechanistic research over social and population-wide research. Research into ‘disparity’ and ‘socioeconomic’ factors is clearly being undervalued, and it’s not only easy for white reviewers to dismiss such topics as insignificant, it’s convenient.

Many necessary changes can only be made by funding bodies, but there are also steps for Universities to take, such as strengthening application and career development support for Black researchers through mock panels and sponsorship/mentoring programmes.

As is often the case, there are no easy solutions to these issues because they are structural. Because this bias is built into a system suited to the white majority, to eradicate it would likely require an overhaul of the way we assess research, judge performance and award funding.