Erosheva and Lee Co-Author Study on Black-White Disparities in NIH’s Selection of Proposals for Panel Discussion
Posted: 2026-11-11 11:33:47 (CSDE Research)
CSDE Affiliates Elena A. Erosheva (Statistics and Social Work) and Carole J. Lee (Philosophy) recently co-authored a research article in PLOS ONE titled, “Causal Decomposition of Black-White Disparities in NIH’s Selection of Proposals for Panel Discussion.” Earlier research on NIH R01 peer review found that selection of proposals for panel discussion was the decision point contributing most to Black-white funding disparities. The authors used a causal decomposition framework to examine which factors help explain these disparities, considering applicant attributes (degree, career stage, and institutional funding bin) and proposal attributes (application type, amended status, Preliminary Overall Impact Score, and NIH-assigned administering organization and review group). Under reasonable assumptions, they found that the Preliminary Overall Impact Score was the only attribute that, once equalized, could dissolve the disparities. A thought experiment also suggested that NIH’s move to binary scoring of the Investigator and Environment criteria under the new Simplified Peer Review Framework may have no effect on these disparities. The authors conclude that efforts to reduce disparities in selection into discussion should focus on identifying feasible, policy-relevant interventions that address racial disparities in Preliminary Overall Impact Scores. The full article can be found here. Congratulations Dr. Erosheva, Dr. Lee, and team!
Date: 11/11/2026