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2023 College and University Fund Conference: Social and Behavioral Science as R&D

As a capstone to the Council’s Centennial year, this convening brought together leaders of consortium member universities, philanthropic foundations, and public funders of science to celebrate the achievements of 100 years of socially valuable social and behavioral science, and to explore new opportunities for social and behavioral science R&D to find cost-effective and scalable solutions to our most pressing societal challenges. Click here to learn more and read a full summary of the event.

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Frontiers in Social and Behavioral Science – November 2023

At the 100th anniversary of the Council’s founding, we are proud to honor its founders and to celebrate the achievements of policy-relevant and solutions-oriented social and behavioral science. Every month Frontiers features an article from the most recent issue of each founding association’s flagship journal. Across disciplines, the frontiers of social and behavioral science are rapidly advancing, and with them, our collective capacity to support global well-being. Explore the seven articles featured in the November research roundup here.

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Now accepting applications for the 2024-2026 Just Tech Fellows cohort

The Social Science Research Council is pleased to announce that we are seeking applicants for the third cohort of the Just Tech Fellowship. The Just Tech fellowships support diverse cohorts of creators as they imagine and build more just, equitable, and representative technological futures, pursuing innovative technological solutions that advance social, political, and economic rights. Fellows receive two-year awards of $100,000 annually, supplementary funding packages to subsidize additional expenses, and seed funding to work on collaborative projects with other Just Tech Fellows.

Event News

What Have Megastudies Taught Us about Successfully Encouraging Increased Vaccination?

In this lecture, Professor Milkman will discuss three massive field experiments testing dozens of different ways of encouraging increased vaccination. First, she will discuss a “megastudy” encouraging flu vaccination at doctor’s appointments among 47,306 patients of two large U.S. health systems in which 42 scientists worked in teams to design a total of 19 different text reminders using a variety of different behavioral science principles.

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Social Science Research Council launches Research AMP platform 

The Social Science Research Council is pleased to announce the public launch of the Research AMP platform, a free, open-source technology for building scholarly communities, collecting research, and sharing insights with new audiences. Research AMP lowers barriers to the dissemination of public scholarship and fills the need to put credible, accessible, and comprehensive scholarship in the hands of expert and lay audiences. 

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Now accepting applications for the SSRC-Arnold Ventures Criminal Justice Innovation Fellowships

To secure more effective and equitable criminal justice practices, we need to innovate and evaluate new policy solutions that can be adopted by local, state, and federal policymakers. The Arnold Ventures Criminal Justice Innovation Fellowships will support five postdoctoral fellows who are pursuing policy-relevant causal research designed to innovate and evaluate cost-effective and scalable policy solutions that advance the efficacy and equity of criminal justice practices. Click here for more information and to apply.

Event News

What Conventional Wisdom Gets Wrong About Political Polarization

In this lecture, Professor David Broockman explores how Americans are politically polarized, why–and why not–this matters, and potential solutions. Professor Broockman discusses how his research has challenged conventional wisdom on: (1) to what extent Americans’ frustrations with government result from politicians being too extreme, (2) to what extent voters’ dislike of each other–so-called affective polarization–contributes to the nation’s political challenges, and (3) how we all can have more productive and persuasive conversations with our political rivals.

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Exploring the economic impacts of university research: a new National Science Foundation partnership

A new collaboration between the Directorate for Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships (TIP) at the National Science Foundation, the Institute for Research on Innovation and Science (IRIS) at the University of Michigan, the Ohio Education Research Center (OERC) at The Ohio State University, and the Social Science Research Council will build a prototype data infrastructure to enable stakeholders to track the flow of grant-funded scientific talent from universities into regional economies.

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Frontiers in Social and Behavioral Science – October 2023

At the 100th anniversary of the Council’s founding, we are proud to honor its founders and to celebrate the achievements of policy-relevant and solutions-oriented social and behavioral science. Every month Frontiers features an article from the most recent issue of each founding association’s flagship journal. Across disciplines, the frontiers of social and behavioral science are rapidly advancing, and with them, our collective capacity to support global well-being. Explore the seven articles featured in the October research roundup here.

Mercury Project News

Leveraging the Mercury Project Research Framework

Mercury Project codirector Heather Lanthorn introduces the project’s newly updated Research Framework, a public good that supports researchers, funders, and policymakers by mapping intervention designs designed to increase vaccination demand and science-based decision-making along with policy-relevant outcomes of interest. The 18 teams in the Mercury Project Research Consortium—working in 18 countries around the world—use the framework in their projects.

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