The US National Science Foundation (NSF) must demonstrate the value of the research that it funds. To that end, NSF has developed two criteria for its funding decisions: intellectual merit (IM), the potential to advance knowledge, and broader impacts (BI), the potential to benefit society. Critics have argued that these criteria are insufficient, including former Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), who offered his own criteria delineating specific desired impacts, such as economic competitiveness. We empirically assess this criticism by comparing public ratings of NSF-funded projects, based on their Project Outcomes Report (POR), using NSF’s and Smith’s criteria. Participants rated NSF-funded research as satisfying both NSF’s and Smith’s criteria, which were moderately correlated. Adding explicit references to societal BI improved ratings slightly. Noting NSF support did not. Our results suggest that having PORs explicitly address additional criteria could increase perceived BI without compromising IM.

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评估资助研究的更广泛影响：美国国家科学基金会诉 Lamar Smith

美国国家科学基金会 (NSF) 必须证明其资助的研究的价值。为此，NSF 为其资助决策制定了两个标准：智力价值 (IM)，促进知识的潜力，以及更广泛的影响 (BI)，即造福社会的潜力。批评者认为这些标准是不够的，包括前众议员拉马尔史密斯（R-TX），他提供了自己的标准来描述具体的预期影响，例如经济竞争力。我们根据 NSF 和 Smith 的标准，根据他们的项目成果报告 (POR)，比较 NSF 资助项目的公众评级，对这种批评进行实证评估。参与者认为 NSF 资助的研究同时满足 NSF 和 Smith 的标准，这些标准具有中度相关性。添加对社会 BI 的明确引用略微提高了评级。注意到 NSF 没有支持。我们的结果表明，让 POR 明确解决其他标准可以在不影响 IM 的情况下增加感知 BI。