To reflect the breadth of the social and behavioral sciences and COSSA’s membership, we add up federal R&D expenditures for psychology, “social sciences” (as defined by NCSES, which includes anthropology; economics; political science and government; sociology, demography, and populations studies; and social sciences not classified elsewhere), law, communications, and social work to come up with total social and behavioral science research funding.
The HERD survey reports on federal expenditures from the Departments of Agriculture, Defense, Energy, Health and Human Services, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and National Science Foundation, with all other federal R&D spending captured in an “other” category. Federal R&D spending by other departments and agencies (the Department of Education or Justice, for example) are not measured individually by this survey, and are thus not reflected in our rankings of departmental sources of funding.
