Are NIH-funded publications fulfilling the proposed research? An examination of concept-matchedness between NIH research grants and their supported publications

Abstract The conceptual connections between scientific grants and publications are important, yet often overlooked in quantitative studies of science. An analysis of such connections could offer important insights into how science is conducted by individual researchers and research teams under the social and economic conditions of science. This study aims to offer the first piece of evidence towards this endeavor by analyzing the ratio of keyword matchedness between accepted NIH research grants from 2008 to 2015 and their funded publications. By applying linear regression method, we identified and examined three identified predictors of the outcome: 1) the funding rate of an NIH research program in a specific year, 2) the year difference between grant and publication, and 3) the funding size of a grant. Our findings suggest that these three factors contribute to the outcome in different capacities. Moreover, all of them may have different performances in individual funding programs, which highlights the importance of understanding the differences among individual funding mechanisms.

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