Summary

Billions of pounds are spent on research every year but we don’t know whether it is being spent in the most effective way. Despite the importance of diversity, inequalities persist in research funding success by gender and scientific field.

The best way to discover whether problems and inequities exist in the way in which research funding is allocated – and what causes them – is to gather and analyse data about the funding landscape.

As a pilot project using RoRI’s Funder Data Platform, the CRITERIA project explored who receives research funding and how these decisions are made, to understand if and how inequalities arise, and how funding processes to change to realise the full potential of people and research.

Project team

Vincent Traag, CWTS-Leiden and Senior Research Fellow, RoRI

Partner organisations

• Australian Research Council (ARC),
• Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR),
• Dutch Research Council (NWO),
• Michael Smith Health Research BC,
• Novo Nordisk Foundation (NNF),
• Research Council Norway (RCN),
• United Kingdom Research & Innovation (UKRI),
• Wellcome Trust

Project timeline

This project runs until September 2025

Outputs

This project will produce a working paper detailing full results, as well as additional use-oriented outputs (tbc).