Hi TIPSters...happy New Year. I beg your indulgence for just a bit, as this message doesn't have much direct bearing on the teaching of psychology, although I do think it carries a number of implications for how we think about academia and what we value or do not value in our colleagues.
Here's what has moved me to write. A number of psychology departments in R1 institutions, including a major one in the Southeast (not Emory, although we may be following suit soon, I predict) are in the process of revising their tenure and promotion documents to demand that large-scale federal grant funding should be a strong expectation, if not an outright requirement, for tenure (and almost certainly, promotion to Full Professor). I have serious reservations about this proposal for a host of reasons, not least of which is this recent article: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v492/n7427/full/492034a.html which has already created a firestorm of controversy, including a recent rebuttal by NIH and a rejoinder by the authors. http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v492/n7427/full/492034a.html The merits of Nicholson and Ioannidis' provocative but contentious piece aside, I very much worry about the move to make grant funding a requirement or a "soft" requirement for tenure in psychology departments. Among other things, a good deal of excellent research in psychology does not require federal grants, and a number of consistently grant funded researchers in my own field of clinical psychology (names omitted...) are not especially creative or for that matter, especially highly cited. There's much more to be said here, but I can leave that for future messages. At the risk of engaging in a bit of confirmation bias, I'm trying to make the case that many extremely influential and creative psychologists (or people we might loosely consider "psychologists," like Freud) did not receive any federal grant funding. Obviously, one can assume (or am I wrong?) that Freud, Piaget, James, Jung, Titchener, and the like did not apply for and receive competitive federal grants from their countries (in the case of James and Titchener, the U.S.) in the way we presently understand them. But I'm wondering about more "recent" psychologists whom we would all agree are extremely impactful. Here is my naïve question: Is there some easy (or if not, complicated) way of finding out whether a given psychologist ever received federal funding? I know that NIH and other major granting agencies keep archives of past grant funding, but I don't believe that such a search would be comprehensive given the large number of potential granting agencies. Nor do I know whether these archives are comprehensive, or how far they go back. So, for example, is there some way of finding out (short of reading detailed biographies) whether Skinner, Tolman, Allport, Festinger, Asch, Schachter, Neisser, Rock, J.J. Gibson, Loftus, Tversky, or George Miller (I'm just throwing out some quasi-random names of people we'd all agree are extremely influential and creative - not saying we'd all agree with everything they wrote...) received federal grant funding for their research (I believe that Skinner received some funding from the defense department for applications of his work but I'm not sure whether that should count) and if so, how much? (as an aside, the smartest psychologist I've ever known, Paul Meehl, received virtually no grant funding over the course of his career). Again, apologies to this list if the question is a silly one. But I've thinking about this question for a little while and have been sort of stumped by it. Thanks much in advance for any and all help you can provide. ...Scott Scott O. Lilienfeld, Ph.D. Professor Department of Psychology, Room 473 Emory University 36 Eagle Row Atlanta, Georgia 30322 slii...@emory.edu; 404-727-1125 The Master in the Art of Living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation, his love and his intellectual passions. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence in whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him - he is always doing both. - Zen Buddhist text (slightly modified) ________________________________ This e-mail message (including any attachments) is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this message (including any attachments) is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender by reply e-mail message and destroy all copies of the original message (including attachments). --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: arch...@jab.org. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=22652 or send a blank email to leave-22652-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
