NIH Notice of Special Interest (NOSI): Using Systems Science Methodologies to Protect and Improve Child and Reproductive Population Health
Related Announcement: PA-20-185 - NIH Research Project Grant (Parent R01 Clinical Trial Not Allowed)
Purpose
The purpose of this Notice of Special Interest (NOSI) is to solicit applications to support multi-disciplinary scientific teams proposing research using systems science approaches to address persistent public health challenges. Systems science refers to multi-level methodologies addressing complex behavioral and social phenomena. This initiative encourages applications for both basic and applied research, including methodological and measurement development, with a focus on human behavioral and/or social science. This initiative also seeks to promote interdisciplinary collaboration among health researchers and experts in mathematical modelling.
Background
Systems science is an interdisciplinary field comprising methodological approaches that address dynamic connections between a system’s structure and its behavior over time. “Systems science methodologies” is an umbrella term that refers to a variety of methodologies including, but not limited to, agent-based modeling, microsimulation, system dynamics modeling, network analysis, discrete event analysis, Markov modeling, econometric modeling, engineering methods, and a variety of other dynamic modeling and simulation approaches.
Systems science methodologies are valuable because they can address complex behavioral and social phenomena. These models and other novel analytic tools can be used to elucidate behavioral and social pathways and relationships and to assess population-level health policy and behavioral intervention options. By facilitating the modeling of social and behavioral determinants of health, systems science models advance scientific understanding of the underlying factors contributing to persistent public health problems.
Specific Interests
Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD)
The mission of NICHD is to lead research and training to understand human development, improve reproductive health, enhance the lives of children and adolescents, and optimize abilities for all.
General topics of interest include basic and applied research on models of behavioral and social processes associated with health, disability, and developmental outcomes from pre-conception to adulthood. NICHD is particularly interested in models that focus primarily on computational, econometric, mathematical, or engineering methods to improve the measurement and modeling of the following topics:
- Health disparities and the reduction of maternal and child morbidity and mortality;
- Child, maternal, reproductive and population health models utilizing multi-level perspectives. Of particular interest are systems models of: 1) behavior and development in childhood and adolescence; 2) sexual behavior, and 3) contraceptive use from early adolescence through the reproductive years;
- Models of the complex relationships among demographic, social, and environmental factors and their effects on child and maternal health;
- Models that address complex social and behavioral factors affecting intellectual, behavioral and physical disability outcomes, rehabilitation outcomes, and long-term impacts of disability on individuals and families;
- Complex models of developmental issues over the life course—for example, models that link variations in childhood health and development and environmental context and exposure during childhood with health trajectories or disability in later life;
- Models that address policy resistant health problems—for example, modeling how community characteristics and processes interact with individual characteristics to contribute to risk of chronic diseases such as childhood obesity and sexually transmitted diseases.
- Models that address how macro-environmental factors interact with biological processes to impact eating, physical activity, and obesity outcomes.
Scientific topics of low priority to NICHD include: disease-specific processes and prevention that are central to the mission of other ICs.
Key Dates
First Available Due Date: June 5, 2021
Expiration Date: May 8, 2024
More information about NOT-HD-20-032 and application instructions for PA-20-185 are available on the NIH website.
Mar 17, 2021