Sociology Program Doctoral Dissertation Research Grant

*Who May Serve as PI:

DDRI proposals must be submitted with a principal investigator (PI) and a co-principal investigator (co-PI).

The PI must be the advisor of the doctoral student or another faculty member at the U.S. IHE where the doctoral student is enrolled. The doctoral student whose dissertation research will be supported must be designated as a co-PI. There is no limitation on the number of times that an individual may be the principal investigator on a DDRI proposal or proposals submitted to the Sociology Program, either during a specific competition or over the course of her/his career.

There isno limitation on the number of times a doctoral student may serve asco-PI on aDDRI proposal to the Sociology Programprovided the student meets the eligibility criteria. A student and her/his advisor, however, should carefully consider the times during the student’s graduate program that are most appropriate for submission of a DDRI proposal. Proposals will only be accepted in the Sociology Program’s Spring DDRI competition if they were submitted to a Fall competition, were declined,and received an invitation to resubmit. The invitation to resubmit will be included in the panel summary.

As part of its effort to encourage and support projects that explicitly integrate education and basic research, the Sociology Program provides support to improve the conduct of doctoral dissertation projects undertaken by doctoral students enrolled in U.S. Institutions of Higher Education (IHEs) when the dissertation research is conducted in a scientifically sound manner and it offers strong potential for enhancing more general scientific knowledge. The Sociology Program funds doctoral dissertation research to defray direct costs associated with conducting research, for example, dataset acquisition, additional statistical or methodological training, meeting with scholars associated with original datasets, and fieldwork away from the student’s home campus. Projects are evaluated using the two Foundation-wide criteria, intellectual merit and broader impacts. In assessing the intellectual merit of proposed research, four components are key to securing support from the Sociology Program: (1) the issues investigated must be theoretically grounded; (2) the research should be based on empirical observation or be subject to empirical validation or illustration; (3) the research design must be appropriate to the questions asked; and (4) the proposed research must advance understanding of social processes, structures and methods.