Demonstrating the Relevance of Prevention Science to Public Policymakers

Although government entities fund the largest proportion of research in the United States, the extent to which policymakers (e.g., elected officials, administrators) use research findings to guide decisions varies tremendously between branches of government (i.e., executive, legislative, judicial) and across levels of governance (e.g., federal, state, municipal). Not only might the use of research evidence increase the intended impact of public policies, the application and demonstrable utility of research evidence for public benefit may also serve to justify ongoing government support and commitment to developing the emerging evidence base. The need for improving policymakers’ awareness and utilization of research is salient because too few decision makers are aware of the wide array of programs, practices, and policies that have been empirically demonstrated to prevent the most common and costly psychological, behavioral, and health problems. Approaches for strengthening policymakers’ awareness and utilization of prevention science primarily rely on engaging in long-term science-policymaker partnerships to enhance policymakers’ goals for improving social wellbeing. For instance, researchers who actively engage policymakers (and their staff) to discuss empirical evidence relevant to current policy priorities has the potential to impact how problems are prevented and addressed in our communities. Furthermore, researcher-policymaker partnerships grounded in the creation of knowledge itself (e.g., investigating policymakers’ research questions, using administrative data, jointly interpreting findings) can improve the relevance and utility of emerging research. Such collaboration with decisionmakers has the potential to bolster the application of scientific knowledge in ways that strengthen public policy and practices in communities, states, and nationally.

This roundtable will facilitate discussion regarding how policymakers use empirical research and approaches that prevention scientists can use to form researcher-policymaker partnerships. The chair will initiate discussion by describing the rationale behind a comprehensive approach to facilitating researcher-policymaker collaboration known as the Research-to-Policy Collaboration (RPC). Subsequently, panelists will describe their range of experiences in researcher-policymaker collaborations and how the RPC could seek to forge such collaborations. Specifically, discussants will describe (1) research partnerships involving state administrative data, (2) the role of research in Executive branch agencies, (3) preliminary findings from a study examining juvenile court judges' and attorneys’ use of research evidence, (4) the nonprofit sector's role, including foundations, in advancing evidence-based policies and practices, and (5) efforts to improve and assess how policymakers use research.