NIH Highlighted Topic: Interventions to Promote Health by Fostering Connectedness
Introduction
This topic encourages rigorous research to evaluate connectedness interventions to improve health or reduce risk factors for chronic disease.
Connectedness may take many forms, including but not limited to connections with people, communities, history, traditions, hobbies, sports, the arts, or nature. Interventions may be tested as adjuncts to healthcare, or as stand-alone interventions in non-medical settings.
Projects are strongly encouraged that:
- Specify a clear conceptual model identifying the hypothesized pathways between connectedness and health outcomes.
- Use validated measures of connectedness and health outcomes to the extent possible, such as those in the PhenX Toolkit.
- Address multi-level factors that make connections possible and sustainable (e.g., an intervention connecting urban youth to nature may require providing transportation to existing green spaces).
- Involve collaboration with relevant organizations that have capacity to implement or deliver connectedness interventions if proven effective.
- Include a rigorous intervention study design that is sufficiently powered and accounts for the expected correlation in outcomes within clusters (e.g., family, school, clinic, neighborhood).
See more information here, including participating NIH Institutes/Centers and their specific interests relating to the Highlighted Topic.
Apply to a highlighted topic through an appropriate NIH Parent Funding Announcement or another broad NIH opportunity available on Grants.gov. Learn how to interpret and use Highlighted Topics.
Please contact Dr. Karen Cielo, Director of Research Development, if you are interested in applying or would like to discuss the opportunity. Please see Research Development Tiers of Service here.