Foundation funding and psychiatric research

Abstract

Support for psychiatric research is limited to a relatively small number of funding sources. Foundations--nonprofit entities that support a variety of social, medical, educational, and other activities--are a potentially important source. The authors describe the role and structure of foundations, discuss historical trends in foundation support for research in mental illness, and present the results of a study of the extent to which foundations support mental health research. The results of this study confirm the paucity of foundation support for mental health research but show important differences and similarities among the foundations that support research in this field.