Decision, Risk and Management Sciences

About this funding opportunity

The Decision, Risk and Management Sciences Program (DRMS) supports scientific research directed at increasing understanding and effectiveness of decision making by individuals, groups, organizations and society. DRMS supports research with solid foundations in theories and methods of the social and behavioral sciences. This social and behavioral science research should advance knowledge, address fundamental scientific and societal issues and have strong broader impacts. DRMS funds disciplinary and interdisciplinary research, doctoral dissertation research improvement grants (DDRIGs) and conferences in the following areas: judgment and decision making; decision analysis and decision aids; risk analysis, perception and communication; societal and public-policy decision making; management science and organizational design. The program supports the use of the RAPID funding mechanism for research that involves ephemeral data, typically tied to disasters or other unanticipated events. Much less frequently, the program also supports highly unusual, proof-of-concept, high-risk projects that are potentially transformational (Early Concept Grants for Exploratory Research, EAGER). For detailed information concerning RAPID and EAGER grants, please review Chapter II.E of the NSF PAPPG. All research must be grounded in theory and generalizable. Purely algorithmic management-science proposals should be submitted to the Operations Engineering (OE) Program rather than to DRMS.

Decision, Risk and Management Sciences offers Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grants (DDRIGs) to improve the quality of dissertation research. For detailed guidelines on preparing a DDRIG proposal, consult the separate DRMS-DDRIG solicitation.

Topic areas: General and Cross-cutting R&D, Social Sciences and Humanities, Public Policy and Governance.

Funding amount

This grant provides Varies in funding.

Deadline

Applications are due Aug 18, 2026. Confirm the exact closing time on the official program page before applying.

Who can apply

This opportunity is open to the following applicant types:

• Open to all applicant types

Eligibility

The program did not publish a separate eligibility statement. See the official opportunity page for the full eligibility criteria.

Agency

Decision, Risk and Management Sciences is administered by U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF), listed via Grants.gov.