Ontologies in the Behavioral Sciences Accelerating Research and the Spread of Knowledge (2022) / Chapter Skim
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6 Conclusions and Recommendations
6 Conclusions and Recommendations
Pages 121-132
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From page 121... ...
Based on our analysis of those four questions, we offer nine conclusions about how ontologies could accelerate progress in the behavioral sciences and how to engineer them. And, based on those conclusions, we offer six recommendations to those who fund, influence, and carry out research about how to stimulate and provide support for ontology development.
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From page 122... ...
A wide variety of stakeholders rely on the knowledge created by the behavioral sciences, including, just in the domain of mental health, scientists who study behavior, social science, psychology, development, and cognition; and clinicians who provide educational, behavioral, social, and psychological interventions; as well as educators, health care practitioners, policy makers, and patients. One in five adults experiences a mental condition in a given year, and the quality of their care depends on both the availability of research on mental disorders and the capacity of clinicians to distill relevant information from the massive volume of research published every year.
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From page 123... ...
Nevertheless, while existing ontological systems have served valuable purposes, taken together they have not exploited the large potential for ontologies to accelerate advancement and application of behavioral research. Our scoping review and examination of example ontological systems indicated that there are comparatively few semantically formal behavioral science ontologies.
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From page 124... ...
In attempting to understand what would be needed to engineer ontologies that could better support behavioral science, we examined sociocognitive practices or functions through which decisions about the terms and relationships the ontology covers are made and the computational tools that can facilitate the intellectual work. The socio-cognitive practices involved in creating and editing an ontology and adapting it over time require intensive human community engagement, and iteration.
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From page 125... ...
There is no substitute for the raw people power that is essential for the intellectual work of designing the ontology. CONCLUSION 5-1: Valuable ontological systems and related tools exist and are supporting research in the behavioral sciences.
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From page 126... ...
Without a doubt, however, developing workable ontologies is difficult, though it is necessary in any scientific domain. CONCLUSION 6-1: Ontology development and use has the poten tial to move behavioral science forward from a domain in which research is generally siloed and the data and results are often in compatible to one in which the evidence is searchable and more easily integrated and in which computer technology is leveraged in the discovery of new relationships, the development of novel hypotheses, and the identification of knowledge gaps.
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From page 127... ...
Particularly within the behavioral sciences there has been a lack of sustainable resources: ontology development does not usually lead to a commercial product. As a result, some ontological systems have been supported by national or international agencies.
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From page 128... ...
Therefore, we have chosen a middle position by focusing on ways to expand available resources and incentives, to stimulate grassroots ontology development, and to coordinate efforts, with the aim of pushing for ontologies to be a higher priority in behavioral science research. Agencies of the federal government are best positioned to provide the coordination and resources needed for this kind of activity, so we direct
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From page 129... ...
should develop formal agendas for accelerating behavioral science research through the development and use of semantically formal ontologies. These agendas should draw on ideas generated within other scientific domains and the international scientific community and should include a range of activities: • NIH should use its convening authority to engage experts and to develop a plan for ontology development across NIH institutes and centers.
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From page 130... ...
RECOMMENDATION 2: The National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, and other agencies that sup port research should seek and encourage opportunities to fund work that will support continuing progress in the development and use of ontologies in the behavioral sciences, such as research on technological supports for ontology development, the ways scientists develop and use ontologies across diverse fields, and institutional supports and structures that support ontology use in diverse fields. RECOMMENDATION 3: The Office of Science and Technology Policy should develop a report on how an explicit formal specifi cation of a shared conceptualization for behavioral science can be implemented across federal science agencies, based on review of ontologies developed by other agencies including, but not limited to, the National Science Foundation; the Departments of Health and Human Services, Defense, Transportation, Agriculture, Labor, and Justice; the Environmental Protection Agency; the National Institute of Standards and Technology; the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration; and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.
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From page 131... ...
RECOMMENDATION 4: The Federation of Associations in Be havioral and Brain Sciences and the Consortium of Social Science Associations, along with similar organizations, should coor dinate ontology development across academic and professional organizations. RECOMMENDATION 5: The American Psychological Associ ation Council of Editors and the Association for Psychological Science editorial office, along with similar organizations, should develop policies to improve the use of common vocabularies and data-reporting standards in behavioral science journals.
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From page 132... ...
. Commissioned paper prepared for the Committee on Accelerating Behavioral Science through Ontology Development and Use, National Acad emies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
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