NEA Research Labs

NEA Research Labs

Introduction

Through a series of awards, the Arts Endowment has established a national program that permits transdisciplinary research teams, grounded in the social and behavioral sciences, to engage with the Arts Endowment's five-year research agenda. The National Endowment for the Arts Research Labs (NEA Research Labs) program will yield empirical insights about the arts for the benefit of arts and non-arts sectors alike.

Each of the NEA Research Labs will design a research agenda, conduct a program to implement its own agenda, and prepare reports and other products that contribute substantively to a wider understanding several areas of special interest to the Arts Endowment. Sustained methods of inquiry into these topic areas will have distinctive benefits for the arts community, but also for sectors such as healthcare, education, and business or management. Our Labs are currently covering the following topic areas, with more to come in future years that align with our current Research Agenda:

As the federal agency of record on arts research, the National Endowment for the Arts, through its Office of Research & Analysis, produces accurate, relevant, and timely analyses and reports that reveal the conditions and characteristics of the U.S. arts ecosystem and the impact of the arts on our everyday lives. The NEA Research Labs add important cross-sector resources to the agency’s collection of publications such as Arts Participation Patterns in 2022: Highlights from the Survey of Public Participation in the Arts, funding opportunities such as Research Grants in the Arts, and producing other data resources. The NEA Research Labs initiative will help to fulfill milestones of a five-year research agenda, available on the Arts Endowment's website.