Board on Behavioral, Cognitive, and Sensory Sciences

Many of the key policy issues now facing the nation are behavioral in nature. Among these are educating and training citizens who can earn and keep jobs in a changing global economy; changing the behaviors that now cause half of all deaths in the country (e.g., smoking, poor diet and exercise patterns, and alcohol and drug abuse); reducing crime and violence; providing for an aging population; harnessing new information technologies to improve our quality of life; and reducing environmental pollution. These problems contrast with the defining policy challenges of the Cold War era, which demanded expertise primarily from the physical sciences.
Fortunately, the pressing need to solve behavioral problems arises at a time when rapid advances in behavioral, cognitive, and sensory sciences are improving our ability to address the problems. The time is ripe to strengthen the links between scientists and the policy community to harness new scientific advances to pressing public needs. To help forge these links, the National Research Council's (NRC) Commission on Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education (CBASSE) established a Board on Behavioral, Cognitive, and Sensory Sciences. This paper explains the need for this effort, and its potential. The report discusses the new promise of behavioral, cognitive, and sensory sciences, outlines the CBASSE record in these fields and its broadening focus on science-related policy questions; notes a range of emerging issues in which policy can benefit from expertise in these areas; and describes the functions of the new board.