We aim to increase the transparency of intervention research

used to support evidence-based policy-making.

We promote research transparency through the policies, procedures, and practices of stakeholders in the social intervention evidence ecosystem. All projects are based on the Transparency and Openness Promotion (TOP) Guidelines and funded by Arnold Ventures.


Evidence Clearinghouse Project

Evidence clearinghouses act as repositories of information to inform public policy by identifying, reviewing, and rating the evidence underpinning social interventions. These clearinghouses are increasingly used to identify which interventions are eligible for financial support from federal, state, and local governments. Clearinghouses consequently provide benchmarks for high quality research and have a wide-ranging impact on policy-making.

In the Evidence Clearinghouse Project, we are using systematic methods to examine the extent to which evidence clearinghouses consider research transparency and reproducibility when rating the evidence underpinning social interventions. Our goal is to understand and recommend how clearinghouse policies and procedures can facilitate more transparent social intervention research to inform policy-making.


Journal Project

The TOP Guidelines describe how journal policies in any discipline can support transparent and open science. Based on the TOP Guidelines, the TRUST Initiative has developed a method for evaluating how organizational policies adhere to principles of transparent and open science. In the Journal Project, this method is being applied to social intervention journal policies, procedures, and practices.

Building on the Evidence Clearinghouse Project, we will first identify the journals that contribute the most research reports to clearinghouses. Then, we will systematically evaluate those journals’ policies, submission systems, and reports to identify good practices, as well as areas to target for improvement.

Explore the results using our Shiny app!