Donna Ginther, an economist at the University of Kansas and lead author of the 2011 study, said in an email that the findings show “a systemic problem where hard/lab science is valued over applied/patient-focused science.” She suggested that some of the terms highlighted in the study showed a devaluation of research on reproductive and women’s health (though earlier studies found women and men have largely an equal chance obtaining N.I.H. grants).

To Farah Lubin, an associate professor of neuroscience at the University of Alabama at Birmingham who reviews N.I.H. funding applications, it is natural that scientists of color are drawn to researching health disparities. She said many academics research issues that personally affect their families, and speculated that black researchers may be interested in patient-centered work because their communities have historically been underrepresented in clinical data.

“Maybe in their own communities they’re seeing loved ones suffering from a specific type of disorder,” Dr. Lubin said. “And there’s very little data on these underrepresented groups because most of it is on Caucasians.” Dr. Lubin said she’s seen improvement in the diversity of N.I.H. application reviewers in recent years, including representation of women of color, like herself.

Human-focused research tends to be more costly and complex than laboratory science. Dr. Ginther noted that a lab experiment affords the researcher complete control, while experiments with human subjects are more variable and prone to outside interference. That could make a funding application for patient-centered research seem like more of a gamble to N.I.H. reviewers.

As Dr. Lubin put it: “Access to humans is tricky.”

The N.I.H.’s funding system is partly self-reinforcing — grants are reviewed by experts chosen to some extent based on their previous success applying for grants. Alycia Mosley Austin, a neuroscientist and assistant dean of diversity at the University of Rhode Island, said that the N.I.H. has sought to address this by involving early-career scientists in their review processes, but the bias is still toward more senior biomedical academics.

This tension between the theoretical and the practical in research is not unique to biomedicine, and sometimes the practical prevails. This year’s Nobel winners for economics were three researchers who have devoted their careers to experimental efforts to fight poverty, and in doing so have helped transform the field of development economics more broadly.

Yet the N.I.H.’s study results worry some scientists because of the signal they might send about low value attached to clinical, community-level research.