# RR&D Senior Research Career Scientist Award

> **NIH VA IK6** · VA CONNECTICUT HEALTHCARE SYSTEM · 2024 · —

## Abstract

Dr. Bell is requesting renewal of his SRCS for an additional 5 years at which point Dr. Bell will have 54
years of VA service. During these 5 years he plans to continue to vigorously pursue his research, education,
administrative and service mission.
 Dr. Bell has been involved in VA rehabilitation research for almost five decades. During that time, he
has helped shape the field of vocational rehabilitation and cognitive remediation, and many of his innovations
have been adopted into clinical practice and have inspired new research by investigators nationally and
internationally. His research has focused on 1) vocational rehabilitation, 2) neurocognitive and social cognitive
deficits and their relationships to functional impairments, 3) development of assessment instruments, 4)
cognitive remediation, and 5) substance abuse rehabilitation. He has a consistent record of successful
research with funding from VA HSR&D, VA RR&D, NIMH, NIDA, NIAAA, DoD and NSF. Currently, he is
principal investigator of a VA RR&D MERIT grant, and a current NIAAA RO1 grant. He also has pending for
this round a resubmission of a MERIT application to RR&D Engineering panel regarding continued
development of the Automated Test of Embodied Cognition (ATEC), for which the VA has an international
patent pending. He also has a CDMRP grant pending for ATEC evaluations for stages of multiple sclerosis.
 Dr. Bell also plans to continue his scientific contributions in terms of publications and presentations.
During his current SRCS funding, he has published over 50 peer reviewed articles, 2 book chapters, 2 new
testing instrument and their manuals (Activate Test of Embodied Cognition (for children) and the Automated
Test of Embodied Cognition for adults) and despite the pandemic has given more than 20 scientific
presentations. Two of Dr. Bell’s contributions to assessment are used nationally and internationally in
psychiatric clinical trials and are regarded as the “gold standard” for measuring work performance and for
measuring social cognition. One indication of his status as a leader in psychiatric rehabilitation is that he was
selected by the World Health Organization to be one of three USA psychiatric rehabilitation experts for their 24-
member international panel for the development of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and
Health (ICF-11) and was then selected to be one of 4 team leaders on the project.
 Dr. Bell is an accomplished educator and mentor with more than 55 mentees during his career, many of
whom have gone on to independent research careers. Fifteen are currently working for the VA. In 2001, Dr.
Bell was awarded a prestigious training grant (NIMH T32) to provide training in functional disability
interventions. This award was twice competitively renewed because of its significant impact on bringing young
and promising investigators into the field of rehabilitation. He plans to continue to train researchers interested
in rehabilitation thr...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10991608
- **Project number:** 2IK6RX002458-08
- **Recipient organization:** VA CONNECTICUT HEALTHCARE SYSTEM
- **Principal Investigator:** MORRIS D. BELL
- **Activity code:** IK6 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** VA
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** —
- **Award type:** 2
- **Project period:** 2017-10-01 → 2031-09-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10991608

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10991608, RR&D Senior Research Career Scientist Award (2IK6RX002458-08). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-29 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10991608. Licensed CC0.

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