Cognitive biases
Recognizing the halo effect in cultural funding decisions and grantmaking criteria that evaluate artistic merit separately from institutional prestige.
Understanding how first impressions of institutions shape funding judgments helps decouple merit from status, supporting fairer, more inclusive arts funding practices and more trustworthy cultural ecosystems.
Published by
Henry Griffin
August 04, 2025 - 3 min Read
When funders evaluate artistic projects, they often rely on signals beyond the work itself. Name recognition, past associations, or prestige can color judgments about quality, originality, or impact. The halo effect describes this tendency: a favorable impression in one domain spills over into other evaluations, making people assume excellence across the board. In cultural funding, this means a grant might be awarded not solely on the creative merit of a project, but on where the artist or institution sits within a network of influence. The result is a skew that favors well-connected players and established brands, reinforcing cycles of visibility and resource access that are hard to disrupt.
This dynamic matters because most inspection processes rely on proxies. Review panels may weigh institutional pedigree, past funding success, or marquee collaboration partners as shortcuts to quality. Yet such shortcuts can obscure the actual craft and ideas behind a proposal. When selection hinges on prestige, the art’s intrinsic value—the ways it challenges assumptions or expands cultural conversation—can recede in importance. The halo effect therefore risks flattening diverse approaches into a narrow spectrum of what is deemed credible. Recognizing this bias invites grantmakers to design criteria that foreground originality, process, and potential impact independent of name recognition.
Practices that separate artistic merit from the luster of prestige
A more deliberate funding practice requires explicit criteria that separate artistry from institutional cachet. Panels should be trained to identify concrete, observable indicators of merit: clarity of concept, methodological rigor, evidence of public engagement, and the potential for lasting influence. When evaluators anchor decisions to a project’s ambitions and methods, rather than the status of the artist or the organization, creative risk-taking is encouraged. Transparent rubrics help ensure accountability and reduce ambiguity that fuels bias. Additionally, evaluators can employ blind or anonymized reviews for certain aspects of the proposal to minimize familiarity effects and preserve focus on the work’s intrinsic qualities.
Beyond individual reviewers, funding organizations can adjust structures to mitigate halo effects. Diversifying panels, rotating members, and including practitioners from varied disciplines can dilute the weight of prestige. Internal dashboards that separate artistic indicators from institutional metrics provide a clearer map of how decisions are made. Feedback loops are essential: stating why a proposal was favored or withheld offers learning opportunities for applicants and reviewers alike. Finally, time and reflection built into the process allow panels to question assumptions about prestige, revisiting decisions with fresh perspectives before final approvals.
Strategies to cultivate a fairer decision-making ecology in arts funding
Another strategy involves publishing the explicit criteria used to judge each facet of a proposal, with examples of how merit will be recognized in practice. When applicants can reference concrete standards—such as the novelty of the concept, experimental methodology, or anticipated community impact—it becomes easier to separate merit from reputation. This transparency not only benefits applicants but also creates a shared language for evaluation across cycles. As standards evolve, continuing education for reviewers helps keep biases in check and maintains alignment between stated goals and actual decisions.
Granting bodies can experiment with alternative funding models that reduce the emphasis on track records. Seed grants, micro-grants, and exploratory residencies encourage work that might not yet have a recognizable name attached. By prioritizing process over pedigree, funders invite a broader spectrum of voices and risk-taking. Feedback mechanisms, including applicant surveys and post-decision analyses, illuminate where prestige may have crept into judgments. Over time, these signals encourage a culture in which artistic merit is judged by the work’s own merits rather than the weight of a well-known institution’s name.
Concrete steps to lower status bias in funding and grantmaking
Reframing the conversation around impact is also critical. Impact can be defined in multiple ways beyond audience size or media attention. Cultural outputs might influence policy discourse, spark intergenerational dialogue, or provide new ways of seeing everyday life. By foregrounding diverse definitions of impact, grantmakers acknowledge a range of valuable outcomes that do not depend on the artist’s or the institution’s prestige. This broadened perspective supports the growth of smaller organizations and independent creators who contribute fresh perspectives to the cultural landscape.
Equally important is deliberate attention to context. Review panels should consider resource constraints, audience reach, and community relevance as legitimate dimensions of merit. A project that works intensively with underserved communities or that experiments with new collaborative models deserves recognition even if it lacks broad fame. By situating evaluation within the social and cultural context of a project, evaluators can resist aura-based judgments and honor work that expands the field in meaningful ways, not merely in perceived sophistication.
The path toward more equitable funding ecosystems for the arts
Establish a decoupled merit framework that treats artistic innovation separately from prestige signals. This framework outlines the exact criteria for originality, execution, and potential impact, and it requires assessors to justify decisions with reference to those criteria. Regular calibration sessions help ensure that judgments stay aligned with the framework rather than with reputation. In practice, this means scoring panels and grant reviews against standardized benchmarks, with room for qualitative notes that illuminate how a project meets or challenges those benchmarks.
Encourage interdepartmental collaboration to diversify the lens on merit. When teams from different departments review a single proposal, the evaluation benefits from cross-disciplinary thinking that can challenge insular biases. Input from education, community outreach, and curatorial perspectives can reveal strengths that authoritative prestige alone might obscure. This cross-pollination fosters more nuanced assessments, where the artwork’s value is measured through a tapestry of considerations rather than through the lens of a single, highly visible institution.
Longitudinal tracking of funded projects offers another method to address halo effects. By mapping outcomes over time—creative growth, community engagement, and sustainability—funders can assess merit in a dynamic, context-rich way. This evidence-based approach reduces the temptation to rely on first impressions. It also creates accountability: if a project demonstrates enduring value, the funding decision gains credibility beyond the weight of any prestige attached to the applicant.
Finally, cultivating a culture of humility within grantmaking is essential. Reviewers should acknowledge their own susceptibility to bias and engage in ongoing learning about cognitive biases that affect judgments. Open forums, peer feedback, and external audits can reinforce a commitment to fair evaluation. When funding decisions emphasize artistry over reputation, they support a more vibrant and inclusive cultural sector—one in which diverse creators find a fair shot to contribute, grow, and influence the artistic conversation.
