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The Nature Index's first social-sciences ranking shows the United States as the clear leader, with 9 out of the top 10 institutions. China's Tsinghua University is the only institution outside the United States to break into the top 10.
Social-sciences journals were added to the Nature Index for the first time in June. The subject, defined as the study of human society and behaviours, encompasses a broad range of topics including anthropology, law, economics and education.
The ranking below is based on data released as part of the Nature Index 2026 Research Leaders and covers the 2025 calendar year.
Leading institutions in social sciences in the Nature Index
Institutions are ranked by article Share for the period January to December 2025. Each institution's article count (Count) is also listed.
| Rank | Institution | Location | Count | Share |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Harvard University | United States | 193 | 68.61 |
| 2 | Stanford University | United States | 137 | 52.04 |
| 3 | National Bureau of Economic Research | United States | 208 | 49.30 |
| 4 | University of California, Berkeley | United States | 115 | 44.88 |
| 5 | Tsinghua University | China | 112 | 44.58 |
| 6 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) | United States | 100 | 40.03 |
| 7 | University of Chicago | United States | 93 | 34.32 |
| 8 | Yale University | United States | 81 | 32.74 |
| 9 | Princeton University | United States | 85 | 31.75 |
| 10 | Columbia University | United States | 83 | 30.91 |
1. Harvard University
Share: 68.61
Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts is the leading institution globally for social-sciences output in the index.
Harvard also leads the health-sciences ranking and is the second highest ranked academic institution in the biological sciences after the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing. Harvard has long been the top-ranked academic institution overall, but it lost this place to Zhejiang University in the 2026 Research Leaders.
Facilities that support Harvard's world-leading output in the social sciences include the institute for Quantitative Social Science, which manages the Henry A. Murray Research Archive — a repository of more than 100 terabytes of data, audio and video collected from social-science research projects. Researchers from across the world can access the archive.
2. Stanford University
Share 52.04
Stanford University in California is the second strongest institution for social sciences in the index, but its lead over the US National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), in third, is slim, at just under 3 Share points.
The university excels at political sciences, a topic that falls under the social-sciences banner. In the latest 12-month window of index data (which covers the period 1 March 2025 to 28 February 2026), Stanford is at the top of the leaderboard for political sciences.
Stanford is a key player in several national social-sciences-related research programmes. The university's Institute for Research in the Social Sciences, for example, has contributed to the American National Election Studies project — which surveys US voting behaviour after each election — for more than 20 years.
3. National Bureau of Economic Research
Share: 49.30
Social sciences is by far the strongest subject area for NBER, a private, non-profit research organization based in Cambridge Massachusetts. Between 2024 and 2025, it increased its Share in the subject by 21.5%.
NBER is the 11th ranked NPO/NGO globally in the index, owing to the strength of its social-sciences research. In the 2024 Research Leaders, which did not include social-sciences journals, NBER did not rank within the top 100. After social sciences, its next highest subject ranking is in the health sciences, in 658th place.
4. University of California, Berkeley
Share: 44.88
The University of California, Berkeley (UCB) has a low social-sciences article Count relative to NBER (115 articles, compared to NBER's 208), but there is less than 5 Share points between them. This suggests that UCB contributes more authors per paper than NBER in the subject.
Between 2024 and 2025, UCB increased its Share in social sciences by 35.68% — one of the largest increases among institutions in the top 10.
Its fourth-place ranking is the university's highest across subject areas; in 2025, UCB was ranked 15th for physical sciences and 25th for biological sciences — its two highest outputs after social sciences.
5. Tsinghua University
Share: 44.58
In 2024, Tsinghua University in Beijing trailed more than 4 Share points behind UCB in social-sciences output. In 2025, it closed that gap to less than one Share point. Between 2024 and 2025, Tsinghua's article Share in the subject increased by 54.1% — the second largest rise among the top-10 institutions.
Tsinghua's fifth place ranking in social sciences is its second highest global ranking after applied sciences, for which it ranked second in 2025, behind the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
6. Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Share: 40.03
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Massachusetts had the largest increase in social-sciences Share between 2024 and 2025 among at top 10 institutions, at 63.7%.
As the United States' third-ranked institution overall in the Nature Index, the university is strong in several subject areas. It was the leading North American institution in both the physical sciences and chemistry in 2025, and in 11th place for physical sciences and 41st for chemistry globally.
The MIT media lab, opened in 1985, is one of the university's most prominent social-sciences research facilities. One of the projects it operates is the Atlas of Inequality, a collaboration with Carlos III University of Madrid that maps income disparities across Boston.
7. The University of Chicago
Share: 34.32
The University of Chicago in Illinois is one of only two institutions in the social-sciences top 10 to have recorded a decrease in Share between 2024 to 2025, at 9.5%. Its lead over Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, in eighth place, has dropped significantly during this time, from 11.19 Share points to less than 2.
Social sciences is the University of Chicago' s strongest subject in the index. In the 2026 Research Leaders, it ranked 26th for the physical sciences and 46th for biological sciences — its next two strongest subjects.
8. Yale University
Share: 32.74
Yale University ranks eighth in social sciences globally in the index and is the United States' eighth ranked institution overall. Alongside social sciences, Yale is also strong in the health and biological sciences, ranking in the top 20 for both.
In 2025, Yale's social-sciences research appeared in journals such as The Review of Economic Studies and American Journal of Political Science.
9. Princeton University
Share: 31.75
Researchers from Princeton University in New Jersey contributed to 85 social-sciences papers in the index in 2025, helping the institution reach ninth place in the subject, when ranking by Share.
Among these papers was one published in Nature Human Behaviour in 2025, which investigated why people prefer experts to use specialized terminology when explaining scientific concepts — even when they do not understand the terms themselves.
Another paper, published in the journal Cities in 2025, investigated how crime levels in certain areas of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, affected school attendance.
10. Columbia University in the City of New York
Share: 30.91
Social sciences is Columbia University's strongest subject in the Nature Index. The New York-based university's next highest subject rankings in the 2026 Research Leaders are 25th in biological sciences and 26th in health sciences.
Columbia researchers contributed to 83 social-sciences papers in 2025. The journals featuring the most Columbia-authored social-sciences papers were Nature Communications and American Economic Review, with seven papers each.
