The Pioneer Fund is an American non-profit foundation established in 1937 "to advance the scientific study of heredity and human differences." Until his death on 2 October 2012, the fund was headed by psychology professor J. Philippe Rushton, the fund states that it focuses on projects it perceives will not be easily funded due to controversial subject matter. The organization is frequently described as racist and "white supremacist" in nature, or as a "hate group".
Two of the most notable studies funded by the Pioneer Fund are the Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart and the Texas Adoption Project, which studied the similarities and differences of identical twins and other children adopted into non-biological families. The Pioneer Fund has also been an important source of funding for research on the partly genetic hypothesis of IQ variation among races.
The fund's grantees and publications have generated controversy including the 1994 publication of The Bell Curve, which drew heavily from Pioneer-funded research. The fund has also been criticized for its ties to eugenics.
Read more about Pioneer Fund: Early History
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