The views of this article are the perspective of the author and may not be reflective of Confessions of the Professions.
Doctorate Of Science
Countries are investing in their higher education systems, and more people than ever before are completing doctoral degrees, but not all countries are the same when it comes to PhD opportunities.
RS Components has analysed data from the National Science Foundation to reveal the breakdown of Science PhDs around the world and visualised the results in this infographic.
Which countries have the most PhD graduates?
Leading the way is the US, which has a sizeable 39,834 Science PhD graduates, putting the States significantly ahead of any other nation. Next after the US is the UK, which has 14,271 Science PhD graduates, followed closely by India, with 13,144.
Which country has the highest percentage of female PhD graduates?
Gender equality does arise in some countries when it comes to doctoral studies, such as Latvia, which has 55% female PhD graduates. There are also more female Science PhDs than male in neighbouring Slovenia (53%), Lithuania (52%) and Poland (51%). Then things are dead equal in the Netherlands, where PhDs are split 50/50 between women and men.
Where is gender imbalance still a big problem in PhD studies?
Taiwan has the biggest gender imbalance among PhD graduates with only 18% of them being female. Only slightly better are South Korea (23%), Sudan (25%) and Iran (25%). In both the US and the UK 42% of PhD graduates are female.
![Breakdown of Science PhDs [Infographic]](https://cdn.confessionsoftheprofessions.com/media/2019/07/graduates.jpg "Breakdown of Science PhDs [Infographic]")
