ResearchEducation & Skills
Male Stagnation in Doctoral Programs
Summary
Recent trends for men at the doctoral level of the education system have been mixed. Although their numbers remain stable in many programs, men have experienced stagnation and/or decline in specific fields like veterinary science and psychology, and recent declines in law and medical school enrollments. This contrasts with the strong and welcome gains for women in doctoral degree attainment. Given the broader challenges facing men, it is important to understand the reasons for male decline in the pipelines towards many advanced professions.
Key Takeaways
- The share of doctoral degrees going to men dropped from 73% in 1980 to 43% in 2022.
- The number of doctoral degrees going to men has been stable since 2013, while for women it has increased by 26,000.
- While most PhD programs have more men than in 1993, others like psychology and education have fewer.
- Men are now the minority of MDs, and their numbers have plummeted in other health fields: enrollment in veterinary programs, for example, has declined by 40% for men over the past forty years, while female enrollment has surged by about 400%.
- Male law school enrollment is at a 50-year low.
The fall in male college enrollment has gained widespread attention over recent years. But the decline is not limited to undergraduate degrees. Over the past forty years, the share of degrees awarded to men has decreased at all levels, as Figure 1 shows.
The most notable drops are at the postgraduate level. The share of master’s degrees going to men has fallen from 51% to 37%. The decline in doctoral degrees is the most dramatic, starting from a much higher point: down from 73% in 1980 to 43% in 2022.
Figure 1
DATA NOTEDefinition
Doctoral degree: the highest academic degree in a field, includes both research doctorates (e.g., PhD) and professional doctorates (e.g. M.D, J.D., etc.). Master’s degrees are not included.
The data used to produce this brief primarily come from the following sources:
- National Center for Education Statistics, which collect data from “postsecondary institutions participating in Title IV federal financial aid programs and U.S. service academies.”
- National Science Foundation, which collects data on research doctorates (PhD’s) in their “Survey of Earned Doctorates.”
- American Association of Medical Colleges, which collects data on M.D. granting medical schools. We also include an assortment of health education organizations in order to analyze other health disciplines, like veterinary medicine for example.
- American Bar Association, which collects data on ABA-affiliated law schools.
References to specific years are to the academic year ending in that calendar year: e.g., 2022 means 2021-2022 academic year.
General Doctoral Trends
It is important here to describe the absolute numbers as well as the relative shares. For doctoral degrees overall, the shift in the gender split is driven by the huge increase in the number of women into these programs. Though the share of doctoral degrees awarded to men has declined over recent decades, the absolute number has nonetheless increased, albeit at a far slower pace than for women. Recent trends are more concerning, however: the number of degrees conferred to men has largely remained stagnant since 2012, as Figure 2 shows.
Figure 2
In what follows, we examine in more detail some specific areas of doctoral study: research doctorates (PhD) by field, medicine and health, and law.
PhDs
Men still account for the majority of research doctorates (PhDs), though the gender gap has shrunk considerably over time. Most of the decrease in the gender gap occurred before 2000, with the gender gap in the past two decades remaining mostly stable.
Figure 3
The trends vary by subfield. Men are still the majority in most STEM fields, such as computer sciences (74%), engineering (73%), and math and statistics (73%). Biological and biomedical sciences are the only STEM fields where men are in the minority (44%). The gender share has shifted in some fields, for example the share of engineering PhDs going to men has dropped from 91% to 73% over the past thirty years. However, the number of men has still increased.
Meanwhile fields of study like psychology and education are now overwhelmingly female: men earn just 25% and 27% of research doctorates in psychology and education, respectively. They have seen a drop in both the male share and number of male recipients, as shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4
Medicine and Health
Over the past forty years, medical schools have seen a rise in enrollment from women and a more uneven pattern for men. Until recently, however, men have accounted for the majority of medical students. That pattern has changed in the last few years however, as Figure 5 shows.
Figure 5
In 2021, women became the majority of medical school graduates: since then, their share has continued to grow. In 1981, the matriculating class of medical students was 75% male; in 2024 it was only 47%. The absolute number of men graduating medical school declined from 1980 to 2006, then rose again until around 2016 when the numbers started to dip again.
Other health disciplines have also seen a decline in their male share. Men are now in the minority in dental, pharmacy and veterinary schools, as Figure 6 shows.
Male Stagnation in Health Subfields
Figure 6
While the male share is now below 50% in all three fields, in dental school and pharmacy school that’s because the absolute enrollment rates for men rose more slowly than for women. Since 1980, the number of men enrolling in dental school has risen by 10%, compared to a rise of 130% for women, for example.
But in veterinary school the male share has plummeted in large part because the absolute number of men enrolling has declined by about 40% over the past forty years, while female enrollment has risen by about 400%. Veterinary medicine has essentially become a female profession in the space of a few decades.
Law
Law schools have seen a similar gender shift, as Figure 7 shows. In 1970, over 90% of law students were men. Since then, women have seen a substantial rise in their enrollment while male enrollment has fluctuated. In 2016, women became the majority of law students for the first time. In 2022, men were 44% of law students.
Figure 7
Again, this is not just a case of changes in shares but in absolute terms too. Rates of enrollment declined for both men and women in the Great Recession. They have since bounced back for women but continued on a downward trend for men.
Looking Ahead
The continued educational advance of women, including at the doctoral level, is a clear and unambiguous success. And it will take time for these gains to translate into more gender equality in the respective professions. Women still account for only 41% of full-time tenured professors, 39% of lawyers and 37% of physicians. Over time, these professions will reflect the changes in the educational and professional pipeline.
The story for men is more troubling, however. Male rates of enrollment in various doctoral and professional degrees have risen more slowly, stagnated or even fallen. Of course there is no “right” share of men or women in these fields. The goal is not to force-fit the gender balance to an arbitrary number. But if there are large and growing gaps in the share of men and women, this warrants attention from institutions and policymakers: whether that is in STEM PhDs or veterinary school. And if the gender balance is being driven by declining absolute enrollment rates among men, for example in medical schools, this should act as a warning sign.
Huge progress has been made over recent decades in reducing gender gaps, in large part because of the rise of women. This is good news. Care should now be taken to reduce the risk that new gender gaps open up in the opposite direction.
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