4 ms·

A lot of this seems ridiculous: > Mental health issues are rife: approximately one-third of PhD students are at risk of having or developing a psychiatric diso

by knappa 8y ago

A lot of this seems ridiculous: > Mental health issues are rife: approximately one-third of PhD students are at risk of having or developing a psychiatric disorder like depression. The baseline percentage of the population which experience depression (and other mental illness) each year is known to be pretty high -- and highest in for people in their 20's. One third sounds fairly normal; at any rate, there is a burden here to show that this is an exceptional proportion. > For instance, a PhD in Germany is supposed to take three years, according to university regulations, but most students need five years to complete one. If you are starting from an undergraduate degree, you probably need at least two years to take the PhD intro classes. One year to start a research program might work in a subject like the author's where your papers are chats about social implications, but there are plenty of subjects where even the data collection is going to take longer than that. > In the US, meanwhile, the average completion time for a PhD in education sciences surpasses 13 years. These programs are dominated by people who are working teachers, working on PhDs part-time. > One study found that for every 200 people who complete a PhD, only seven will get a permanent academic post and only one will become a professor. Being a professor is only one possible goal and for some fields, it isn't even the primary one.

eli_gottlieb 8y ago
>If you are starting from an undergraduate degree, you probably need at least two years to take the PhD intro classes. One year to start a research program might work in a subject like the author's where your papers are chats about social implications, but there are plenty of subjects where even the data collection is going to take longer than that. In Germany, you need a Master's with the coursework done before starting a PhD.
- mcguire 8y ago
  Right. The first two years of our graduate program were "breadth" and "depth" courses. After that, you could exit with a Masters or do PhD research.
chrisseaton 8y ago
> If you are starting from an undergraduate degree, you probably need at least two years to take the PhD intro classes. Outside of the US, I don't think most PhD students take 'classes'. In Europe a PhD is purely a research degree.
- roel_v 8y ago
  In Europe you won't get hired if you only have an undergrad degree.
  - quietbritishjim 8y ago
    Putting aside the fact that this is clearly untrue, what does it have to do with the parent or GP comment?
    - roel_v 8y ago
      By Europe I meant 'mainland Europe', where it is very exceptional to get hired in any PhD position without a masters. So you've already taken 5 years of classes, which is what the gp was talking about. Very few continental PhD's will be taking any classes.
      - detaro 8y ago
        GP assumes with no reason the "starting from an undergraduate degree", where the article is quoting 5 years for the PhD only, not for masters + PhD.
jderick 8y ago
According to this website, the baseline for depression in America is 6.7%. http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/conditions/depression http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/conditions/depression 1/3 is not normal at all.
- timbre 8y ago
  The article says 1/3 are "at risk" of depression. It looks like the statistic is based on a web survey (https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/9ac3/478bc1263be53f5150a54b3f6c65b0c333fe.pdf https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/9ac3/478bc1263be53f5150a54b...), so I suppose they couldn't do an actual diagnosis.
- ikeyany 8y ago
  Your article says 6.7% of Americans have a depression in a given year, not that 6.7% of Americans get depression at all. That can very well mean 1/3 of Americans get depression over their entire lives, and a PhD program would seem like the time to get it.
- MrEfficiency 8y ago
  Ive theorized the people getting a PhD are not your average american. Most college grads finish school and go into industry. My peers who went onto get PhDs without going to industry were... different. Not necessarily super smart, but not the best socially or in leadership positions. I can think of 3 people that were getting their PhDs in engineering, but I thought they were average students at best. One was an average to below average working with me on labs. Another was just a goofy weirdo, I couldnt be friends with him because he'd shoo me away. Another was somewhat a brainiac, but to a fault, He'd get As, but didnt really have friends from what I could tell. I imagine lots of this is correlation not causation, and that things are different at big names schools.
  - rotexo 8y ago
    My experience was the opposite. The people in my PhD program (at an upper-tier state institution) were far better thinkers in my field (biology) than the people in my major at an upper-tier liberal arts college (who, granted, were largely pre-med).
ApostleMatthew 8y ago
I agree with your latter two points, but I must take issue with your first point about mental health. I've posted some links below for your further reading which can explain the stressors better than I can, but graduate school is a breeding ground for mental health problems -- you have constant pressure to always be working (often up to 80-100 hours a week), constantly comparing yourself intellectually to other graduate students, and dealing with the overbearing reminder that you need to take a candidacy exam and defend your thesis. As a poster above said, 30% is absolutely not normal for society as a whole. Most articles point out the dearth of students who seek help, which I don't think is uncommon, but what is uncommon is the additional stressors. I don't know if you've been through a PhD program, but as someone who has, it's really difficult to explain the pressures and stress that you encounter during it to someone who hasn't. https://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2014/02/paying-graduate-schools-mental-toll https://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2014/02/paying-graduate-s... https://psychcentral.com/blog/highlighting-mental-health-in-grad-students/ https://psychcentral.com/blog/highlighting-mental-health-in-...
occamrazor 8y ago
The Bologna system, adopted almost uniformly in rhe EU and other European countries, has three levels of university degrees: Bachelor, 3 full time years; Masters, Bachelor + 2 years or rarely high school + 5 years without an intermediate Bachelor; PhD, Master + 2-4 years, but mostly 3 years. Integrated Master + PhD degrees are extremely rare.
a_136_chiffa 8y ago
> The baseline percentage of the population which experience depression (and other mental illness) each year is known to be pretty high -- and highest in for people in their 20's. One third sounds fairly normal; at any rate, there is a burden here to show that this is an exceptional proportion. There has been a study in Belgium that showed that Grad students had a relative risk of psychological disorder scored according to a questionnaire used to decide whether psychological/psychiatric care is needed were about 5x times more at risk than the general population, even when matched for the age, education attainment and several other known common confounding factors for mental health disorders. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048733317300422 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S004873331... > If you are starting from an undergraduate degree, you probably need at least two years to take the PhD intro classes. One year to start a research program might work in a subject like the author's where your papers are chats about social implications, but there are plenty of subjects where even the data collection is going to take longer than that. In Germany, you need a master's to start a PhD, as such your classes load is minimal... > Being a professor is only one possible goal and for some fields, it isn't even the primary one. Not according to the professors mentoring you. That's changing, but the normal consideration is that if you are not on a tenure track, you are a failure. If you acknowledge it, quite often you will lose the support of your PI and your peers.

by knappa 8y ago

eli_gottlieb 8y ago

>If you are starting from an undergraduate degree, you probably need at least two years to take the PhD intro classes. One year to start a research program might work in a subject like the author's where your papers are chats about social implications, but there are plenty of subjects where even the data collection is going to take longer than that. In Germany, you need a Master's with the coursework done before starting a PhD.

mcguire 8y ago
Right. The first two years of our graduate program were "breadth" and "depth" courses. After that, you could exit with a Masters or do PhD research.

chrisseaton 8y ago

> If you are starting from an undergraduate degree, you probably need at least two years to take the PhD intro classes. Outside of the US, I don't think most PhD students take 'classes'. In Europe a PhD is purely a research degree.

roel_v 8y ago
In Europe you won't get hired if you only have an undergrad degree.
- quietbritishjim 8y ago
  Putting aside the fact that this is clearly untrue, what does it have to do with the parent or GP comment?
  - roel_v 8y ago
    By Europe I meant 'mainland Europe', where it is very exceptional to get hired in any PhD position without a masters. So you've already taken 5 years of classes, which is what the gp was talking about. Very few continental PhD's will be taking any classes.
    - detaro 8y ago
      GP assumes with no reason the "starting from an undergraduate degree", where the article is quoting 5 years for the PhD only, not for masters + PhD.

jderick 8y ago

According to this website, the baseline for depression in America is 6.7%. http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/conditions/depression http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/conditions/depression 1/3 is not normal at all.

timbre 8y ago
The article says 1/3 are "at risk" of depression. It looks like the statistic is based on a web survey (https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/9ac3/478bc1263be53f5150a54b3f6c65b0c333fe.pdf https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/9ac3/478bc1263be53f5150a54b...), so I suppose they couldn't do an actual diagnosis.
ikeyany 8y ago
Your article says 6.7% of Americans have a depression in a given year, not that 6.7% of Americans get depression at all. That can very well mean 1/3 of Americans get depression over their entire lives, and a PhD program would seem like the time to get it.
MrEfficiency 8y ago
Ive theorized the people getting a PhD are not your average american. Most college grads finish school and go into industry. My peers who went onto get PhDs without going to industry were... different. Not necessarily super smart, but not the best socially or in leadership positions. I can think of 3 people that were getting their PhDs in engineering, but I thought they were average students at best. One was an average to below average working with me on labs. Another was just a goofy weirdo, I couldnt be friends with him because he'd shoo me away. Another was somewhat a brainiac, but to a fault, He'd get As, but didnt really have friends from what I could tell. I imagine lots of this is correlation not causation, and that things are different at big names schools.
- rotexo 8y ago
  My experience was the opposite. The people in my PhD program (at an upper-tier state institution) were far better thinkers in my field (biology) than the people in my major at an upper-tier liberal arts college (who, granted, were largely pre-med).

ApostleMatthew 8y ago

I agree with your latter two points, but I must take issue with your first point about mental health. I've posted some links below for your further reading which can explain the stressors better than I can, but graduate school is a breeding ground for mental health problems -- you have constant pressure to always be working (often up to 80-100 hours a week), constantly comparing yourself intellectually to other graduate students, and dealing with the overbearing reminder that you need to take a candidacy exam and defend your thesis. As a poster above said, 30% is absolutely not normal for society as a whole. Most articles point out the dearth of students who seek help, which I don't think is uncommon, but what is uncommon is the additional stressors. I don't know if you've been through a PhD program, but as someone who has, it's really difficult to explain the pressures and stress that you encounter during it to someone who hasn't. https://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2014/02/paying-graduate-schools-mental-toll https://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2014/02/paying-graduate-s... https://psychcentral.com/blog/highlighting-mental-health-in-grad-students/ https://psychcentral.com/blog/highlighting-mental-health-in-...

occamrazor 8y ago

The Bologna system, adopted almost uniformly in rhe EU and other European countries, has three levels of university degrees: Bachelor, 3 full time years; Masters, Bachelor + 2 years or rarely high school + 5 years without an intermediate Bachelor; PhD, Master + 2-4 years, but mostly 3 years. Integrated Master + PhD degrees are extremely rare.

a_136_chiffa 8y ago

> The baseline percentage of the population which experience depression (and other mental illness) each year is known to be pretty high -- and highest in for people in their 20's. One third sounds fairly normal; at any rate, there is a burden here to show that this is an exceptional proportion. There has been a study in Belgium that showed that Grad students had a relative risk of psychological disorder scored according to a questionnaire used to decide whether psychological/psychiatric care is needed were about 5x times more at risk than the general population, even when matched for the age, education attainment and several other known common confounding factors for mental health disorders. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048733317300422 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S004873331... > If you are starting from an undergraduate degree, you probably need at least two years to take the PhD intro classes. One year to start a research program might work in a subject like the author's where your papers are chats about social implications, but there are plenty of subjects where even the data collection is going to take longer than that. In Germany, you need a master's to start a PhD, as such your classes load is minimal... > Being a professor is only one possible goal and for some fields, it isn't even the primary one. Not according to the professors mentoring you. That's changing, but the normal consideration is that if you are not on a tenure track, you are a failure. If you acknowledge it, quite often you will lose the support of your PI and your peers.