Are PhDs getting harder? [The worrying trends]

In this video, I share with you whether or not PhDs are getting harder. We look at it from a range of different angles.
▼ ▽ Sign up for my FREE newsletter
Join 19,000+ email subscribers receiving the free tools and academic tips directly from me:
andrewstapleton.com.au/newsle...
▶ Become a Master Academic Writer With AI using my course: academy.academiainsider.com/c...
▶ Use my Ultimate PhD Kickstart: 12 Point Success System for Aspiring PhDs to start your PhD strong: academy.academiainsider.com/c...
▶ My best KZbin advice curated into an an easy to follow course, Effortless Academia: academy.academiainsider.com/c...
▶ Applying for a PhD? Get my FREE PhD application resource pack to apply with confidence: www.subscribepage.com/freeapp...
▶ Learn what I wish I had known before starting my PhD in my ebook bundle: academiainsider.com/ebook-bun...
................................................
▼ ▽ TIMESTAMPS
0:00 - introduction
0:59 - getting into a PhD position
3:55 - finding research gaps
5:59 - expectations
7:48 - job prospects
10:11 - self-sabotage
Innovation in PhD completion: the hardy shall succeed (and be happy!): doi.org/10.1080/0729436070165...
................................................
▼ ▽ TOOLS
▶ Best PhD Writing Tool - Writefull - link.andrewstapleton.com.au/w... (Get 10% off with my link)
▶ Avoid plagiarism - Quillbot - link.andrewstapleton.com.au/Q...

[@me0101001000]

I'd like to mention why I've decided to do my PhD in Germany rather than the US. I have a deep admiration and respect for the way Americans do their PhDs. They are discovering new things, making a real life impact, and creating successful businesses from their work. I think all of that is amazing, and I want to do things like that at some point as well. But for the purposes of doing a PhD, I feel like it misses the point of research. I think research is an inherently selfish endeavor, where we seek out how deep we can delve into one thing, how thoroughly I can understand this one thing that I am extremely passionate about, how much I can complete the human understanding of an idea or concept, and innovation is just a by-product of that rather than a goal. American research and academic culture, at least in Physics, Chemistry, and Engineering, seems to prioritize real world impacts for the most part, whereas in the EU, particularly in Germany, the main star of the show is seeing how deep the rabbit holes go. As much as I would love to make a real world impact, my main priority is developing a deep and thorough understanding of my field (organometallic electrochemistry).

[@JohnVKaravitis]

Your point, exactly?

[@me0101001000]

@@JohnVKaravitis the fact that PhDs are getting more and more difficult is exacerbated by the fact that research foci, at least in the US, are heavily industry driven. You can't build an entire line of work that is focused on innovating and innovating and innovating. I just think it's quite sad that funding is granted not by how much a project can further our understanding of a certain phenomenon, but instead by what makes the biggest splash in the real world. That's not the point of academic research, that's for industry to do. I think academic and industrial research can cross paths from time to time, but I think their purposes should remain distinct. In short, I am blaming the increasing difficulty of PhDs on the industrialization of academic research.

[@jonnybingham1]

@@JohnVKaravitis I think he said his point? And explained it well. What is your point, to coin your question?

[@andso7068]

@@JohnVKaravitis I think his point was pretty clear- while both countries have rigorous and robust processes for their PhDs, the priority for PhDs in one country is of greater alignment with his own interests than the other.

[@prapanthebachelorette6803]

I like these interesting discussions

[@amitlavon1647]

I think getting a PhD today is easier because... we have Andy Stapleton's youtube channel! I learn so much from your channel and other online resources regarding scientific reading and writing, presentation skills, handling failure etc. This makes my PhD progress much easier and helps me deliver high quality research. So I'd say PhD's today are easier but also better.

[@emmanuelameyaw9735]

😂😂

[@simonebrioschi6822]

Hi Andy, this is Simone. I'm doing my postdoc in immunology in US. The ultimate goal of PhD students is to get a paper (hopefully a good paper) so they can move on with their career. I've been in the field for almost 10 years and I can say that publishing a good paper today is much harder compared to some years ago. Working hard and producing remarkable results is often not enough. This situation is probably due to the increasing competition among research labs and aggressive editorial policy. The editors' job is to boost the citations of their journal, and only a given number of papers can get accepted every year. Therefore editors became more and more selective, and the probability of being directly rejected from the editorial board is increasing. If your lab doesn't have funding to afford the most advanced technologies on the market, or your PI is not a big name in the field, it will be hard for you to pass the editor's selection, regardless the importance of your scientific question and quality of your data. My answer to you is "yes, definitely". PhDs are becoming harder, and one of the reasons is that the standards for a good publication are increasing, and therefore it is more difficult to publish compared to some years ago.

[@engineeringvision9507]

Also China.

[@sirmclovin9184]

@@engineeringvision9507 Care to elaborate?

[@engineeringvision9507]

@@sirmclovin9184 It has created vastly more papers than a couple decades ago which is why most papers just get lost in the noise. China and to some extent India are also why working conditions are so terrible for PhD students and earlier lecturers. There is basically an infinite supply of really great people who will happily do that job in the UK for a visa and a mars bar. PhD's have even less bargaining power than someone at Mcdonalds or Tesco because those require a work visa and the PhD student only a student visa! PhD students in the UK mostly work for below minimum wage when you set their £15k salary against the amount of hours they do plus the unpaid writing up period and of course no 25 days off! I'd argue that the system is pretty broken because people aren't building on the work of others to make new science, they are just trying to get more pubs for the sake of it. It's quite a common problem actually where a metric is used to measure success in meeting a goal, but people end up optimising for the metric and forget all about the goal! One paper that outlines practical results from a teleporting machine for example, is probably more valuable than the total sum of all social sciences papers, but in the academic system the latter is vastly more valuable the former is just one 5 star paper.

[@sirmclovin9184]

@@engineeringvision9507 While I quite disagree with your example, I very much do agree with your view that the system is broken and to some degree why it is broken. It seems (and I may be wrong) that those Chinese students aren't in it primarily for getting an academic position in the West though, but rather for getting one in China---which is agreat way to import Western knowledge.

[@ernstuzhansky]

Thanks for the video! What my supervisor have been telling me all the years of my PhD: people should know you by sight. Give presentations, talk to people at the conferences, help others. When you are writing a letter to ask for a Postdoc or discuss job opportunities and people know you personally is completely different from the case when they get a letter from someone they have never seen before.

[@MrGTO86]

Do the PhD if you're passionate about exploring your subject matter. But supplement it with financial management skills. That's if you want to go into industry.

[@magr590]

Just now I am procrastinating watching your video on my phone when I should be writing my next paper haha

[@nicholaschia5681]

The Likert scale is largely used in in the humanities, social sciences and psychological research

[@SabiAll]

am in love with your jumper! I also adore your channel. am a lecturer at a UK uni, and I send many prospective PhD applicants who are unsure about why they are getting into a PhD to your channel. great content !

[@DrAndyStapleton]

Oh thank you! I made the jumper myself! Thank you for the support and sending students to my channel.

[@anthonyl6185]

I'd be interested in your thoughts on 'Pre-Docs'? I saw one pre-doc opportunity for Economics at the University of Zurich and found it worrying as it basically prolongs the PhD even more.

[@alicewyan]

Bear in mind that many European countries have 3 year PhD programs, so these usually help with the fourth year funding issue.

[@thecodechugger53]

In tech, academia is falling more and more behind in research, which is why some of the greatest papers nowadays (in the field of CS at least) are produced by tech giants like Google, Meta, Amazon, etc. As a result, getting a PhD is, in my opinion, the minimum qualification for working in R&D.

[@janakidevi9177]

I am also doing PhD.where are you getting difficulty? I am feeling difficulty In writing. Only in writing or in all including guide? Just for sharing and understand the problems.

[@JohnVKaravitis]

@@janakidevi9177 English, please.

[@emmanuelameyaw9735]

​@@JohnVKaravitis don't play stupid though...english doesn't make you smart.🙂

[@sethhu20]

they have money

[@janakidevi9177]

@@JohnVKaravitis tell clearly sir? I didn't understand.

[@aliensinmyass7867]

My PhD is just a technical qualification for me. I did a research placement at a biotech company and I NEED a PhD to have any kind of career progression. The company I worked for was 80% PhDs, they use that as a selling point on their website. Everyone I talked to in industry told me to get a PhD, and all the industry jobs say they'd like candidates to have a PhD. If you don't have one then you hit a career ceiling fast. I have no intention on staying in academia, and from my experience working in industry, doing job interviews, and looking through job search websites, they only care about skills, and not about publications. So industry jobs are more abundant, pay more, are more stable, and don't require publications. So why does anyone stay in academia at all? (This is my experience in UK biotech/pharmaceuticals, I don't know about other fields)

[@Loumo]

Idealistically, academia, especially professorship, sounds amazing for those who genuinely enjoy the pursuit of knowledge. It would literally be my dream job to teach university level students and be on the cutting edge of human discovery, as an expert in the field I’m most passionate about (auditory neuroscience in my case!). Realistically, you bump into the pressure to publish or perish. The often insane expectations in hours and output. The relatively abysmal pay. The instability of the postdoc treadmill. And if all that doesn’t break the fantasy (and it doesn’t for many), the 1% survival rate from PhD to professorship means in most cases it doesn’t even matter because you wouldn’t get there anyway. With all that said, some people still can’t accept not at least trying their best to go through all this process, because their passion for it is that strong. Either that or they’re oblivious to all this/wilfully ignorant/taking the path of least resistance as Andy mentioned before. But my point is I definitely see the appeal if you look at it idealistically. (I’m just a 1st year phd student idk anything, just my observations so far)

[@Loumo]

Would like to add, it’s encouraging to hear about your experience in the UK - that’s where I am too. Good to know there’s demand for PhDs. If you have any tips about anything at all please feel free!

[@parth17bhatia]

Thank you!

[@timothyrday1390]

Andy, it would be useful if you could get a guest to come on to discuss the difference between the PhD experience in the humanities/social science fields versus STEM. I am always intrigued and fascinated by your information, but the experience is so different in many ways that it would be an interesting avenue to explore.

[@MariNate1016]

Getting a PhD is easy ?? *me who’s been rejected two cycles in a row in poli sci starts sweating* Lol. Fixed my SoP up a lot better for this year and waiting to get some feedback from a former prof

[@bignose3639]

Thank you

[@giampierolopresti41]

Could you provide the list of research engines for papers you mentioned in the description? Thanks

[@alia1413]

The term "academic slavery" comes to mind!

[@stampederealty]

At what stage, in your opinion, do you think the term would start to apply?

[@pascalfriedmann1479]

I applied to 11 marketing/entrepreneurship PhD positions in Germany (10) and Ireland (1) and got 6 admissions, none of which offered me a starting salary of $40,000 or less (which I know is more than I would be making in North America). Pretty much everyone who gave me a first interview after seeing my application materials made me an offer. It's not like I'm outrageously smart (in fact, I've been out of academia for a few years before I came back to get a Master's more recently). There are just very few applicants who meet the minimum requirements professors - who are the direct hiring managers in those systems - are looking for in PhD students, which evidently includes a track record of wanting to pursue a career in research.

[@splatsma]

I think in the Humanities theres more gaps than ever before. My area of focus is a religion/history/international diplomacy angle and only has a handful of researches around this topic. Very easy to have niches in.

[@engineeringvision9507]

How many papers moaning about Brexit and calling White people racist does the world really need? I'm sure they've covered all the gaps in that by now.

[@cryora]

My thesis was like 300 pages and was full of meticulously created colored figures, including 3D figures. My advisor's thesis was like 100 pages and had no color. Then again, his thesis looked like it was made with a typewriter.

[@lilywang7228]

I am a 2nd year applied math Ph.D. working on three different projects with a 7-month-old baby at home. It can be challenging to understand theory deeply when I have to switch tasks frequently. But (fortunately and unfortunately) people in the US just love to see real-world applications rather than theory. Sometimes I ask myself what the point of getting a Ph.D. if I cannot understand theory deeply. Why don't I just spend these years in industry. I do feel passionate about what I am doing.

[@tomreddel2466]

I largely disagree about the statement that PhDs are easier to get into. The distrubution of undergraduate grade awards has never been so negatively skewed with more and more people coming out with 2.i and 1.1 awards, which are typically the requirements for a PhD. This is likely very subject specific but, in my fields of interest (particle physics & cosmology), there are many candidates whom apply and funding is very select and rationed appropriately. I have applied for 5 positions in the last year where I have been in competition for positions with people holding multiple master's degrees, and there was one individual (who got the position) already holding a PhD. There is absolutely nothing incorrect about what has been said by Andy but there are just a lot more factors involved than the interests of the academic heirarchy as well as the overall increase in PhD programmes being available.

[@Brockdorf]

I wonder if it is just PhDs that are less creative. Here is my example/perspective. In accounting in the US, during the year you graduate, you go to a Rookie Camp. Last year there were 160 students and 65 universities (Basically all R1). During the weekend, everyone has to spend 15 minutes explaining what their dissertation is on. The majority of people are doing the same thing, most people were doing some level of text mining to compare what corporate reports are stating as compared to what companies are posting on social media. Sure this is an interesting topic, but very few dissertations really wowed you--there were some though that blew your mind. The ones that blew your mind were from random schools, and not one blew my mind from Harvard, Yale, MIT etc.

[@Bananananamann]

If everyone does the self-sabotage stuff, why do we call it something negative? Why can't we just love ourselves for once?

[@epotnwarlock]

20 papers? Certainly there is a material difference in quality?

[@Pauli650]

In the IT industry managers treat a PhD like another course work degree. They definitely don't treat it as "experience". So you kind of start 4-5 years behind the rest of the pack.

[@janakidevi9177]

I feel difficulty in writing Andy. I watched all your videos. What should I do? Please give reply. Always hiding from my guide with this problem. Please help me out.

[@Joeyykins]

What is the title of the self-sabotaging paper/document?

[@DrAndyStapleton]

Linked in the comments

[@trevoryingwane5714]

Hard truth especially when one is in the process.

[@johnbarryyallagher1128]

Sounds like different approaches between engineering and science. Not to say one it more worthy than the other

[@jurajtrecer6733]

could someone tell me what was the name of a first tool on looking for research gaps? Subtitles are showing illicit.

[@DrAndyStapleton]

It's elicit.org

[@jurajtrecer6733]

@@DrAndyStapleton Thank You

[@kinanauk5012]

You r totally right about the transition after PhD and it all in the hand of the supervisor ... just ass kissers find their way easily🥲

[@onenonlyheart]

haha you mean kissing supervisor as* is the easiest way

[@alekseimarianov3388]

10-20 papers during the PhD? This is unacceptable. What about in excess of 150? I know of one example like this.

[@syednobin2779]

Even the comment section of this channel is more insightful.

[@MRAgundli]

Please anyone can explain how to get admission in PhD computer science?

[@sivamaths]

Where are you from? And in which institute you want to join?

[@MRAgundli]

@@sivamaths I live in Latvia and I want to do phd in data science from Netherlands .

[@dr.emilyacevedo812]

I finished my PhD in June. The work is getting harder and harder.

[@gdatomic]

congrats! flexing the doctor title I see

[@Loumo]

What work?

[@on_in_five]

I am still debating whether or not doing a PhD, DBA or just running with MBA that I am about to get. 🤔

[@HaydenHatTrick]

Also doing an MBA

[@on_in_five]

@@HaydenHatTrick hope you are enjoying it.

[@HaydenHatTrick]

@@on_in_five It's definetly needed a whole new set of skills.

[@on_in_five]

@@HaydenHatTrick yeah, it takes time to adjust (for me anyway). After speaking to my course mates, as I have been working with them by explaining some stuff, and my professor just about the project made me think about perhaps taking some of this or any other research forward.

[@HaydenHatTrick]

@@on_in_five I definetly think the MBA provides a lot of value. It's sad there is a culture for picking on it and/or saying it is only for networking.

[@GeoffryGifari]

in the video it was said that getting a *worthwhile* PhD is harder... what kind of criterias fit into this category? thanks!

[@DrAndyStapleton]

One that will have concrete positive impact on your future career. A lot of the time a person can get the job they end up with without a PhD

[@Loumo]

@@DrAndyStapleton What about potential doors it unlocks further on in one’s career? The first job they get may not need a PhD but maybe later on its value would show? Genuinely asking, I don’t have enough data on this.

[@akshatrastogi9063]

Social media leads to procrastination..hands down!

[@elrondmcbong467]

As my father said, a good carpenter can bring it further than a bad academic.

[@abhishekcp2024]

You missed the cheap clerical job by offering TA 😂

[@johnbarryyallagher1128]

Use your own imagination and broad knowledge and reading to find gaps. Automating gaps seems like the foundations of the science is known. It is not. Look at or imagine what could or are the unstated implicit assumptions. By definition cannot be automated. Then look a those argue the consequences or prediction then go out and test how important with data

[@radiant92023]

😍🙏🙏🙏

[@adaptercrash]

They getting easier, you take 3 courses a semester and 7 years to write a PhD? You could have a house and a family by then. I gotta guy who wrote mine when I was 3, and it was pretty good.

[@workforyouraims]

I think most PhD positions are a waste of time. Most professors are dumb, they have just managed to play politics right publishing rubbish. In certain universities working with the right professors I think it can be a really interesting endeavor.

[@JohnVKaravitis]

THIS is the best post on this KZbin video. Don't bother reading any of the others. :discussionclosed:

[@emmanuelameyaw9735]

most people are dumb including professors, plumbers, bankers, bakers, truck drivers, youtubers...etc. The distribution is the same irrespective of area of work...so why focus on professsors, huh?🥱

[@workforyouraims]

@@emmanuelameyaw9735 I used to think professors deal with science and they are intellectuals. I was young and naive. They are stupid as fuck.

[@workforyouraims]

@@emmanuelameyaw9735 also this video talks about academia not plumbers

[@olumideayeni6347]

Finding gaps isn't difficult. Think about the many disease that still haven't been cured yet....

[@Scott21]

I was told to write 5 papers in 2 years for my Master's

[@yemiojo2265]

How is that possible?

[@cyn1clcynide]

When are you supposed to do your masters then?

[@Pauli650]

sure, there is a conference for every paper. Just how low are you willing to go.

[@johnbarryyallagher1128]

You are forgetting personal self fulfillment, much a stoic philosphy

[@emmanuelameyaw9735]

If you advisor always give deadlines...you can't procrastinate.😊

[@ejb2865]

Ouch... I don't like this video

[@ImtiyazAlam-ws8yd]

Are you a Jewish

[@shakespearaamina9117]

Thank you!