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• The median age of new humanities and arts Ph.D.’s was 34.2 years in 2020—almost three years older than the median among new doctorate recipients generally (31.5 years; Indicator II-28a). Only doctoral degree recipients in education had a higher median age (38.5 years).
• From 1994 to 2020, the median age of new doctoral degree recipients in all fields combined declined by 2.6 years, from 34.1 to 31.5. In the humanities and arts, the median age fell by 1.5 years, from 35.7 to 34.2—similar to every other field except education, where the median fell by more than five years (from 43.6 to 38.5).
• In the humanities and arts, 22% of new doctoral degree recipients in 2020 were age 30 or younger, as compared to 68% of the graduates in physical/earth sciences and 36% of those in the behavioral/social sciences (Indicator II-28b). A substantial plurality of new Ph.D.’s in the humanities and arts, 39%, were ages 31–35—the largest share in that age group for any field. Another 18% of humanities and arts Ph.D.’s were over 40. The only field with a larger share of degree recipients over 40 was education.
• Throughout the 2010–2020 time period, the median age of women earning humanities and arts Ph.D.’s was modestly lower than that of men (33.8 years versus 34.4 years in 2020; findings not visualized). Similarly, a comparison of the broad disciplinary categories within the humanities employed by the data collector1 revealed only small differences in age at receipt of the doctorate across the ten-year period.

Endnotes

• 1The compared disciplines are history, languages and literatures other than English, and “Letters.” The latter encompasses: American literature (U.S. and Canada); classics; comparative literature; creative writing; English language; English literature (British and Commonwealth); rhetoric and composition; and speech and rhetorical studies.