The italian consortium AlmaLaurea, that represents 75 italian Athens with 91% of the Italian academic students, published on September, 2017 a report describing the “PhD-world” in Italy.

PhD: WHO ARE THEY?

54% of the people who obtained the PhD is female. On average they complete the PhD program at 32.9, even if nearly half of them are not older than 30 and 23% are less than 29 years old.

PhD: WHY?

81% of the new Phd said that thy enrolled in a PhD program after graduating because they wanted to refine up their cultural and scientific training. 47% of them judged as important the research and study activities cunducted in Academy, 39% the improvement of their professional outcomes, 34% the achievemet of a grant to support their activities, and finally 31% of them considered important the activities conducted outside the academia.

TO GO OR NOT TO GO?

Experiences abroad are an important topic: 48% of the new PhD spent voluntary a period outside Italy to collaborate with experts (53%), to work on their PhD thesis or to use specific laboratories or methodologies (respectively, 13% and 12%). The overall satisfaction for such training abroad was very high (a mean of 8.8 on a 1-10 scale).

PhD, WHAT AFTER?

After obtaining the PhD title, 32% aims at beginning an academic career, in Italy or abroad; 18% would like to hold a highly specialized position in a public or private company, 17% expect to go on with their research activities.

The original article and the full reports are available here (content only in Italian).