Data for the annual Survey of Earned Doctorates from the National Science Foundation shows gender differences in financial support for students who earn doctoral degrees.
For instance, 42.6 percent of men who earned doctorates in 2025 had served as research assistants. Only 30.7 percent of women doctoral recipients served as research assistants. Men were also more likely than women to have served as teaching assistants while pursuing their doctorates.
About one out of every five women who earned a doctorate paid for their degrees primarily from their own funds or savings. For men who earned doctorates in 2025, 11.1 percent used their own funds or savings as the primary source for paying for their education.
Just over 60 percent of all women who earned doctorates in 2025 had no education-related debt when they earned their terminal degree. For men, 66.2 percent had no education-related debt. The median graduate education debt for women was $45,000. Men who earned doctorates in 2025 had an average graduate student debt of $25,000.
Of all women who earned doctorates in 2025, 4.5 percent had student debt of more than $160,000. For men, 2.6 percent of all doctoral recipients had student debt exceeding $160,000.