Gender Distribution of Degrees in Religion
- In 2014, 45% of religion degree completers at the bachelor’s degree level and 46% at the master’s degree level were women (Indicator II-54a). This represents a modest increase in the share earned by women at both levels in 1987 (near 40%). The highest recorded share earned by women at both levels was 49.7%, reached in 2005 at the bachelor’s level and 2002 at the master’s level.
- The share of women earning doctoral degrees in religion was almost 15 percentage points higher in 2014 than in 1987 (39.5% as compared to 24.9%).
* Degree shares do not include second majors.
Source: U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, National Center for Education Statistics, Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS). The IPEDS data were accessed and analyzed via the National Science Foundation’s online science and engineering resources data system, WebCASPAR.
See the Note on the Data Used to Calculate Humanities Degree Counts and Shares, the Note on the Definition of Advanced Degrees, and the Degree Program Code Catalog for an inventory of the specific degree programs included by the Humanities Indicators under the heading of “Religion.” Unlike the other disciplines profiled in the Humanities Indicators, for which basic degree completion data are available going back to 1966, counts of religion degrees are available only from 1987 onward. (Until the late 1980s, religion degrees were combined by the National Center for Education Statistics, the collector of these data, with those conferred in religious studies.)
