Just over a third of students drop out of their PhD before it has been completed because of social reasons, a report published by the Swedish National Agency for Higher Education on 29 February claims.
Such social reasons include a difficulty to combine the PhD studies with family responsibilities, long-term illness and simply not liking the work.
The second biggest factor is the rigour of the doctoral education itself, the ‘Reasons why students leave the graduate programme without a degree’ report says.