A bar graph showing research students across five subjects in 2005

The bar chart illustrates how many male and female research students studied six different subjects (linguistics, psychology, natural sciences, engineering, programming and mathematics) in 2005.

Overall, there were more male research students than females in 2005. Although the most popular subject for both genders was natural sciences, men least preferred linguistics and women showed little interest in mathematics. Linguistics was the only subject that was favoured by women more than men.

There was a similar number of men and women in three subjects. There were equal numbers in research students (200) studying natural sciences. There was a difference between the genders of about 25 in both psychology and linguistic with more women learning linguistics (around 110) and more men taking psychology (200). .

A difference of about half was evident in engineering and programming where 150 men chose both subjects. By contrast, 200 men selected mathematics which was approximately five fold that of women (about 40).