New Ideas Concerning Arts and Social Studies Vol. 8

Although women’s participation in higher education has increased, gender differences persist across academic levels and fields of knowledge. This study examines gender differences among master's and doctoral graduates from the University of Guadalajara during the 2021–2025 period. The findings show that, although women's participation in higher education has increased, this growth does not eliminate segmentation by field of knowledge or inequalities at the highest academic levels. The research questions guiding the study were: What is the gender distribution among postgraduate degree recipients? How does gender participation change between master's and doctoral programmes? Which fields of knowledge show a greater concentration of women or men? Are there gender differences by locality in postgraduate studies? Which postgraduate programmes show the greatest and smallest gender disparities?

A database was created using publicly available information on degrees awarded by the institution during the study period, and data for 6,969 graduates were analysed using descriptive statistics. The results show an overall distribution of 50.9% women and 49.1% men. Women represented 51.7% of master's graduates, whereas men represented 52.7% of doctoral graduates. In exact sciences and engineering, men predominated, accounting for 67.8% of master's graduates and 70.5% of doctoral graduates. In contrast, women predominated in health sciences, representing 59.6% of master's graduates and 58.3% of doctoral graduates. Most graduates completed their studies in the Guadalajara Metropolitan Area. Additional findings show that the number of doctoral graduates increased from 180 in 2021 to 380 in 2025, although men remained the majority at this level. The greatest disparities appeared in engineering, computing, physics, public health, psychology, nutrition, behavioural science, and human genetics. However, several programmes, including behavioural science, chemistry, business finance, social sciences, local development, biotechnology, and pharmacology, reached near or complete gender parity. Thus, the gender gap in postgraduate education is not uniform; it depends on degree level, field of knowledge, locality, and the specific postgraduate programme.