The German Doctoral Candidates and Doctorate Holders Study ProFile

Abstract

Introduction and background This paper provides an overview of the longitudinal data set of the German Doctoral Candidates and Doctorate Holders Study ProFile which is available for analysis to researchers interested in the topics of doctoral training and careers of doctorate holders. ProFile was developed against the background of a lack of information with regard to the conditions of doctoral training and careers of doctorate holders in Germany and the aim to also provide decision makers from academia, science and science policy with a sound empirical basis, encourage debates and support them with data. In Germany the focus of the discussion lies mostly on the structural weaknesses of doctoral training and its organization (

A conceptual framework for studying science research careers

“…• ProFile-panel data on training conditions and preferred occupational activities of doctoral candidates in German universities (Lange et al 2016); • The European Tertiary Education Register (ETER), structured as a database of characteristics of higher education institutions in Europe; and • The Leiden Ranking of major universities worldwide.…”

“…The data from the MORE2 survey has been used to address the dynamics of return mobility of European researchers (Cañibano et al 2017) and are currently also under exploitation, to study mobility profiles by research career stage and to address the potential association between international mobility and career progress (Cañibano et al 2016). Profile has been used to analyze how different formats of doctoral training prepare doctoral candidates for research careers (Hauss et al 2015;Ambrasat and Tesch 2017), as well as the individual and institutional determinants of the post-PhD job-placement of doctorate holders (Lange et al 2016). The development of open datasets platforms like the RISIS infrastructure offers the possibility of 'aggregating' datasets allowing sets conceived separately and for different purposes to enrich each-other when 'common' or 'linking' variables exist.…”