Doctoral Students’ Life Satisfaction Throughout the Covid-19 Pandemic: Inequalities by Parenthood and Gender

Abstract While large and highly societally relevant, the group of doctoral students still plays a subordinate role in the well-being literature. To narrow this research gap, we investigate how their life satisfaction (LS) trajectories developed throughout the Covid-19 pandemic in Germany. We draw on set-point, adaptation, family, and gender theories to examine doctoral students’ LS trajectories before, at the onset of, during, and after the pandemic. Thereby, we consider not only shorter-term but also longer-term consequences of the pandemic. Analysing data from the German National Academics Panel Study (Nacaps) through fixed-effects (FE) panel regression models, we find that doctoral students’ LS decreased – first moderately, then substantially – in the two years after the onset of the pandemic. Thereafter, however, their LS re-approached pre-pandemic levels again. Importantly, parenthood and gender substantially moderated doctoral students’ LS trajectories. Among doctoral students with children, the decline in LS at the onset of and during the Covid-19 pandemic was stronger than among childless doctoral students – especially for mothers. While childless doctoral students re-attained their pre-pandemic levels of LS after the pandemic, doctoral students with children remained below their pre-pandemic level. These results suggest that individuals strongly reacting to a critical life event might not or only slowly return to their baseline level of LS. On a broader note, our results illustrate the need to apply a long-term social inequalities perspective to fundamentally understand how well-being trajectories unfold during crises scenarios.