Disciplinary divides: exploring the development of political interest across academic disciplines

Abstract Personal political interest is key to being an active citizen in a democracy, but not everyone develops it equally. Although higher education is often seen as a main factor in promoting political engagement, recent studies have questioned how much it really matters, pointing instead to self-selection and field-specific educational experiences. This study brought together several theories and applied growth curve analysis using data from the German National Educational Panel Study (NEPS) to examine how academic disciplines affect political interest over time. We found that political interest differed by discipline, but these differences changed only modestly over time. In terms of absolute levels, cultural fields showed the highest, followed by STEM and business fields, and lastly service fields. Regarding trajectories, cultural fields showed the greatest growth, followed closely by STEM and service fields. Business fields displayed a surprising U-shaped growth, suggesting a complex interplay between self-selection and discipline-specific socialization. Persistent gender gaps across disciplines further indicated that higher education alone did not overcome structural disadvantages. Overall, our findings challenge simplified assumptions about the politicizing role of higher education and highlight the importance of pre-college characteristics and context-specific pathways in individual political development.