It is a truth universally acknowledged: Fewer and fewer university students are studying physics. According to figures released by the American Institute of Physics (AIP), the number of physics bachelor degrees awarded each year in the US fell by more than 20% in the 1990s. 1 The absolute decline in the number of students studying physics is a recent trend, but the relative unattractiveness of physics as a field of study is a long-term phenomenon. Even with the dramatic increases in physics enrollments during the 1960s, the number of physics bachelor degrees awarded annually since 1955 has gone up by only a factor of three. Over the same period, the number of bachelor degrees granted overall has increased more than ninefold!
Similar patterns are repeated in other countries, for example, in Australia 2 and Germany. 3 And it is not just physics that is suffering this way. Trends in chemistry...
