Can You Get Multiple PhDs? Should You Even Try?

Can you get more than one PhD? Or I guess the corollary is is it advisable to get more than one PhD? The simple answer is yes, you can get more than one. You can get 4, 5, 6, 8 PhDs if you want to. And there's nothing stopping you other than being accepted into programs, having time and having money. But other than that, yes, feel free to get more than one PhD. Now let's talk about is it advisable to get more than one PhD? Because if you stop and think about it, in a PhD program, I cover material, but I also learn research and how to question and the research process and the scientific method. Theoretically, I could just apply that to another area, especially today where knowledge is so much more easily available. If getting a second PhD is about garnering more knowledge, you may be able to do that on your own. However, if getting a PhD or a second PhD or doctorate of any kind is about perhaps changing careers, let's say I've got a PhD in economics. I've got this burning desire to teach physics. Well, that PhD in economics is not going to get me into a physics department. So I have to have a degree in field from the area I'm going to be teaching in order to move over there. And a lot of that depends upon schools and their levels of accreditation. They ask, do your teachers have degrees in field? In that case, then Maybe getting a second PhD may be advisable for you. On the career change front, if you look at people who have multiple degrees, sometimes there are people like MDs and PhDs in an know related field and that's understandable. An MD is not a research degree. It's about treating humans and getting all that knowledge. Whereas a research degree is about applying the scientific method. I see a number of people who have MDs and then get PhDs because they want to go deeper into doing research. I've also heard of cases of international students who can only be here on a student visa and want to stay. They finish a degree, you can only push it out so long so they get another degree in order to continue staying on a student visa. There are also cases, although these may be rare, where you need a specific type of certification. And that certification is demanding, so much time consuming that a number of people have said, well, I'll just get the Ph.D. in order to to fulfill that requirement. The one thing I want to mention, technically, when you have a doctorate, you are either a Dr. Steve Tippins or Steve Tippins PhD. You are not both unless you have multiple doctorates. So If I wanted to get another doctorate, I could be Dr. Steve Tippins, PhD. But right now I'm either Dr. Steve Tippins or Steve Tippen's PhD. What are some of the difficulties of getting a second doctorate degree? I've been a student, I got a doctorate and then I finished and I was welcomed into the union, so to speak, as a doctor. And now to go back and be a student again might be a difficult transition for you to make. To then be in that uneven power differential of your committee. And you. You've already been through it. You may even have been a committee member. Now you're deciding to go back through it again. Your skills as a researcher are transferable so you can do the research. Interdisciplinary research is also possible so you can find people within a field who you can do research with without having to take the years to get another doctorate degree. In my experience, I've had one client who's gotten two doctorates. They got a second doctorate because they found that the field that they were going into was limited and had limited job opportunities, but they did want to teach at a university, so they got a second doctorate to move into a different field and have the credibility to jump into a different field. I haven't seen a lot of other people get multiple degrees other than the MD PhD route, because if it's going to take me four or five years to get a degree, think of all the work I can get done during those four or five years on my career. It's a decision that has to be based on your unique situation and considering as many factors as possible. If someone came to me and said, I'm considering a second doctorate, I would say, I think you need to think about a number of things. One is the time. It's going to take a certain amount of time to do that. What are you going to be doing during that time? Are you going to continue the job you have right now and therefore make getting the degree longer? Are you in the position where you can take off and just immerse yourself in a degree and maybe be three to five years of full time? Is it you're looking for a new career? What's that career look like? You also get degrees for you for personal reasons. So I would be thinking, what are the personal reasons why I'm getting a degree? Because it may not financially make sense, but it may be what I promised my grandfather, or it's going to make me feel better about certain things, or going to allow me to publish in areas and have some credibility that I want to publish in. So there's a number of things you want to consider. If you're going to be looking at getting a second degree, is it better to get a second PhD or a master's in a new field? That question has multiple answers. If I'm looking to become a faculty member, master's isn't going to do it at most institutions. So I may have to get a second PhD in a different field to be able to switch and teach in a different area. If I'm looking at knowledge, I can get the master's for the knowledge. And I already have the skill set that I've developed as a researcher in my first PhD. So there may be a strong reason to get the masters in order to build my knowledge base because I still have the skills. I've already accumulated them to be a researcher who actually needs multiple doctorates. Other than getting a second career, a second approach into academia, or being an MD, wanting to be a researcher and getting a PhD or another type of practical doctorate like a JD, a law degree. If I want to move into law, there aren't a lot of other reasons to just say I'm going to go get a second doctorate other than personal fulfillment. I've been asked sometimes what's the difference between a double PhD or a joint or dual degree. You see a lot of schools that have mba, JD dual degrees where you save a little bit of time and get an MBA and a law degree, but that's not a dual doctorate. You don't see a lot of places. You might see some MD, PhD type program, but other than that, I don't see a lot of PhD, PhD in education and in chemistry or other areas like that. So if there's a logical reason for the dual degrees, people have put them together. You don't see a lot of demand for people getting second PhDs. And look, if 2% of the population in the United States has a PhD, you're only pulling from those 2% in order to come up with your second thing, your second degree program. There's not a huge demand that schools are going to say, we got to fill that. Another question that arises is what do employers think of a second PhD? A second PhD is kind of meaningless if I'm going to go teach chemistry. However, if the second PhD is what allowed me to get there, great. But they're not really going to be thinking a lot about the first doctorate. If I'm a medical researcher, then yeah, the MD and the PhD is going to be highly sought after by, let's say, a drug company who's developing drugs and wants someone who understands the human body but also is deeply versed in the research process. McDonald's, on the other hand, probably isn't going to or Uber isn't going to think a lot of a double PhD. An interesting question is how do I address somebody with two HT's? Dr. Dr. Tippins, how you do? No, you cleared the threshold. You're a doctor. That's it. There's. I've never heard anybody called Doctor Doctor. So a slight variation is instead of just one person with multiple doctorates, what if I'm addressing seven people who have doctorates? You can either say, hello, Dr. Jones, hello, Dr. Smith, hello Doctor or Doctors Collective, how are you? Hello Doctors. Without giving individual name, hello doctors and others. If you are in the middle of the doctoral process or thinking of jumping into getting a doctorate, join our live community where we support people in your position. There are live Q&As, there's course materials, there's group support and expanding services in order to support you on your journey to get your doctorate. Hi, I'm Steve Tippins. I've been in academia for over 35 years. I've sat on over 300 dissertation committees in various roles, and my goal in life right now is to help people finish their degrees so they can go out and change the world. Come on and join us. Just click the link below if you're looking for more information.