Are science degrees considered harder than humanities/arts degrees?

[LoniceraJaponica]

DD has been deiscussing with her boyfriend that the degree she wants to do (biomedical science) has a lot of contact hours (upwards of 21 hours a week dependig on where she goes).

He has been crowing that he will have about 9 or 10 hours a week (history). Obviously there is lab work to take into consideration for DD, and both degrees rely on a lot of self study. Is the BF deluded that he is going to have a much easier ride?

My biochemistry degree had 24 hours contact time per week and we expected to do a further 14 hours self directed time. Realistically it took 14 hours to write up and submit the experimental work for 4 modules of experiments and more time on top to study around the subjects and complete other assignments. It was the same for the other science subjects.

The arts and humanities has significantly less contact time and were always horrified but the amount of work we had.

I did an intercalated BSc in biomedical science. I found it all fairly straightforward. I got a First.

I also did an MBBS which was harder but doable.

I would have really struggled with something like a BA in English Literature.

DS1 is about to start a degree course in History. My understanding is that for every lecture/seminar, they are expected to do about an hour of pre-reading and a further hour of follow-up work. That would make his workload 27-30 hours a week, not including time for writing essays and assignments.

I don’t think I really did misunderstand your question, OP.

However if he does work less for his History degree, and plenty of students get a rude awakening about the quality of their essays, he may find he needs to work hard and up his hours to improve.

Your original question rather implied science was harder judged on the contact hours. Obviously this is not the case. Reading and essays and prep for seminars take time. Different skills are required to be successful at this.

DH did Civil and Structural Engineering and that’s 30 hours a week plus. Was it harder than History? Not for him. Would many History grads have done Engineering, probably not.

@TheThirdOfHerName

My Ds did History. He reckoned he put in as many hours as scientists he knew , but he had to organise those hours himself. There were those who thought , just because I am not in a lecture / seminar / tutorial my time is my own.

I agree with Bubbles - different skills required. One of which is ( simplistic but true) , just because you are working in your room , don't let everyone who has just finished a lecture think Oh Basilisk Junior will be about , we'll pop in for a coffee - 3 people do that every day and you've lost half your day's working. Ds used to squirrel off to library to get some peace and quiet.

Sorry Bubbles I think the BF is a wee bit complacent about how much effort he is going to need. He actually told DD that he would have more time to party than she would.

You would think that after the wake up call of his A level results (DD did much better than he did because she put in more hours of revision) that he would have worked it out by now.

DD would really struggle to do a history degree, so she would find it harder than a science degree.

It isn't a case of one being more difficult than another, though - it depends where your aptitude lies.
If you are good at humanities, then of course a Science degree would be difficult. If you are a 'natural' mathematician, then doing a languages degree would be difficult, and so on and so forth.

I doubt if your dd's bf will even get 9 hours contact time. Ds didn't in his history degree. He will have to be much more self motivated than your dd, to get the appropriate number of hours study in. Some people like the fact they can choose their hours, and choose where and when to be studying. Others find it easier to have the 'discipline' of a lot more contact time, and be in the lab, and lectures, seminars, tutorials, etc on a regular 9 - 4 sort of basis. (21 hours seems low to me for BioMed??).
So no, Science isn't necessarily more difficult, just different from History.

Oh, and the bf isn't necessarily fooling himself, just joking about with her.

At my uni, you will get 8 hrs standard contact time for a history degree, but that is not counting your tutor's office hour, or regularly scheduled meetings to discuss essay writing or feedback. Also, if one of your modules is a language (modern or dead) you'll get 3 hours for that- which would add up to 9. Mine could definitely not get away with a couple of hours extra reading per lecture: I tell them to think of it in terms of a 40 hr week.

Was it Rutherford who said that "Physics is knowledge everything else is stamp collecting"?
So a science degree is learning, and arts degree is just the ability to churn out what others have told you

Sigh. And so the two cultures continues. Lets hope he's just joking, if so she can joke back about her higher earning potential.

More seriously, tell her from me (scientist in Pharma with 20 years experience) that she should try and get significant lab experience as soon as possible. Do a year in industry or do a summer project in a lecturer's lab.

Thank you CountFosco. I have already said she should do a degree with a year's work placement rather than just a straight 3 year degree.

Yes! If she can get a year in industry that will be incredibly helpful. Everyone I knew who did it (I didn’t have the option) found it a huge boost.
The networking, experience and practical knowledge is key. Both the practical knowledge of how the work is but also the exposure to the workplace. If she has a choice between an academic lab and industry I’d choose industry

Not harder, but certainly more contact hours. My degree had only 6 hours of lectures each week, though lots of background reading.

The lads who lived next door who did biochemistry had more like 9-4pm every day lectures/practicals though actually, thinking about it- they still had a lot of background reading to do and essays to write. Theirs was more like being at school.

Well, lonicera: parties happen in the evenings. My DH partied hard and did loads of gigs as he played in a band. High contact hours don’t stop you having fun! I don’t really understand what the problem is! Let him believe what he wants to believe. Your DD has done well and he’s messed up a bit. So what! She might mature and ditch him. Win win all round then!

Bubbles, I dont know when your DH was at University. I assume some time ago. Nights out clubbing now seem to start at around midnight and finish at 4.00am. Yes there are prees and pre-prees, but DD usually had to drop out when others were just getting started. It is different for science students, at what might be considered 'party' universities.

Yes I do know hours have slipped. Cheap student nights are often midweek too which isn’t helpful. However, the point I was trying to make, despite DH’s extreme age, was that there is time to play hard even on the most demanding of degrees. It doesn’t have to be nose to the grindstone 24/7 and even if clubbing isn’t what you can do, students find other ways to have a good time.

Just finished first year doing biomedical sciences at a RG uni. This year peaked at 27 hours I think. But I'd easily be working another 20 hours of self study outside of lectures and labs. A lab report could easily take the whole weekend (I say whole maybe five hours each day) with course work maybe another 3-4 hours and test revision note rewriting etc would fill the rest of my time. It's full on but you get value for money. I preferred it over history / English student work because it was all scheduled. I know what needs doing and when.

"She might mature and ditch him."

That's what I am hoping.
The problem is that DD doesn't have the stamina to party every evening and get up early, so what your husband was capable of Bubbles is irrelevent.

Whether a science/engineering type degree is 'harder' than an arts/humanities type degree obviously depends on the individual student, but it was generally the case when I was at uni decades ago, and still seems to be the case now for DD and her cohort, that the former do tend to have less time for extracurricular activities including partying than the latter.

Theirs was more like being at school.

Or even like being at work. I did a Masters after a couple of years working long hours, uni was again 9-5 every day but getting labs etc done and written up by staying on an extra hour in the evening was easier than work. Plenty of those that came straight from their first degree struggled.

I think they are just different in that for some (not all) arts/humanities subjects, 'knowledge' is just less important that a highly developed, sophisticated essay style and you might have come across some of the content before (for instance, if you were already very well read in English literature, history etc). So a certain type of person can do pretty well by harnessing those skills and previous knowledge. Whereas for other subjects, there is no way you'll get away without intense memorisation of models, facts and approaches that are pretty unlikely to be part of prior knowledge - the hours aren't easily shave-able. So some subjects favour a certain kind of precocity a bit more. Obviously, working your arse off does little harm in any subject though.

Whereas for other subjects, there is no way you'll get away without intense memorisation of models, facts and approaches that are pretty unlikely to be part of prior knowledge - the hours aren't easily shave-able.

Plus, the practical lab work, plus the problem sheets - science/engineering you need to be able to understand and do hard stuff with objectively correct solutions. Putting in the hours is necessary but not sufficient to get good grades.

I've done both. I've got an undergraduate chemistry degree and also studied humanities first year undergrad too. There was so much reading for the humanities that it basically took up all the time I would have had contact in my chemistry degree.

Poor lad, he's just a little boy lost, isn't he? Who knows, maybe it's bravado, after having the stuffing knocked out of him by missing his grades and not getting into his university of choice. He'll work it out eventually.

I speak as an arts student - my lack of subject ability notwithstanding, I'd have found all the labs quite taxing, but I imagine if you're enjoying what you're doing, it's not so bad. A lot of scientists would rather saw their arm off than work their way through the average reading list, let alone then distil it into an essay (not doubting their capability of doing so, just their interest/motivation!) so anyone who can manage a foot in both camps, I doff my cap to.

For me, I would always consider the 'other' discipline harder than my own.

To your question LoniceraJaponica, I think objectively, yes, in terms of attendance in a lecture hall, or in front of a tutor, or, in the inital terms, submitting work, BF will have an easier ride than DD, stuck in labs. Of course, the consequences of being given all that freedom is that he will then criminally underperform in his exams, and risk ending up with an indifferent class of degree, if he doesn't recognise that coasting on his own brilliance has already cost him his first choice university, will he then let it cost him his first choice class of degree?

I feel very sorry for him - it sounds like he has a lot of growing up to do. Hopefully he can do so before his time at uni turns out to have been a waste.

Your DD's hours sound similar to mine (second year Biological Sciences). Of course, they vary. Last semester I had 28 hours per week. This semester I have 22. Next one there will be 29.
I haven't gotten involved in any labs yet, but they require a minimum of 15 hours of dedication per week, so the hours add up rather fast.

I'm always very impressed at people who manage to party and study with those hours. It's probably my antidepressants making me sleepy, but 8 hours of rest don't feel enough.