It’s official: If you want to be happy after uni, you should have studied one of these courses

When you pick your degree all young and naïve in sixth form, you normally end up being one of two people. The first is the people who pick something because they know it’s gonna make them rich in a couple of years after graduating and the second is people who just pick something they enjoy because they can’t think of a single thing they want to do with their life. For the second kind of students (the best kind) it’s the most expensive way to give yourself a couple of years to work everything out. But which type of student actually ends up being happiest in the long run?

Well, consultancy firm PwC analysed data from over 84,000 graduates who graduated in the last 10 years. The grads were asked to rate their current well-being on a scale of one to ten with one being not at all satisfied with life and 10 being completely satisfied. The results were controlled for age, sex, health, religion and nationality.

Of the 35 degrees studied, 28 of them were found to have a positive impact on the grads’ lives with graduates for eight courses reporting feeling less happy after completing their degrees. You can find out the most miserable grads here.

But taking the top spot for the happiest grads is actually Celtic studies. Celtic studies can be studied at Glasgow University as well as Oxford and Cambridge and looks at the history and culture of Celtic-speaking people. I’m seriously gonna need them to spill their secrets right now.

Closely following Celtic studies in happiness are sports science and medicine and dentistry grads.

Dr Geraldine Parsons, head of the Celtic studies department at the University of Glasgow said: “It’s wonderful to hear of the very high levels of life satisfaction enjoyed by graduates of Celtic studies. It attracts passionate, engaged students with strong investment in their personal, community and other group identities. I think that this translates into careers and leisure activities that give individuals a lot of happiness.”

So these are the uni degrees producing the happiest graduates, in 2023:

20. Computing – 0.09

19. Biosciences – 0.1

18. Chemistry – 0.11

17. Business – 0.13

16. Economics – 0.15

15. Health and social care – 0.15

14. Geography – 0.16

13. Engineering – 0.16

12. Architecture and planning – 0.17

11. Agriculture and food – 0.19

10. Maths – 0.19

9. Allied health – 0.2

8 Nursing – 0.22

7. Veterinary science – 0.23

6. Education – 0.25

5. Medical sciences – 0.25

4. Pharmacology – 0.29

3. Medicine and dentistry – 0.35

2. Sports science – 0.37

1. Celtic studies – 0.4

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