[a_136_chiffa]

> The baseline percentage of the population which experience depression (and other mental illness) each year is known to be pretty high -- and highest in for people in their 20's. One third sounds fairly normal; at any rate, there is a burden here to show that this is an exceptional proportion.

There has been a study in Belgium that showed that Grad students had a relative risk of psychological disorder scored according to a questionnaire used to decide whether psychological/psychiatric care is needed were about 5x times more at risk than the general population, even when matched for the age, education attainment and several other known common confounding factors for mental health disorders. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S004873331...

> If you are starting from an undergraduate degree, you probably need at least two years to take the PhD intro classes. One year to start a research program might work in a subject like the author's where your papers are chats about social implications, but there are plenty of subjects where even the data collection is going to take longer than that.

In Germany, you need a master's to start a PhD, as such your classes load is minimal...

> Being a professor is only one possible goal and for some fields, it isn't even the primary one.

Not according to the professors mentoring you. That's changing, but the normal consideration is that if you are not on a tenure track, you are a failure. If you acknowledge it, quite often you will lose the support of your PI and your peers.