The graphic compares the number of universities ranked within the top 200 globally across three specific disciplines for the US, the UK, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada, based on data from 2011.
What is most striking when looking at the chart is the USA’s dominance, boasting the highest number of top-200 universities in all three subjects. This contrasted sharply with New Zealand, which recorded the smallest figures across the board.
Looking first at the US and the UK, they significantly outstripped the other three in terms of representation. The US had an impressive 69 universities ranked within the top 200 for biology, 54 for medicine, and 58 for psychology. These figures were about double those for the UK, which had 30, 24, and 29 universities ranked in the same disciplines respectively.
Turning to Australia and Canada, these countries presented broadly comparable figures. In the discipline of biology, each had 9 universities featured in the global top 200. As far as medicine and psychology are concerned, Australia held a slight edge over Canada, with 13 and 17 universities ranked, respectively, compared to the latter’s 12 and 14.
Finally, only in New Zealand were there fewer than 10 institutions appearing in the world top 200 for each subject. Only 6 New Zealand universities were ranked for biology, while the figures for psychology and medicine were even lower, with only 4 and 2 universities achieving top-200 status, in that order.