what is phd thesis

• What Is a PhD Thesis?
• Doing a PhD

This page will explain what a PhD thesis is and offer advice on how to write a good thesis, from outlining the typical structure to guiding you through the referencing. A summary of this page is as follows:

• A PhD thesis is a concentrated piece of original research which must be carried out by all PhD students in order to successfully earn their doctoral degree.
• The fundamental purpose of a thesis is to explain the conclusion that has been reached as a result of undertaking the research project.
• The typical PhD thesis structure will contain four chapters of original work sandwiched between a literature review chapter and a concluding chapter.
• There is no universal rule for the length of a thesis, but general guidelines set the word count between 70,000 to 100,000 words .

What Is a Thesis?

A thesis is the main output of a PhD as it explains your workflow in reaching the conclusions you have come to in undertaking the research project. As a result, much of the content of your thesis will be based around your chapters of original work.

For your thesis to be successful, it needs to adequately defend your argument and provide a unique or increased insight into your field that was not previously available. As such, you can’t rely on other ideas or results to produce your thesis; it needs to be an original piece of text that belongs to you and you alone.

What Should a Thesis Include?

Although each thesis will be unique, they will all follow the same general format. To demonstrate this, we’ve put together an example structure of a PhD thesis and explained what you should include in each section below.

Acknowledgements

This is a personal section which you may or may not choose to include. The vast majority of students include it, giving both gratitude and recognition to their supervisor, university, sponsor/funder and anyone else who has supported them along the way.

1. Introduction

Provide a brief overview of your reason for carrying out your research project and what you hope to achieve by undertaking it. Following this, explain the structure of your thesis to give the reader context for what he or she is about to read.

2. Literature Review

Set the context of your research by explaining the foundation of what is currently known within your field of research, what recent developments have occurred, and where the gaps in knowledge are. You should conclude the literature review by outlining the overarching aims and objectives of the research project.

3. Main Body

This section focuses on explaining all aspects of your original research and so will form the bulk of your thesis. Typically, this section will contain four chapters covering the below:

• your research/data collection methodologies,
• your results,
• a comprehensive analysis of your results,
• a detailed discussion of your findings.

Depending on your project, each of your chapters may independently contain the structure listed above or in some projects, each chapter could be focussed entirely on one aspect (e.g. a standalone results chapter). Ideally, each of these chapters should be formatted such that they could be translated into papers for submission to peer-reviewed journals. Therefore, following your PhD, you should be able to submit papers for peer-review by reusing content you have already produced.

4. Conclusion

The conclusion will be a summary of your key findings with emphasis placed on the new contributions you have made to your field.

When producing your conclusion, it’s imperative that you relate it back to your original research aims, objectives and hypotheses. Make sure you have answered your original question.

Finding a PhD has never been this easy – search for a PhD by keyword, location or academic area of interest.

How Many Words Is a PhD Thesis?

A common question we receive from students is – “how long should my thesis be?“.

Every university has different guidelines on this matter, therefore, consult with your university to get an understanding of their full requirements. Generally speaking, most supervisors will suggest somewhere between 70,000 and 100,000 words . This usually corresponds to somewhere between 250 – 350 pages .

We must stress that this is flexible, and it is important not to focus solely on the length of your thesis, but rather the quality.

How Do I Format My Thesis?

Although the exact formatting requirements will vary depending on the university, the typical formatting policies adopted by most universities are:

What Happens When I Finish My Thesis?

After you have submitted your thesis, you will attend a viva . A viva is an interview-style examination during which you are required to defend your thesis and answer questions on it. The aim of the viva is to convince your examiners that your work is of the level required for a doctoral degree. It is one of the last steps in the PhD process and arguably one of the most daunting!

For more information on the viva process and for tips on how to confidently pass it, please refer to our in-depth PhD Viva Guide .

How Do I Publish My Thesis?

Unfortunately, you can’t publish your thesis in its entirety in a journal. However, universities can make it available for others to read through their library system.

If you want to submit your work in a journal, you will need to develop it into one or more peer-reviewed papers. This will largely involve reformatting, condensing and tailoring it to meet the standards of the journal you are targeting.

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Masters Thesis vs. PhD Dissertation: Key Differences

Whether you are a graduate student just starting out in academia or a professor advising a student, making the distinction between a dissertation and a thesis is critically important to writing a strong dissertation and becoming a stronger writer. Unfortunately, the difference remains unclear since the terms are used interchangeably by graduate students, doctoral researchers, academic publishers & universities.

If you’re not sure whether you’re writing a thesis or a dissertation, this article will help you understand the differences between the two whether you’re a PhD or master’s degree student.

Main Differences Between a Dissertation and a Thesis

While theses and dissertations share many similarities (they are both advanced graduate research papers), they actually refer to two different types of academic writing, and their differences include important concepts such as scope, purpose, length, and research requirements.

Most importantly, the difference between a thesis and a dissertation depends on the level of education. Far beyond being a simple essay, a thesis is for graduate students pursuing a master’s degree while a dissertation is written by doctoral students, also referred to as PhD candidates.

There are a few key differences between a thesis versus a dissertation.

The biggest difference between a thesis and a dissertation is that a thesis makes arguments based on existing research. Meanwhile, a dissertation often requires the PhD candidate to conduct research and then perform an analysis.

More specifically, a thesis often takes the form of a literature review , which is a compilation of research knowledge in a particular field of study that proves one is competent in that subject. On the other hand, a dissertation is a more specific type of research paper written by those working toward a specific doctorate degree that contributes knowledge, theory, or methods to a field of study.

What is a master’s thesis?

A master’s thesis is an academic research paper that requires a greater degree of research than an undergraduate thesis or term paper. It is marked by a higher standard of writing, and students are expected to demonstrate competence, literacy, and mastery of a subject. It usually takes two or three years to complete. Finally, a master’s degree thesis is usually written in order to obtain a research degree and is not intended to be published separately.

What is a PhD dissertation?

A PhD dissertation is a substantial piece of independent research that is required of all students who are pursuing a doctorate degree. It is a piece of original work that has not been published elsewhere and, most importantly, makes a new contribution to the field. This contribution may be a new way of thinking about an existing topic or even a novel theory. The research performed for a dissertation is usually conducted over a period of several years to half a decade.

Features of a Master’s Thesis vs PhD Dissertation

Content and Structural Differences

So how is dissertation writing different from thesis writing?

Now that you know the definitions of a dissertation and thesis, let’s dive into some clear ways in which they differ in structure and other main characteristics.

How long is a thesis vs dissertation?

Length is the most obvious factor in differentiating between writing a thesis or dissertation. 

Generally, a doctoral dissertation has greater breadth, depth, and intention than a master’s thesis since it is based on original research. While the standard length of a master’s thesis is around 100 pages , a doctoral dissertation can be upwards of 400-500 pages. 

While most students can finish their PhD dissertation or thesis in as little as 1-2 years, it can take as long as 7 years depending on the school, program, and dissertation topic. As doctoral programs have their own formatting requirements, check with your school or university to find out what you need for your own dissertation or thesis. Most dissertations are organized into chapters, but the number of chapters varies as well.

Differences in research methods

A thesis and dissertation are both graduate-level research reports. This means they require students to investigate and report on a specific topic. But what is the difference in the scale of research between a master’s versus doctoral degree? The answer comes down to how much and what type of data you collect .

Data sources for a thesis vs dissertation

A master’s thesis is limited to secondary or reported knowledge . This knowledge has already been published, analyzed, and scrutinized in the literature. A thesis does not typically offer anything new in that regard. Your purpose is usually to write a comprehensive literature review on a novel or underreported topic using already-reported data.

On the other hand, a doctoral dissertation reports on  novel data  and is published so it can be scrutinized by others. It culminates in your dissertation defense.

The above lists clearly show that a PhD researcher and dissertation writer must have specific hands-on experience about not only the result of others’ research but also how the researchers obtained the data. A dissertation must venture into criticism of how other studies performed their experiments, whereas a master’s student will only report on and evaluate the results.

Differences in research scope 

As mentioned above, a thesis is more of a literature review written to demonstrate competence and mastery of a field of study. In short, you are a reliable “reporter” of information related to that subject. A thesis shows that you know the technical jargon, understand the subject, are familiar with industry tools, and can translate that information to a general audience. This is why a master’s degree is sufficient and often preferred for industry jobs.

In contrast, a doctoral dissertation goes beyond simply using the building blocks of your subject and actually creates new tools, knowledge, and theories to advance the subject as a whole. If a master’s degree holder is like a seasoned Rolling Stone journalist, then a doctorate is the band/musician who actually makes the music.

So should you pursue a thesis or a dissertation?

The benefits of earning a graduate degree are huge. According to the US Census Bureau , those with an advanced degree earn 3.7 times as much as a high school dropout, and 13.1% hold a master’s, professional, or doctorate degree. If you’re a curious undergraduate student thinking of applying to graduate school, which is the right choice?

In short, a dissertation is more focused and in-depth than a thesis. While a doctoral dissertation is based on original research, a thesis is often an extension or review of others’ research in order to demonstrate literacy. Further, a dissertation can be used as the basis or subject of a thesis, but not vice versa.

Editing a Dissertation vs Thesis

So far, we’ve focused a lot on differences such as research and purpose, but in the end, a thesis or dissertation is a written document that requires skill, focus, discipline, subject knowledge, organization, and scheduling. 

For non-native English speakers, the challenge is especially difficult since English is the lingua franca of academia and research. 

How does an editing service improve your dissertation or thesis ?

From body spacing and pagination, to font size and citation formatting, the dissertation guidelines are exhaustive. Even worse, they vary by school. So besides the actual English writing and grammar, graduate students must worry about consistency, formatting, nomenclature, and terminology. That’s quite the burden!

This is why it’s very common for graduate students, especially ESL and foreign ones, to seek out dissertation editing services that specifically cater to the academic needs of researchers and students.

Here are just a few reasons why dissertation proofreading is so helpful and what these editors do:

• Correct grammar, punctuation, syntax, and structural errors
• Offer suggestions to rewrite, remove, and revise writing
• Ensure formatting and nomenclature are consistent
• Knowledgeable academic editors with master’s and PhD degrees
• Free up your time to focus on research, revisions, and content instead of looking for mistakes
• Provide a  language editing certificate , which may be necessary for non-native English-speaking students

Lastly, most PhD advisors recommend that students seek out professional editing services , specifically thesis editing or dissertation editing , since professors prefer to assess the actual research content of a dissertation, not mundane writing errors. Any graduate student reading this knows professors don’t like their time to be wasted! 

Be sure to check out other academic resources on how to improve your academic manuscript and the benefits of proofreading and editing.

And try the Wordvice FREE Citation Generator, which provides citations for four academic formatting styles:  APA Citation Generator , MLA Citation Generator , Chicago Citation Generator , and Vancouver Citation Generator .

How To Write A Dissertation Or Thesis

8 straightforward steps to craft an a-grade dissertation.

By: Derek Jansen (MBA) Expert Reviewed By: Dr Eunice Rautenbach | June 2020

Writing a dissertation or thesis is not a simple task. It takes time, energy and a lot of will power to get you across the finish line. It’s not easy – but it doesn’t necessarily need to be a painful process. If you understand the big-picture process of how to write a dissertation or thesis, your research journey will be a lot smoother.  

In this post, I’m going to outline the big-picture process of how to write a high-quality dissertation or thesis, without losing your mind along the way. If you’re just starting your research, this post is perfect for you. Alternatively, if you’ve already submitted your proposal, this article which covers how to structure a dissertation might be more helpful.

How To Write A Dissertation: 8 Steps

• Clearly understand what a dissertation (or thesis) is
• Find a unique and valuable research topic
• Craft a convincing research proposal
• Write up a strong introduction chapter
• Review the existing literature and compile a literature review
• Design a rigorous research strategy and undertake your own research
• Present the findings of your research
• Draw a conclusion and discuss the implications

Step 1: Understand exactly what a dissertation is

This probably sounds like a no-brainer, but all too often, students come to us for help with their research and the underlying issue is that they don’t fully understand what a dissertation (or thesis) actually is.

So, what is a dissertation?

At its simplest, a dissertation or thesis is a formal piece of research , reflecting the standard research process . But what is the standard research process, you ask? The research process involves 4 key steps:

• Ask a very specific, well-articulated question (s) (your research topic)
• See what other researchers have said about it (if they’ve already answered it)
• If they haven’t answered it adequately, undertake your own data collection and analysis in a scientifically rigorous fashion
• Answer your original question(s), based on your analysis findings

In short, the research process is simply about asking and answering questions in a systematic fashion . This probably sounds pretty obvious, but people often think they’ve done “research”, when in fact what they have done is:

• Started with a vague, poorly articulated question
• Not taken the time to see what research has already been done regarding the question
• Collected data and opinions that support their gut and undertaken a flimsy analysis
• Drawn a shaky conclusion, based on that analysis

If you want to see the perfect example of this in action, look out for the next Facebook post where someone claims they’ve done “research”… All too often, people consider reading a few blog posts to constitute research. Its no surprise then that what they end up with is an opinion piece, not research. Okay, okay – I’ll climb off my soapbox now.

The key takeaway here is that a dissertation (or thesis) is a formal piece of research, reflecting the research process. It’s not an opinion piece , nor a place to push your agenda or try to convince someone of your position. Writing a good dissertation involves asking a question and taking a systematic, rigorous approach to answering it.

If you understand this and are comfortable leaving your opinions or preconceived ideas at the door, you’re already off to a good start!

Step 2: Find a unique, valuable research topic

As we saw, the first step of the research process is to ask a specific, well-articulated question. In other words, you need to find a research topic that asks a specific question or set of questions (these are called research questions ). Sounds easy enough, right? All you’ve got to do is identify a question or two and you’ve got a winning research topic. Well, not quite…

A good dissertation or thesis topic has a few important attributes. Specifically, a solid research topic should be:

Let’s take a closer look at these:

Attribute #1: Clear

Your research topic needs to be crystal clear about what you’re planning to research, what you want to know, and within what context. There shouldn’t be any ambiguity or vagueness about what you’ll research.

Here’s an example of a clearly articulated research topic:

An analysis of consumer-based factors influencing organisational trust in British low-cost online equity brokerage firms.

As you can see in the example, its crystal clear what will be analysed (factors impacting organisational trust), amongst who (consumers) and in what context (British low-cost equity brokerage firms, based online).

Need a helping hand?

Attribute #2:   Unique

Your research should be asking a question(s) that hasn’t been asked before, or that hasn’t been asked in a specific context (for example, in a specific country or industry).

For example, sticking organisational trust topic above, it’s quite likely that organisational trust factors in the UK have been investigated before, but the context (online low-cost equity brokerages) could make this research unique. Therefore, the context makes this research original.

One caveat when using context as the basis for originality – you need to have a good reason to suspect that your findings in this context might be different from the existing research – otherwise, there’s no reason to warrant researching it.

Attribute #3: Important

Simply asking a unique or original question is not enough – the question needs to create value. In other words, successfully answering your research questions should provide some value to the field of research or the industry. You can’t research something just to satisfy your curiosity. It needs to make some form of contribution either to research or industry.

For example, researching the factors influencing consumer trust would create value by enabling businesses to tailor their operations and marketing to leverage factors that promote trust. In other words, it would have a clear benefit to industry.

So, how do you go about finding a unique and valuable research topic? We explain that in detail in this video post – How To Find A Research Topic . Yeah, we’ve got you covered 😊

Step 3: Write a convincing research proposal

Once you’ve pinned down a high-quality research topic, the next step is to convince your university to let you research it. No matter how awesome you think your topic is, it still needs to get the rubber stamp before you can move forward with your research. The research proposal is the tool you’ll use for this job.

So, what’s in a research proposal?

The main “job” of a research proposal is to convince your university, advisor or committee that your research topic is worthy of approval. But convince them of what? Well, this varies from university to university, but generally, they want to see that:

• You have a clearly articulated, unique and important topic (this might sound familiar…)
• You’ve done some initial reading of the existing literature relevant to your topic (i.e. a literature review)
• You have a provisional plan in terms of how you will collect data and analyse it (i.e. a methodology)

At the proposal stage, it’s (generally) not expected that you’ve extensively reviewed the existing literature , but you will need to show that you’ve done enough reading to identify a clear gap for original (unique) research. Similarly, they generally don’t expect that you have a rock-solid research methodology mapped out, but you should have an idea of whether you’ll be undertaking qualitative or quantitative analysis , and how you’ll collect your data (we’ll discuss this in more detail later).

Long story short – don’t stress about having every detail of your research meticulously thought out at the proposal stage – this will develop as you progress through your research. However, you do need to show that you’ve “done your homework” and that your research is worthy of approval .

So, how do you go about crafting a high-quality, convincing proposal? We cover that in detail in this video post – How To Write A Top-Class Research Proposal . We’ve also got a video walkthrough of two proposal examples here .

Step 4: Craft a strong introduction chapter

Once your proposal’s been approved, its time to get writing your actual dissertation or thesis! The good news is that if you put the time into crafting a high-quality proposal, you’ve already got a head start on your first three chapters – introduction, literature review and methodology – as you can use your proposal as the basis for these.

Handy sidenote – our free dissertation & thesis template is a great way to speed up your dissertation writing journey.

What’s the introduction chapter all about?

The purpose of the introduction chapter is to set the scene for your research (dare I say, to introduce it…) so that the reader understands what you’ll be researching and why it’s important. In other words, it covers the same ground as the research proposal in that it justifies your research topic.

What goes into the introduction chapter?

This can vary slightly between universities and degrees, but generally, the introduction chapter will include the following:

• A brief background to the study, explaining the overall area of research
• A problem statement , explaining what the problem is with the current state of research (in other words, where the knowledge gap exists)
• Your research questions – in other words, the specific questions your study will seek to answer (based on the knowledge gap)
• The significance of your study – in other words, why it’s important and how its findings will be useful in the world

As you can see, this all about explaining the “what” and the “why” of your research (as opposed to the “how”). So, your introduction chapter is basically the salesman of your study, “selling” your research to the first-time reader and (hopefully) getting them interested to read more.

How do I write the introduction chapter, you ask? We cover that in detail in this post .

Step 5: Undertake an in-depth literature review

As I mentioned earlier, you’ll need to do some initial review of the literature in Steps 2 and 3 to find your research gap and craft a convincing research proposal – but that’s just scratching the surface. Once you reach the literature review stage of your dissertation or thesis, you need to dig a lot deeper into the existing research and write up a comprehensive literature review chapter.

What’s the literature review all about?

There are two main stages in the literature review process:

Literature Review Step 1: Reading up

The first stage is for you to deep dive into the existing literature (journal articles, textbook chapters, industry reports, etc) to gain an in-depth understanding of the current state of research regarding your topic. While you don’t need to read every single article, you do need to ensure that you cover all literature that is related to your core research questions, and create a comprehensive catalogue of that literature , which you’ll use in the next step.

Reading and digesting all the relevant literature is a time consuming and intellectually demanding process. Many students underestimate just how much work goes into this step, so make sure that you allocate a good amount of time for this when planning out your research. Thankfully, there are ways to fast track the process – be sure to check out this article covering how to read journal articles quickly .

Literature Review Step 2: Writing up

Once you’ve worked through the literature and digested it all, you’ll need to write up your literature review chapter. Many students make the mistake of thinking that the literature review chapter is simply a summary of what other researchers have said. While this is partly true, a literature review is much more than just a summary. To pull off a good literature review chapter, you’ll need to achieve at least 3 things:

• You need to synthesise the existing research , not just summarise it. In other words, you need to show how different pieces of theory fit together, what’s agreed on by researchers, what’s not.
• You need to highlight a research gap that your research is going to fill. In other words, you’ve got to outline the problem so that your research topic can provide a solution.
• You need to use the existing research to inform your methodology and approach to your own research design. For example, you might use questions or Likert scales from previous studies in your your own survey design .

As you can see, a good literature review is more than just a summary of the published research. It’s the foundation on which your own research is built, so it deserves a lot of love and attention. Take the time to craft a comprehensive literature review with a suitable structure .

But, how do I actually write the literature review chapter, you ask? We cover that in detail in this video post .

Step 6: Carry out your own research

Once you’ve completed your literature review and have a sound understanding of the existing research, its time to develop your own research (finally!). You’ll design this research specifically so that you can find the answers to your unique research question.

There are two steps here – designing your research strategy and executing on it:

1 – Design your research strategy

The first step is to design your research strategy and craft a methodology chapter . I won’t get into the technicalities of the methodology chapter here, but in simple terms, this chapter is about explaining the “how” of your research. If you recall, the introduction and literature review chapters discussed the “what” and the “why”, so it makes sense that the next point to cover is the “how” –that’s what the methodology chapter is all about.

In this section, you’ll need to make firm decisions about your research design. This includes things like:

• Your research philosophy (e.g. positivism or interpretivism )
• Your overall methodology (e.g. qualitative , quantitative or mixed methods)
• Your data collection strategy (e.g. interviews , focus groups, surveys)
• Your data analysis strategy (e.g. content analysis , correlation analysis, regression)

If these words have got your head spinning, don’t worry! We’ll explain these in plain language in other posts. It’s not essential that you understand the intricacies of research design (yet!). The key takeaway here is that you’ll need to make decisions about how you’ll design your own research, and you’ll need to describe (and justify) your decisions in your methodology chapter.

2 – Execute: Collect and analyse your data

Once you’ve worked out your research design, you’ll put it into action and start collecting your data. This might mean undertaking interviews, hosting an online survey or any other data collection method. Data collection can take quite a bit of time (especially if you host in-person interviews), so be sure to factor sufficient time into your project plan for this. Oftentimes, things don’t go 100% to plan (for example, you don’t get as many survey responses as you hoped for), so bake a little extra time into your budget here.

Once you’ve collected your data, you’ll need to do some data preparation before you can sink your teeth into the analysis. For example:

• If you carry out interviews or focus groups, you’ll need to transcribe your audio data to text (i.e. a Word document).
• If you collect quantitative survey data, you’ll need to clean up your data and get it into the right format for whichever analysis software you use (for example, SPSS, R or STATA).

Once you’ve completed your data prep, you’ll undertake your analysis, using the techniques that you described in your methodology. Depending on what you find in your analysis, you might also do some additional forms of analysis that you hadn’t planned for. For example, you might see something in the data that raises new questions or that requires clarification with further analysis.

The type(s) of analysis that you’ll use depend entirely on the nature of your research and your research questions. For example:

• If your research if exploratory in nature, you’ll often use qualitative analysis techniques .
• If your research is confirmatory in nature, you’ll often use quantitative analysis techniques
• If your research involves a mix of both, you might use a mixed methods approach

Again, if these words have got your head spinning, don’t worry! We’ll explain these concepts and techniques in other posts. The key takeaway is simply that there’s no “one size fits all” for research design and methodology – it all depends on your topic, your research questions and your data. So, don’t be surprised if your study colleagues take a completely different approach to yours.

Step 7: Present your findings

Once you’ve completed your analysis, it’s time to present your findings (finally!). In a dissertation or thesis, you’ll typically present your findings in two chapters – the results chapter and the discussion chapter .

What’s the difference between the results chapter and the discussion chapter?

While these two chapters are similar, the results chapter generally just presents the processed data neatly and clearly without interpretation, while the discussion chapter explains the story the data are telling  – in other words, it provides your interpretation of the results.

For example, if you were researching the factors that influence consumer trust, you might have used a quantitative approach to identify the relationship between potential factors (e.g. perceived integrity and competence of the organisation) and consumer trust. In this case:

• Your results chapter would just present the results of the statistical tests. For example, correlation results or differences between groups. In other words, the processed numbers.
• Your discussion chapter would explain what the numbers mean in relation to your research question(s). For example, Factor 1 has a weak relationship with consumer trust, while Factor 2 has a strong relationship.

Depending on the university and degree, these two chapters (results and discussion) are sometimes merged into one , so be sure to check with your institution what their preference is. Regardless of the chapter structure, this section is about presenting the findings of your research in a clear, easy to understand fashion.

Importantly, your discussion here needs to link back to your research questions (which you outlined in the introduction or literature review chapter). In other words, it needs to answer the key questions you asked (or at least attempt to answer them).

For example, if we look at the sample research topic:

In this case, the discussion section would clearly outline which factors seem to have a noteworthy influence on organisational trust. By doing so, they are answering the overarching question and fulfilling the purpose of the research .

For more information about the results chapter , check out this post for qualitative studies and this post for quantitative studies .

Step 8: The Final Step Draw a conclusion and discuss the implications

Last but not least, you’ll need to wrap up your research with the conclusion chapter . In this chapter, you’ll bring your research full circle by highlighting the key findings of your study and explaining what the implications of these findings are.

What exactly are key findings? The key findings are those findings which directly relate to your original research questions and overall research objectives (which you discussed in your introduction chapter). The implications, on the other hand, explain what your findings mean for industry, or for research in your area.

Sticking with the consumer trust topic example, the conclusion might look something like this:

Key findings

This study set out to identify which factors influence consumer-based trust in British low-cost online equity brokerage firms. The results suggest that the following factors have a large impact on consumer trust:

While the following factors have a very limited impact on consumer trust:

Notably, within the 25-30 age groups, Factors E had a noticeably larger impact, which may be explained by…

Implications

The findings having noteworthy implications for British low-cost online equity brokers. Specifically:

The large impact of Factors X and Y implies that brokers need to consider….

The limited impact of Factor E implies that brokers need to…

As you can see, the conclusion chapter is basically explaining the “what” (what your study found) and the “so what?” (what the findings mean for the industry or research). This brings the study full circle and closes off the document.

Let’s recap – how to write a dissertation or thesis

You’re still with me? Impressive! I know that this post was a long one, but hopefully you’ve learnt a thing or two about how to write a dissertation or thesis, and are now better equipped to start your own research.

To recap, the 8 steps to writing a quality dissertation (or thesis) are as follows:

• Understand what a dissertation (or thesis) is – a research project that follows the research process.
• Find a unique (original) and important research topic
• Craft a convincing dissertation or thesis research proposal
• Write a clear, compelling introduction chapter
• Undertake a thorough review of the existing research and write up a literature review
• Undertake your own research
• Present and interpret your findings

Once you’ve wrapped up the core chapters, all that’s typically left is the abstract , reference list and appendices. As always, be sure to check with your university if they have any additional requirements in terms of structure or content.  

Psst... there’s more!

This post was based on one of our popular Research Bootcamps . If you're working on a research project, you'll definitely want to check this out ...

20 Comments

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• The PhD Journey - Stages of a Doctoral Degree

The PhD Journey

Written by Mark Bennett

A PhD typically involves between three and four years of full-time study, culminating in a thesis which makes an original contribution to your field.

The process of getting a PhD is made up of quite a few components and milestones, from the literature review and writing up your dissertation right through to the viva examination at the end.

This section is a guide on how to do a PhD, providing in-depth advice and information on some of the main challenges and opportunities you’ll meet along the way!.

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7 stages of the PhD journey

A PhD has a few landmark milestones along the way. The three to four year you'll spend doing a PhD can be divided into these seven stages.

• Preparing a research proposal
• Carrying out a literature review
• Conducting research and collecting results
• Completing the MPhil to PhD upgrade
• Participating in PhD teaching, conferences and publications
• Writing your thesis
• Defending your PhD results at a viva voce

We've expanded on what you can expect from each stage below.

1. Preparing a research proposal

Strictly speaking, your research proposal isn’t part of your PhD. Instead it’s normally part of the PhD application process.

The research proposal sets out the aims and objectives for your PhD: the original topic you plan to study and / or the questions you’ll set out to answer.

It also explains why your work is worthwhile and why it fits with the expertise and objectives of your university.

Finally, a PhD proposal explains how you plan to go about completing your doctorate. This involves identifying the existing scholarship your work will be in dialogue with and the methods you plan to use in your research.

All of this means that, even though the proposal precedes the PhD itself, it plays a vital role in shaping your project and signposting the work you’ll be doing over the next three or more years.

2. Carrying out a literature review

The literature review is normally the first thing you’ll tackle after beginning your PhD and having an initial meeting with your supervisor.

It’s a thorough survey of work in your field (the current scholarly ‘literature’) that relates to your project or to related topics.

Your supervisor will offer some advice and direction, after which you’ll identify, examine and evaluate existing data and scholarship.

In most cases the literature review will actually form part of your final PhD dissertation – usually setting up the context for the project, before you begin to explain and demonstrate your own thesis.

Sometimes a literature review can also be evaluated as part of your MPhil upgrade .

Research vs scholarship

Research and scholarship are both important parts of a PhD. But they aren't the same thing - and it's helpful to know the difference. Research is the original work you produce with your thesis. Scholarship is the expert understanding of your subject area that enables you to conduct valuable research.

3. Conducting research and collecting results

Once you’ve carried out your literature review, you’ll move from scholarship to research .

This doesn’t mean you’ll never read another academic article or consult someone else’s data again. Far from it. You’ll stay up to date with any new developments in your field and incorporate these into your literature review as necessary.

But, from here on in, your primary focus in your PhD process is going to be investigating your own research question. This means carrying out organised research and producing results upon which to base your conclusions.

Types of PhD research

The research process and the type of results you collect will depend upon your subject area:

• In Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) subjects you’ll focus on designing experiments, before recording and analysing their outcomes. This often means assembling and managing complex numerical datasets – sometimes in collaboration with the rest of your laboratory or workshop.
• In Social Science subjects you’ll be more focussed on designing surveys or conducting case studies. These will produce quantitative or qualitative data, depending on the nature of your work.
• In Arts and Humanities subjects you’ll often have less raw data, but that doesn’t mean you won’t be working with ‘hard’ factual information. You’ll analyse texts, sources and other materials according to an accepted methodology and reflect upon the significance of your findings.

Whatever subject you’re in, this research work will account for the greater part of your PhD results. You’ll have regular meetings with your supervisor, but the day-to-day management of your project and its progress will be your own responsibility.

In some fields it’s common to begin writing up your findings as you collect them, developing your thesis and completing the accompanying dissertation chapter-by-chapter. In other cases you’ll wait until you have a full dataset before reviewing and recording your conclusions.

4. Completing an MPhil to PhD upgrade

At UK universities it’s common to register new PhD students for an MPhil before ‘ upgrading ’ them to ‘full’ doctoral candidates. This usually takes place after one year of full-time study (or its part-time equivalent).

Forcing you to register for a ‘lesser’ degree may seem strange, but it’s actually an important part of the training and development a PhD offers:

• As an MPhil student you’re able to comprehend your field and produce new research.
• As a PhD student you’re able to go that crucial step further and produce the significant original contribution to knowledge that defines a doctorate.

The MPhil upgrade is when you take the step from the former to the latter.

The MPhil upgrade exam

Upgrading from MPhil to PhD registration usually involves a form of oral exam – similar to the viva voce that concludes a PhD. But, unlike a full viva, the MPhil upgrade is less formal and only covers part of your thesis.

In most cases you’ll submit a small amount of the material you’ve produced so far. This could be a draft of your first chapter (or part of it) and / or your literature review. You could also be asked to reflect on your progress in general.

You’ll then sit down with your supervisor and someone else from your department (familiar with your field, but unrelated to your project). They’ll offer feedback on the quality of your work and ask questions about your findings.

The aim of the process won’t be to examine your drafts so much as to confirm that your project has the potential to justify a PhD – and that you’re on track to complete it on time.

‘Failing’ a PhD upgrade is actually quite rare. Your university may ask you to repeat the procedure if they are concerned that you haven’t made sufficient progress or established a viable plan for the rest of your project.

What is an MPhil?

The MPhil (Master of Philosophy) is also a research degree, but its scope is more limited than a PhD (Doctor of Philosophy). And no, just like a PhD, an MPhil isn’t necessarily a Philosophy qualification. Our guide covers all you need to know about the difference between a MPhil and PhD .

5. PhD teaching, conferences and publications

During the PhD process, you’ll have lots of opportunities to take part in extra-curricular activities, such as teaching, academic conferences and publications.

Although it isn’t usually compulsory to participate in these, they can be an incredibly rewarding experience and will look great on your CV.

Teaching during a PhD normally involves hosting undergraduate seminars or supervising students in the lab, as well as marking work and providing feedback.

Academic conferences are an excellent way to network with like-minded colleagues and find out the latest developments in your field. You might even be able to present your own work to your peers at one of these events.

Publishing during a PhD will help you increase your academic profile, as well as give you experience of the peer review process. It’s not normally a requisite of your PhD, but publications will certainly help if you plan on applying for postdoc positions.

6. Writing your thesis

As the culmination of three or more years of hard work, the thesis (or dissertation) is the most important part of the procedure to get your PhD, presenting you with the opportunity to make an original scholarly contribution to your discipline.

Our guide to writing your thesis covers everything you need to know about this lengthy research project, from structure and word count to writing up and submission.

We’ve also written a guide to the PhD dissertation abstract , which is an important part of any thesis.

7. Defending your PhD results at a viva voce

Unlike other degrees, a PhD isn’t normally marked as a piece of written work. Instead your dissertation will be submitted for an oral examination known as a viva voce (Latin for ‘living voice’).

This is a formal procedure, during which you ‘defend’ your thesis in front of appointed examiners, each of whom will have read your dissertation thoroughly in advance.

Examiners at a viva voce

A PhD is normally examined by two academic experts:

• One will be an internal examiner, usually appointed from elsewhere in your faculty and department. They won’t be directly associated with your project, but will have sufficient expertise to assess your findings.
• The other will be an external examiner. They will be a recognised expert in the area you are researching, with a record of relevant research and publication. Most universities in the UK allow you to invite an external examiner of your choice, provided there is no existing conflict of interest.

Your supervisor will help you prepare for the viva and will offer advice on choosing an external examiner. However, they will not normally be present during the examination.

The PhD timeline

Ready to take the next step?

There's lots more information about how to get a PhD in our advice section . Or, if you're ready to start looking at different projects, why not check out one of the thousands of current PhD opportunities in our database?

Not sure how PhD study will differ from a Masters? In this guide, we take a look at how the two qualifications compare, including applications, course structure, assessment and more.

Every student will need to write an abstract for their PhD dissertation. Here's everything you need to know about what an academic abstract is and how to write one.

What can you expect from a PhD? What's life actually like as a postgraduate student? Read our guides to the doctoral research experience.

The viva voce is the final oral exam at the end of a PhD degree. Our guide explains the usual viva format, covers common questions and explains how to prepare.

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A Step-By-Step Guide to Writing a Ph.D. Dissertation

An Independent Research Project for Ph.D. Candidates

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A dissertation, also known as a doctoral thesis , is the final required part of completing a student's doctoral study. Undertaken after a student completes coursework and passes a comprehensive examination , the dissertation is the final hurdle in completing a Ph.D. or other doctoral degree. The dissertation is expected to make a new and creative contribution to a field of study and to demonstrate the student's expertise. In social science and science programs, the dissertation usually requires conducting empirical research.

Elements of a Strong Dissertation

According to the Association of American Medical Colleges, a strong medical dissertation relies heavily on the creation of a specific hypothesis that can be either disproven or supported by data collected by independent student research. Further, it must also contain several key elements starting with an introduction to the problem statement, conceptual framework and research question as well as references to literature on already published on the topic. 

A dissertation must also be relevant (and proven to be such) as well as capable of being researched independently by the student. Though the required length of these dissertations varies by school, the governing body overseeing the practice of medicine in the United States standardizes this same protocol. Also included in the dissertation is the methodology for research and data collection as well as instrumentation and quality control. A stated section on population and sample size for the study is imperative to defending the thesis once it comes time to do so.

Like most scientific publications, the thesis must also contain a section of published results and an analysis of what this entails for the scientific or medical community. The discussion and conclusion sections let the review committee know that the student understands the full implications of his or her work as well as its real-world application to their field of study (and soon, professional work). 

Approval Process

Although students are expected to conduct the bulk of their research and pen the entire dissertation on their own, most graduate medical programs provide an advisory and review committee to the student upon starting their studies. Through a series of weekly reviews over their course of schooling, the student and his or her advisor hone in on the hypothesis of the dissertation before they submit it to the review committee to begin work on writing the thesis. 

From there, the student can take as long or as short of a time as they need to complete their dissertation, often resulting in students who have finished their entire courseload achieving ABD status ("all but dissertation"), just shy of receiving their full Ph.D. In this interim period, the student — with the occasional guidance of his or her advisor —  is expected to research, test and write a dissertation that can be defended in a public forum. 

Once the review committee accepts the finalized draft of the thesis, the doctoral candidate will then get the chance to publicly defend his or her statements. If they pass this test, the dissertation is submitted electronically to the school's academic journal or archive and the candidate's full doctoral degree is issued once the final paperwork has been submitted.

• Understanding the Definition of a Doctoral Candidate
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• What is Grad School Like?
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/images/cornell/logo35pt_cornell_white.svg" alt="what is phd thesis"> Cornell University --> Graduate School

Guide to writing your thesis/dissertation, definition of dissertation and thesis.

The dissertation or thesis is a scholarly treatise that substantiates a specific point of view as a result of original research that is conducted by students during their graduate study. At Cornell, the thesis is a requirement for the receipt of the M.A. and M.S. degrees and some professional master’s degrees. The dissertation is a requirement of the Ph.D. degree.

Formatting Requirement and Standards

The Graduate School sets the minimum format for your thesis or dissertation, while you, your special committee, and your advisor/chair decide upon the content and length. Grammar, punctuation, spelling, and other mechanical issues are your sole responsibility. Generally, the thesis and dissertation should conform to the standards of leading academic journals in your field. The Graduate School does not monitor the thesis or dissertation for mechanics, content, or style.

“Papers Option” Dissertation or Thesis

A “papers option” is available only to students in certain fields, which are listed on the Fields Permitting the Use of Papers Option page , or by approved petition. If you choose the papers option, your dissertation or thesis is organized as a series of relatively independent chapters or papers that you have submitted or will be submitting to journals in the field. You must be the only author or the first author of the papers to be used in the dissertation. The papers-option dissertation or thesis must meet all format and submission requirements, and a singular referencing convention must be used throughout.

ProQuest Electronic Submissions

The dissertation and thesis become permanent records of your original research, and in the case of doctoral research, the Graduate School requires publication of the dissertation and abstract in its original form. All Cornell master’s theses and doctoral dissertations require an electronic submission through ProQuest, which fills orders for paper or digital copies of the thesis and dissertation and makes a digital version available online via their subscription database, ProQuest Dissertations & Theses . For master’s theses, only the abstract is available. ProQuest provides worldwide distribution of your work from the master copy. You retain control over your dissertation and are free to grant publishing rights as you see fit. The formatting requirements contained in this guide meet all ProQuest specifications.

Copies of Dissertation and Thesis

Copies of Ph.D. dissertations and master’s theses are also uploaded in PDF format to the Cornell Library Repository, eCommons . A print copy of each master’s thesis and doctoral dissertation is submitted to Cornell University Library by ProQuest.

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How to Write a PhD Thesis: A Step-by-Step Guide for Success

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We have helped 10,000s of undergraduate, Masters and PhD students to maximise their grades in essays, dissertations, model-exam answers, applications and other materials. If you would like a free chat about your project with one of our UK staff, then please just reach out on one of the methods below.

Writing a PhD thesis is a complicated and demanding process that involves rigorous research, detailed analysis, and structured writing. This guide provides an extensive overview of each step required to craft a successful PhD thesis, offering essential insights and strategies that benefit novice and seasoned researchers.

Step 1: Understand the Requirements

The initial step in crafting your PhD thesis is to thoroughly understand its specific requirements, which can vary widely between disciplines and institutions. A thesis must contribute new knowledge to its field, necessitating a deep familiarity with the expected structure, depth of analysis, and submission formalities. Your university guidelines should state how many words in a PhD thesis are needed within your discipline—usually ranging from 60,000 to 80,000 words.

Step 2: Choose Your Topic Wisely

Selecting a suitable topic is crucial and should be approached with great care. Your subject should interest you, fill a research gap, and be feasible within your available time and resources. Extensive preliminary reading and discussions with advisors are crucial at this stage to refine your topic and formulate precise research questions.

Step 3: Develop a Detailed Proposal

A detailed proposal acts as your thesis roadmap, outlining your research questions, the study's significance, methodologies, and a preliminary literature review. This document guides your research trajectory and is a reference point throughout your project.

Step 4: Conduct Rigorous Research

The research phase forms the backbone of your thesis. It involves systematic data collection, comprehensive literature review, and meticulous analysis. Effective research methods are crucial, and keeping organised, detailed records during this phase will facilitate a smoother writing process later on.

Step 5: Start Writing Early

Begin writing early in the research process. Starting with less complex sections like the literature review or methodology can help clarify your thoughts and identify gaps in your research. Early writing reduces the burden as the thesis deadline approaches.

Step 6: Structure Your Thesis

A PhD thesis usually has an introduction, a literature review, a methodology, findings, a discussion, a conclusion, and a list of references. Each section serves a distinct purpose: the introduction presents your research question and its significance, while the conclusion synthesises your findings and highlights their importance. But, how long is a PhD thesis typically? It usually ranges from 100 to 300 pages, varying by field and the nature of the research conducted.

Step 7: Seek Feedback Regularly

Regular feedback from your supervisor and peers is invaluable. Sharing drafts of chapters as you complete them ensures you remain on the correct path and integrates diverse perspectives that can enhance your work.

Step 8: Revise Thoroughly

Revision is a critical phase in which good writing is refined into excellent writing. Use feedback to enhance your arguments, clarify points, and refine your prose. Expect multiple rounds of revisions and be prepared to rework sections as needed.

Step 9: Proofread and Edit

Comprehensive proofreading and editing are crucial to ensure your thesis is error-free. Consider employing PhD thesis help from a PhD thesis writing service if needed. These professionals can provide detailed feedback and help polish your document to perfection.

Step 10: Prepare for the Viva

The final step is the viva, where you'll present your research to a panel of experts in your field. Thorough preparation, including a deep understanding of your research and readiness for potential questions, is essential. This presentation is your opportunity to highlight the significance and rigour of your work.

The Importance of a High-Quality PhD Thesis

A high-quality PhD thesis is not just a requirement for completing your doctorate; it significantly contributes to your field of study. Furthermore, it highlights your ability to conduct independent research, contribute original insights, and communicate complex ideas clearly and effectively. The calibre of your thesis can influence your academic and professional future, impacting job opportunities, postdoctoral positions, and the ability to publish your work in reputable journals.

Seeking Professional Help: Sources and Providers

When crafting your PhD thesis, seeking professional help can be a wise decision. Support can come from various sources:

University Resources : Most universities offer writing centres and libraries with professionals skilled in research methodologies, writing, and editing. PhD Thesis Writing Services : Specialised services can provide comprehensive help throughout the writing process. These services employ experienced PhD thesis writers familiar with the nuances of doctoral writing across various disciplines. Independent Consultants : Expert consultants or freelance PhD thesis writers can offer personalised guidance and feedback, focusing on specific areas of your thesis where you need extra help.

The Advantages of Professional PhD Thesis Help

Opting for professional PhD thesis help offers several advantages:

• Expert Guidance : Professional writers and editors bring expertise that can help you improve your thesis. They understand the academic standards and can help ensure your thesis meets them.
• Time Management : With the help of a PhD thesis writing service, you can manage your time more effectively. Professionals can speed up the research, writing, and revision processes, allowing you to focus on other important academic or personal commitments.
• Reduced Stress : The process of writing a PhD thesis can be stressful. Having a professional by your side can alleviate much of this stress by ensuring you are on the right track and providing reassurance through expert feedback.

Key Takeaways

A high-quality PhD thesis is the masterpiece of your academic career, thus requiring meticulous attention to detail and a deep understanding of your research topic. When asking, "How many words are in a PhD thesis?" it's important to note that quality and depth of research often matter more than the word count.

Utilising professional help, whether through university resources, dedicated PhD thesis writing services, or independent consultants, can provide invaluable support. These professionals enhance the quality of your work and help streamline the entire thesis process, allowing you to present a polished, scholarly work that stands out in your field. By investing in professional help, you invest in your academic success and future career prospects.

Is a Thesis Writing Format Easy? A Comprehensive Guide to Thesis Writing

How Much Does It Cost To Write A Thesis? Get Complete Process & Tips

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What is a Ph.D. Dissertation?

[I wrote this in 1993 as a letter to a student concerning a draft of his dissertation. In 2003 I edited it to remove some specific references to the student and present it as a small increment to the information available to my grad students. In 2023 I made small edits for grammar and to expand coverage.--spaf]

Let me start by reviewing some things that may seem obvious:

• Your dissertation is part of the requirements for a PhD. The research, theory, experimentation, et al. also contribute. One does not attempt to capture everything in one's dissertation.
• The dissertation is a technical work that documents and proves one's thesis. It is intended for a technical audience and must be clear and complete but not necessarily exhaustively comprehensive. Also note -- experimental data, if used, is not the proof -- it is evidence. The proof is presented as an analysis and critical presentation. Generally, every statement in your dissertation must be common knowledge, supported by citation to technical literature, or original results proved by the candidate (you). Each of those statements must directly relate to the proof of the thesis, or else they are unnecessary.

Let's revisit the idea of the thesis itself. It is a hypothesis, a conjecture, or a theorem. The dissertation is a formal, stylized document used to argue your thesis. The thesis must be significant, original (no one has yet demonstrated it to be true), and it must extend the state of scientific knowledge.

The first thing you need to do is to come up with no more than three sentences that express your thesis. Your committee must agree that your statements form a valid thesis statement. You, too, must be happy with the statement -- it should be what you will tell anyone if they ask you what your thesis is (few people will want to hear an hour's presentation as a response).

Once you have a thesis statement, you can begin developing the dissertation. The abstract, for instance, should be a one-page description of your thesis and how you present the proof of it. The abstract should summarize the results of the thesis and should stress the contributions to science made thereby.

Perhaps the best way to understand how an abstract should look would be to examine the abstracts of several dozen dissertations that have already been accepted. Our university library has a collection of them. This is a good approach to see how an entire dissertation is structured and presented. MIT Press has published the ACM doctoral dissertation award series for decades, so you may find some of those to be good examples to read -- they should be in any large technical library.

The dissertation itself should be structured into 4 to 6 chapters. The following is one commonly-used structure:

• Introduction. Provide an introduction to the basic terminology, cite appropriate background work, and briefly discuss related work that has already covered aspects of the problem.
• Abstract model. Discuss an abstract model of what you are trying to prove. This chapter should not discuss any specific implementation (see below)
• Validation of model/proof of theorems. This is a chapter showing proof of the model. It could be a set of proofs or a discussion of the construction and validation of a model or simulation to gather supporting data.
• Measurements/data. This would present data collected from actual use, simulations, or other sources. The presentation would include analysis to show support for the underlying thesis.
• Additional results. In some work, there may be secondary confirmation studies, or it might be the case that additional significant results are collected along the way to the proof of the central thesis. These would be presented here.
• Conclusions and future work. This is where the results are all tied together and presented. Limitations, restrictions, and special cases should be clearly stated here, along with the results. Some extensions as future work may also be described.

Let's look at these in a little more detail

Chapter I, Introduction. Here, you should clearly state the thesis and its importance. This is also where you define terms and other concepts used elsewhere. There is no need to write 80 pages of background on your topic here. Instead, you can cover almost everything by saying: "The terminology used in this work matches the definitions given in [citation, citation] unless noted otherwise." Then, cite some appropriate works that give the definitions you need. The progress of science is that we learn and use the work of others (with appropriate credit). Assume you have a technically literate readership familiar with (or able to find) standard references. Do not reference popular literature or WWW sites if you can help it (this is a matter of style more than anything else -- you want to cite articles in refereed conferences and journals, if possible, or in other theses).

Also, in the introduction, you want to survey any related work that attempted something similar to your own or has a significant supporting role in your research. This should refer only to published references. You cite the work in the references, not the researchers themselves. E.g., "The experiments described in [citation] explored the foo and bar conditions, but did not discuss the further problem of baz, the central point of this work." You should not make references such as this: "Curly, Moe, and Larry all believed the same in their research [CML53]" because you do not know what they believed or thought -- you only know what the paper states. Every factual statement you make must have a specific citation tied to it in this chapter, or else it must be common knowledge (don't rely on this too much).

Chapter II. Abstract Model. Your results are to be of lasting value. Thus, the model you develop and write about (and indeed, that you defend) should have lasting value. Thus, you should discuss a model not based on Windows, Linux, Ethernet, PCMIA, or any other technology. It should be generic and capture all the details necessary to overlay the model on likely environments. You should discuss the problems, parameters, requirements, necessary and sufficient conditions, and other factors here. Consider that 20 years ago (ca 1980), the common platform was a Vax computer running VMS or a PDP-11 running Unix version 6, yet well-crafted theses of the time are still valuable today. Will your dissertation be valuable 20+ years from now (ca 2050), or have you referred to technologies that will be of only historical interest?

This model is tough to construct but is the heart of the scientific part of your work. This is the lasting part of the contribution, and this is what someone might cite 50 years from now when we are all using MS Linux XXXXP on computers embedded in our wrists with subspace network links!

Chapters III & IV, Proof.There are basically three proof techniques that I have seen used in a computing dissertation, depending on the thesis topic. The first is analytic, where one takes the model or formulae and shows, using formal manipulations, that the model is sound and complete. A second proof method is stochastic, using statistical methods and measurements to show that something is true in the anticipated cases.

• clearly showing how your implementation model matches the conditions of your abstract model,
• describing all the variables and why you set them as you do,
• accounting for confounding factors, and
• showing the results.

Chapter V. Additional results. This may be folded into Chapter III in some theses or multiple chapters in a thesis with many parts (as in a theory-based thesis). This may be where you discuss the effects of technology change on your results. This is also a place where you may wish to point out significant results that you obtained while seeking to prove your central thesis but which are not supportive of the thesis. Often, such additional results are published in a separate paper.

Chapter VI. Conclusions and Future Work. This is where you discuss what you found from your work, incidental ideas and results that were not central to your thesis but of value nonetheless (if you did not have them in Chapter V), and other results. This chapter should summarize all the important results of the dissertation --- note that this is the only chapter many people will ever read, so it should convey all the important results.

This is also where you should outline some possible future work that can be done in the area. What are some open problems? What are some new problems? What are some significant variations open to future inquiry?

Appendices usually are present to hold mundane details that are not published elsewhere but are critical to the development of your dissertation. This includes tables of measurement results, configuration details of experimental testbeds, limited source code listings of critical routines or algorithms, etc. It is not appropriate to include lists of readings by topic, lists of commercial systems, or other material that does not directly support the proof of your thesis.

Here are some more general hints to keep in mind as you write/edit:

• Adverbs should generally not be used -- instead, use something precise. For example, do not say that something "happens quickly." How fast is quickly? Is it relative to CPU speeds? Network speeds? Does it depend on connectivity, configuration, programming language, OS release, etc? What is the standard deviation?
• As per the above, the use of the words "fast," "slow," "perfect," "soon," "ideal," "lots of," and related should all be avoided. So should "clearly," "obviously," "simple," "like," "few," "most," "large," et al.
• What you are writing is scientific fact. Judgments of aesthetics, ethics, personal preference, and the like should be in the conclusions chapter, if they should be anywhere at all. With that in mind, avoid the use of words such as "good," "bad," "best," and any similar discussion. Also, avoid stating "In fact," "Actually," "In reality," and any similar construct -- everything you are writing must be factual, so there is no need to state such things. If you feel compelled to use one of these constructs, then carefully evaluate what you are saying to ensure you are not injecting relative terms, opinions, value judgments, or other items inappropriate for a dissertation.
• Computers and networks do not have knees, so poor performance cannot bring them to something they do not have. They also don't have hands, so "On the one hand..." is not good usage. Programs don't perform conscious thought (nor do their underlying computers), so your system does not "think" that it has seen a particular type of traffic. Generalizing from this, do not anthropomorphize your IT components!
• Avoid mention of time and environment. "Today's computers" are antiques far sooner than you think. Your thesis should still be true many years from now. If a particular time or interval is necessary, be explicit, as in "Between 1905 and 1920" rather than "Over the last 15 years." (See the difference, given some distance in time?)
• Be sure that any scientist or mathematician would recognize something you claim as proof.
• Focus on the results and not the methodology. The methodology should be clearly described but not the central topic of your discussion in chapters III & IV
• Keep concepts and instances separate. An algorithm is not the same as a program that implements it. A protocol is not the same as the realization of it; a reference model is not the same as a working example, and so on.

As a rule of thumb, a CS dissertation should probably be longer than 100 pages but less than 160. Anything outside that range should be carefully examined with the above points in mind.

Keep in mind that you -- the Ph.D. candidate -- are expected to become the world's foremost expert on your topic area. That topic area should not be unduly broad but must be big enough to be meaningful. Your advisor and committee members are not supposed to know more about the topic than you do -- not individually, at least. Your dissertation is supposed to explain your findings and, along with the defense, demonstrate your mastery of the area in which you are now the leading expert. That does not mean writing everything you know -- it means writing enough about the most important points that others can agree with your conclusions.

Last of all, don't fall into the trap that ties up many candidates and causes some of them to flame out before completion: your thesis does not need to be revolutionary. It simply needs to be an incremental advancement in the field. Few Ph.D. dissertations have ever had a marked impact on the field. Instead, it is the author's set of publications and products of the author that may change the field.

If your dissertation is like most, it will only be read by your committee and some other Ph.D. candidates seeking to build on your work. As such, it does not need to be a masterwork of literature, nor does it need to solve a long-standing problem in computing. It merely needs to be correct, to be significant in the judgment of your committee, and it needs to be complete. We will all applaud when you change the world after graduation. And at that, you will find that many well-known scientists in CS have made their careers in areas different from their dissertation topic. The dissertation is proof that you can find and present original results; your career and life after graduation will demonstrate the other concerns you might have about making an impact.

So get to work!

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What is a dissertation?

October 31, 2019

A dissertation is a written document that summarizes research.

It is the final step of a PhD program, and the culmination of a student’s doctoral studies.

“The dissertation is a source of pride for doctoral students,” Dinah Manns, PhD, faculty chair at Capella University, says. “The dissertation is often a compilation of academic and practical knowledge, and in many cases, it can be the student’s first publication.”

Here, Manns explains the content and format of this important piece of scholarship.

From student to scholar

The major objective of any doctoral program is to assist a student in becoming an independent researcher, and a dissertation is a large part of that. “Not all doctoral programs require a dissertation, but all PhD programs do,” Manns notes. “Dissertation work varies by program.”

Initial coursework helps narrow down the research topic and develop it into something that will add to the body of knowledge in the chosen field. Sometimes the research contributes something entirely new to the field, and other times it expands or deepens previous studies.

By the time the doctoral coursework is finished, the topic should be selected and ready for formal research. At this point the student develops a proposal, which encompasses the research plan and methodology as it pertains to the selected topic.

At Capella, once the proposal has been approved by the student’s mentor, committee, and the Institutional Review Board (IRB), the research and analysis begin. The dissertation is largely an independent project that essentially turns the student into a scholar; they’ll dive more deeply into research and writing then they have done before.

“Capella PhD candidates will be prepared for this step through their coursework and residency,” says Manns, noting that they will have learned how to approach this critical phase as part of their pre-dissertation learning.

Format of the dissertation

The dissertation is a much deeper exploration of a research topic than a traditional essay would be. It’s in the form of a book, with at least five chapters (some universities require a sixth chapter in the form of a recap of the previous chapters). Manns outlines the chapters this way:

• Overview. This is a brief look at the research question, containing a preview of the subsequent chapters.
• Literature review. The literature review is an extensive critique and synthesis of the current literature in the field.
• Methodology. This section contains details of the procedures and methods used to collect and analyze data.
• Analysis. The PhD candidate details how the data analysis applies to the collected data.
• Findings. This section provides interpretation of the data and comparison to existing literature, as well as future research possibilities.

The order of the chapters follows a logical progression in which PhD candidates build on their theories and explain research choices in detail before coming to the final chapter that gives weight to the value of the study itself.

Manns recommends that pre-dissertation students review completed dissertations in the field and research various types of methodology and design in the field as well. “That will help give them a feel for the depth of research and discussion, and see how the chapters work together,” Manns explains. “And remember—someday, it may be your dissertation being read!”

Capella University offers PhD and professional doctoral degrees in programs ranging from business to education and health to technology. Learn more about Capella’s doctoral programs.

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Know How to Structure Your PhD Thesis

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In your academic career, few projects are more important than your PhD thesis. Unfortunately, many university professors and advisors assume that their students know how to structure a PhD. Books have literally been written on the subject, but there’s no need to read a book in order to know about PhD thesis paper format and structure. With that said, however, it’s important to understand that your PhD thesis format requirement may not be the same as another student’s. The bottom line is that how to structure a PhD thesis often depends on your university and department guidelines.

But, let’s take a look at a general PhD thesis format. We’ll look at the main sections, and how to connect them to each other. We’ll also examine different hints and tips for each of the sections. As you read through this toolkit, compare it to published PhD theses in your area of study to see how a real-life example looks.

Main Sections of a PhD Thesis

In almost every PhD thesis or dissertation, there are standard sections. Of course, some of these may differ, depending on your university or department requirements, as well as your topic of study, but this will give you a good idea of the basic components of a PhD thesis format.

• Abstract : The abstract is a brief summary that quickly outlines your research, touches on each of the main sections of your thesis, and clearly outlines your contribution to the field by way of your PhD thesis. Even though the abstract is very short, similar to what you’ve seen in published research articles, its impact shouldn’t be underestimated. The abstract is there to answer the most important question to the reviewer. “Why is this important?”
• Introduction : In this section, you help the reviewer understand your entire dissertation, including what your paper is about, why it’s important to the field, a brief description of your methodology, and how your research and the thesis are laid out. Think of your introduction as an expansion of your abstract.
• Literature Review : Within the literature review, you are making a case for your new research by telling the story of the work that’s already been done. You’ll cover a bit about the history of the topic at hand, and how your study fits into the present and future.
• Theory Framework : Here, you explain assumptions related to your study. Here you’re explaining to the review what theoretical concepts you might have used in your research, how it relates to existing knowledge and ideas.
• Methods : This section of a PhD thesis is typically the most detailed and descriptive, depending of course on your research design. Here you’ll discuss the specific techniques you used to get the information you were looking for, in addition to how those methods are relevant and appropriate, as well as how you specifically used each method described.
• Results : Here you present your empirical findings. This section is sometimes also called the “empiracles” chapter. This section is usually pretty straightforward and technical, and full of details. Don’t shortcut this chapter.
• Discussion : This can be a tricky chapter, because it’s where you want to show the reviewer that you know what you’re talking about. You need to speak as a PhD versus a student. The discussion chapter is similar to the empirical/results chapter, but you’re building on those results to push the new information that you learned, prior to making your conclusion.
• Conclusion : Here, you take a step back and reflect on what your original goals and intentions for the research were. You’ll outline them in context of your new findings and expertise.

Tips for your PhD Thesis Format

As you put together your PhD thesis, it’s easy to get a little overwhelmed. Here are some tips that might keep you on track.

• Don’t try to write your PhD as a first-draft. Every great masterwork has typically been edited, and edited, and…edited.
• Work with your thesis supervisor to plan the structure and format of your PhD thesis. Be prepared to rewrite each section, as you work out rough drafts. Don’t get discouraged by this process. It’s typical.
• Make your writing interesting. Academic writing has a reputation of being very dry.
• You don’t have to necessarily work on the chapters and sections outlined above in chronological order. Work on each section as things come up, and while your work on that section is relevant to what you’re doing.
• Don’t rush things. Write a first draft, and leave it for a few days, so you can come back to it with a more critical take. Look at it objectively and carefully grammatical errors, clarity, logic and flow.
• Know what style your references need to be in, and utilize tools out there to organize them in the required format.
• It’s easier to accidentally plagiarize than you think. Make sure you’re referencing appropriately, and check your document for inadvertent plagiarism throughout your writing process.

PhD Thesis Editing Plus

Want some support during your PhD writing process? Our PhD Thesis Editing Plus service includes extensive and detailed editing of your thesis to improve the flow and quality of your writing. Unlimited editing support for guaranteed results. Learn more here , and get started today!

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10 tips for writing a PhD thesis

Ingrid curl shares simple rules for keeping your work clear and jargon-free.

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Writing up a PhD can often take place in a frenzy of activity in the last few months of your degree study, after years of hard work. But there are some steps that you can take to increase your chances of success.

• Do not be daunted by the task of “writing up”. Work on the text as your PhD takes shape, remember that all writers need editing, and help yourself by using these basic tips to make life easier. Read what great writers say about how to write before you start, and take their advice to heart. There is no dark art to clear, concise work; it is mostly a result of editing, and editing again. Above all, keep Elmore Leonard’s advice in mind: “If it reads like writing…rewrite it.”
• Plan the structure of your thesis carefully with your supervisor. Create rough drafts as you go so that you can refine them as you become more focused on the write-up. Much of writing comprises rewriting so be prepared to rework each chapter many times. Even Ernest Hemingway said: “The first draft of everything is shit.”
• Academic writing does not have to be dry. Inject some flair into your work. Read advice on writing and remember George Orwell’s words in Why I Write : “Never use the passive where you can use the active”; and Mark Twain’s on adjectives: “When you catch an adjective, kill it.” If you prefer, Stephen King said: “The road to hell is paved with adverbs.”
• Do not write up in chronological order. Work on each chapter while it is fresh in your mind or pertinent to what you are doing at that moment, but come back to it all later and work it up into a consistent, coherent piece, restructuring sections where necessary.
• Think carefully about your writing. Write your first draft, leave it and then come back to it with a critical eye. Look objectively at the writing and read it closely for style and sense. Look out for common errors such as dangling modifiers, subject-verb disagreement and inconsistency. If you are too involved with the text to be able to take a step back and do this, then ask a friend or colleague to read it with a critical eye. Remember Hemingway’s advice: “Prose is architecture, not interior decoration.” Clarity is key.
• Most universities use a preferred style of references. Make sure you know what this is and stick to it. One of the most common errors in academic writing is to cite papers in the text that do not then appear in the bibliography. All references in your thesis need to be cross-checked with the bibliography before submission. Using a database during your research can save a great deal of time in the writing-up process. Helpful software includes EndNote or Paperpile. Managing your bibliography from day one may seem obsessive but it will save you a great deal of time and stress by the end of the PhD process.
• Use a house style. Professional publications such as Times Higher Education use a house style guide to ensure consistency in spelling. For example, do not use both -ise spellings and -ize spellings, stick to British spelling and be consistent when referring to organisations or bodies. Because dictionaries vary in their use of hyphenation, use one dictionary and stick to it throughout the writing process. If you consult the New Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors , you will note the extraordinary number of words with alternative spellings. It can also be a very useful guide to preferred spellings, use of italicisation and foreign phrases.
• Take care when quoting from other sources. Ensure you note whether the italic emphasis is in the original and take careful notes when you are collecting quotes for your thesis. Transcribe them accurately to save work later and keep original spellings (even if they differ from your chosen style) to ensure fidelity to your source.
• Think about plagiarism. If you are quoting from works, quote from them accurately and paraphrase where necessary for your argument. This is where careful note-taking and use of references is invaluable and will help you to avoid even inadvertently plagiarising another work.
• Remember that your thesis is your chance to present your work in the best possible light. Consider your opening paragraphs, entice your reader with your writing and above all be clear about your hypothesis and your conclusion. Append material where it adds value but not where it merely bulks out your work. Consider your reader at all times. This is your chance to showcase your work.

If you stick to these simple rules, your writing will be clear and jargon-free. Above all, take to heart Orwell’s advice: “Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.”

Ingrid Curl is associate editor of  Times Higher Education , and a former PhD student.

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Know the Difference: PhD Dissertation vs. Thesis

One of the biggest turning points of any PhD student’s journey is the submission of a research writing project in the form of either a PhD thesis or a PhD dissertation. From an academic perspective, the thesis/dissertation is in many ways a major indicator of the abilities and expertise that you have gained as a doctoral candidate.

The mere task of understanding the requirements and compiling a PhD dissertation/thesis is in itself huge. However, what may be confusing to understand, especially if you are just embarking upon your doctoral journey, is the difference between thesis and dissertation.

Table of Contents

Similarities in phd dissertation vs. thesis, 1. understanding differences in the meaning of the two terms, 2. difference between thesis and dissertation based upon geographical location, 3. understanding a difference in content for a phd thesis v/s phd dissertation.

These two terms are often used interchangeably when referring to doctoral studies as there are a number of similarities between them:

• The very first commonality between thesis and dissertation is that the submission of both is considered to be an official culmination of the doctoral work of the candidate.
• Both the thesis and the dissertation demonstrate the ability of a doctoral candidate to effectively communicate their process of resolving a problem statement.
• The thesis and dissertation both test a candidate’s ability toward analytical reasoning and critical thinking , while showcasing his/her expertise in a particular subject area.
• Both the thesis and the dissertation are evaluated by an official review committee consisting of internal as well as external examiners who are experts in the specific subject area being explored in the doctoral study.
• Based upon the reviews of the committee members, both of these documents are then subject to changes and re-submission as required .
• Lastly, both a thesis and a dissertation can be treated as official publications that may be available as resources in the university library .

Owing to the above-mentioned similarities, the confusion between the correct usage of dissertation vs. thesis is quite understandable. In order to ensure the proper usage of these two terms, it’s crucial to understand the differences in a PhD thesis v/s PhD dissertation. Here are some quick pointers that may be useful.

Differences between thesis and dissertation

Since most academic institutions will continue to use these terms interchangeably, it is imperative that you confirm the intricate details regarding the expected structure of a PhD thesis/dissertation with your respective institution. However, for now, we hope that the above article helps in clarifying some of the major doubts that you may have had regarding a PhD thesis v/s dissertation.

In order to better understand the meaning of thesis vs dissertation, let us go back to the origin of the terms. The term ‘thesis’ originates from the Greek word ‘tithenai’, which means ‘to place a proposition’, while the term ‘dissertation’ has a Latin origin, which essentially means ‘disserere’/’dissertare’, i.e., ‘to (continue to) examine and discuss’. 1 To simplify further, a thesis by itself may simply represent an argument that you put forth and describe in depth, while a dissertation may represent a written summary/discussion of a particular work. 2

In countries/institutions that follow the British education system, it is common to term the final doctoral research writing project as a PhD thesis, while the countries/institutions that follow the American education system prefer to call it a PhD dissertation. In case you are unsure which education system is followed by your institution, it may be a good idea to verify this with the respective personnel, so that you can plan your doctoral journey effectively.

While the above two points may be useful to understand the differences between thesis and dissertation on a surface level, as a PhD student it is crucial for you to understand the deeper differences in the content and the type of work that goes into each of them. Let us do this by revisiting the differences in the origin of the two terms: ‘dissertare’ or to discuss (dissertation) v/s ‘to place a proposition’ (thesis). In my experience, the content of a PhD dissertation often comprises peer-reviewed publications that are published by the doctoral candidate during their doctoral work, along with supplementary chapters. This is followed by a dissertation defense , an presentation by the student on the main aspects of the research reported in the dissertation. 

On the other hand, while compiling a PhD thesis, a doctoral candidate may need to describe the doctoral work in detail with the help of distinct chapters comprising: abstract, introduction, literature review, methodology, results, discussion, conclusion and bibliography/references. Thus, the main difference between thesis and dissertation, lies in the way the written document is being presented although the doctoral work done by the candidate will mostly remain the same .

References:

1.         What is the Difference Between a Dissertation and a Thesis? | Postgrad.com. https://www.postgrad.com/advice/exams/dissertation-and-theses/difference-between-a-dissertation-and-a-thesis/

2.         The PhD Thesis | FindAPhD.com. www.FindAPhD.com https://www.findaphd.com/guides/phd-thesis.

The time it takes to write a PhD thesis vs. dissertation can vary depending on several factors, including the research topic, the scope of the project, the research methodology, and the specific requirements of the academic program. However, in general, a dissertation is typically longer and more comprehensive than a thesis, and therefore may take longer to complete.

A dissertation for doctoral programs is typically required after the completion of required coursework, passing comprehensive exams, and hitting any other specific milestones outlined by the program. This means PhD students usually devote years in developing their dissertation, which demonstrates your ability to conduct independent research and make original contributions to the field

A thesis statement is used in academic writing to provide a concise summary of the main argument or point being made in an essay or paper. It should be used at the introduction at the beginning of the paper to guide the reader and provide focus for the writing. A thesis statement can be used in academic essays, research papers, analytical papers and literature reviews and presents readers with a clear roadmap of the research being conducted.

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• Published: 06 July 2016

What’s the point of the PhD thesis?

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Doctoral courses are slowly being modernized. Now the thesis and viva need to catch up.

On the morning of Tom Marshall's PhD defence, he put on the suit he had bought for the occasion and climbed onto the stage in front of a 50-strong audience, including his parents and 6 examiners. He gave a 15-minute-long presentation, then faced an hour of cross-examination about his past 5 years of neuroscience research at the Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour in Nijmegen, the Netherlands. A lot was at stake: this oral examination would determine whether he passed or failed. “At the one-hour mark someone came in, banged a stick on the floor and said ' hora est ',” says Marshall — the ceremonial call that his time was up. “But I couldn't. I had enjoyed the whole experience far too much, and ended up talking for a few extra minutes.”

Marshall's elaborate, public PhD assessment is very different from that faced by Kelsie Long, an Earth-sciences PhD candidate at the Australian National University (ANU) in Canberra. Her PhD will be assessed solely on her written thesis, which will be mailed off to examiners and returned with comments. She will do a public presentation of her work later this year, but it won't affect her final result. “It almost feels like a rite of passage,” she says.

PhDs are assessed in very different ways around the world. Almost all involve a written thesis, but those come in many forms. In the United Kingdom, they are usually monographs, long explanations of a student's work; in Scandinavia, science students typically top-and-tail a series of their publications. The accompanying oral examination — also called a viva voce or defence — can be a public lecture, a private discussion or not happen at all. There is wide variation across disciplines and from one institution to the next. “It is a complicated world in doctoral education. One format does not fit all,” says Maresi Nerad, founding director of the Center for Innovation and Research in Graduate Education at the University of Washington in Seattle.

This isn't necessarily a problem in itself, but some researchers worry that the decades-old doctoral assessment system is showing strain. Time-pressured examiners sometimes lack training and preparation for PhD assessments, which can lead to lack of rigour. “Two or three examiners come together to go through the thesis in a perfunctory way. They tick the boxes, everyone is happy, and then a PhD walks away,” says Jeremy Farrar, director of the biomedical research charity the Wellcome Trust in London.

Farrar, like other scientists, suspects that the PhD assessment is not keeping up with the times . Single-author tomes seem outdated when much of research has become a multidisciplinary, team endeavour. Research is becoming more open, but PhD assessments can lack transparency: vivas are sometimes held behind closed doors. Some PhD theses languish, little-used, on office shelves or in archives. “We're seeing some students who are still submitting paper theses to us — they don't have electronic theses yet,” says Austin McLean, director of scholarly communication and dissertation publishing at ProQuest in Ann Arbor, Michigan, which has the largest database of PhD theses in the world. What's more, little attention is given in the PhD assessment to soft skills such as management, entrepreneurship and teamwork, even though these are an essential part of life beyond the PhD, and students are increasingly leading that life outside academia . “The assessment of the PhD hasn't been updated to fit the modern definition of a PhD,” Farrar says.

“There are a lot of pressures to make changes to the thesis,” says Suzanne Ortega, president of the Council of Graduate Schools in Washington DC, one of a number of groups discussing the issue. The council organized a workshop in January this year called Future of the PhD Dissertation, and in March, the Australian Council of Learned Academies (ACOLA) in Melbourne examined changes to the thesis as part of a review on researcher training. Some scientists and education experts welcome the attention. “I don't think the current model for thesis examination is ideal, but there are positive movements towards changing it,” says Inger Mewburn, director of research training at ANU and editor of the blog The Thesis Whisperer, which is dedicated to those completing a thesis.

Passing the test

Academics agree about one thing regarding the PhD assessment — its aim. The traditional goal is to demonstrate the candidate's ability to conduct independent research on a novel concept and to communicate the results in an accessible way. Where the academics differ is on how best to achieve that goal.

Shirley Tilghman, a molecular biologist and former president of Princeton University in New Jersey, sees merit in the monograph form of the thesis. It demonstrates scholarly ability by requiring students to “frame the historical context of a problem, describe in detail the purpose and execution and then come to a credible conclusion”, she says.

But should the thesis include academic publications, too? That's the norm at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, where most theses are a compilation of the student's original papers, along with a relatively short discussion, perhaps 50 pages long. The rationale is that publishing should be part of training because it better equips students for academic life and securing jobs.

Some students who complete a monograph end up wishing that they had spent more time on writing papers. James Lewis successfully defended his physics PhD at Imperial College London in October 2015, but he thinks that his one published paper landed him his postdoc at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “The job market for postdoc positions is very competitive,” he says, “so if you can get a paper published during your PhD then you're helping yourself.” While he waits to start, Lewis is spending his days writing papers based on his research . “I'm wondering: would it not have been better to write these instead of the thesis, which took me five months to write?”

But others argue that the pressure to publish could rob PhD students of valuable parts of their studies, such as the time to shape their research path and to think creatively and independently . “The PhD might become driven by papers only,” says Farrar. “Students might end up spending their time focusing only on what papers they can produce, then staple them together with a summary and they're done — adding to the sense that the whole scientific enterprise is a paper factory rather than an exploration.”

Long is working at ANU towards a thesis-by-publication: she's written and submitted one paper and has started on a second. But she's struggling. “I am finding this one much harder to write, mostly because it isn't as new or exciting as the previous one,” she says. What's more, her strategy depends on things at least partly outside her control — on her PhD generating enough complete studies for publication and on a reasonably timely peer-review process.

Completed PhD theses are typically stored in university libraries — but that doesn't mean that they are read or used. Some 60% of submissions to the ProQuest database fall under the category of science, technology or mathematics, but they are the ones that are accessed least. “We think this is because the communication is more journal-focused,” says McLean. Scientists do tend to keep a copy of their theses in their office or lab for use by students and colleagues. Neil Curson, a physicist at the London Centre for Nanotechnology, says that his PhD, written more than 20 years ago, is still consulted by his students when they come into his lab. Many theses, however, end up collecting dust.

Viva la viva

Whatever form the thesis takes, it has to be assessed — in most countries, by a panel of experts, and often involving an oral exam. But the viva “doesn't have the same level of consistency as the written form of examination”, says Allyson Holbrook, an education researcher at Australia's University of Newcastle. In Israel, the viva is optional and very few students choose to have one; in the Netherlands, it is formal and ceremonial; in the United Kingdom, it's typically a private affair with two or three examiners; and in Australia, it's hardly performed at all. “One hundred per cent of the doctoral examination is about the thesis here,” says Holbrook. That's largely because, historically, there weren't enough experts in the country to examine the work in person and it was costly to fly them in, she says.

Holbrook and her research team published a study last year that compared the assessment methods used in Australia with those in New Zealand and the United Kingdom (T. Lovat et al. Higher Ed. Rev. 47, 5–23; 2015). They concluded that doing an oral defence rarely changed the result, and that the thesis itself was the “determinative step” of passing. The review on Australian research training published in March didn't support adding a viva either, but it did recommend a move towards more continuous assessment of a student, rather than waiting until the end of the training.

Some researchers see problems with the viva. It's not uncommon for nerves to get the better of a student, and for them to freeze in front of their audience, however small it is. Examiners could worsen the situation by asking very difficult questions, says David Bogle, a chemical engineer at University College London. “There are cases where undue pressure is placed on the candidate by the examiners. This shouldn't be allowed.”

Trial by error

Most researchers don't support a global standard for the PhD assessment. A one-size-fits-all approach would be impossible to implement, they say, and the type of assessment — be it continuous appraisal, written thesis or oral exam — should depend on discipline, project, student, supervisor and institution. “If you take away the variability in assessment and form of the thesis then you lose all creativity and innovation from the PhD,” Nerad says.

But many feel that the system could be improved — by making the thesis shorter, for one. Data from ProQuest, which stores 4 million theses, show that the average length of biology, chemistry and physics PhDs soared to nearly 200 pages between 1945 and 1990. That could be because students are analysing more complex questions, performing longer literature reviews and using increasingly complicated methods that require lengthier explanations (see 'The expanding thesis'). “It's unnecessary to have such a long thesis,” says Farrar, who recently assessed one such tome. “'The thicker my PhD, the better' has become a myth in the PhD community, and is taking it down the wrong direction.”

'The thicker my PhD, the better' has become a myth in the PhD community.

Farrar says that a slimmed-down document would be more appropriate. That could follow the concise format of a research paper, and include a review of the field, then short chapters on methods, analysis and discussion. “It would be more succinct and focused. And the examiners will probably read it all.”

That isn't necessarily the case now. Examiners have to find time to review theses in between research, teaching, grant-writing and many other demands. “Something has to give, and what gives is the amount of time spent on any of those individual tasks,” says Farrar. That means an examiner might skim through years of a PhD student's work in just a couple of hours. “I think we owe it to the students to examine them properly and help prepare them for their future careers,” he says.

The modern thesis

One way to better reflect the team-based nature of science would be to write a joint thesis, an approach that has been used in arts and humanities graduate education in the past. However, this can make it difficult to assign credit. “If you have worked on a collaborative dissertation, a potential employer might struggle to see whether you really are an independent thinker or could you read a lead a research project,” says Ortega.

There is another matter to wrestle with — the fact that half of science PhD graduates in the United States are choosing careers outside of academia , according to the National Science Foundation's 2014 Survey of Earned Doctorates. “Under those conditions, the standard assessment should include the skills in what they'll need when going on to future careers,” says Michael Teitelbaum, labour economist at Harvard Law School.

Increasingly, institutions offer courses to PhD students in skills such as teamwork, management and research ethics, but these skills aren't usually assessed formally. The viva would be one opportunity to do so, perhaps by seeing how students react to various scenarios. Alternatively, as the ACOLA review suggested, PhD candidates could accrue credits in transferable skills through professional-development activities that are recorded in a portfolio. “You can't just assume that if you throw them into an environment they will meaningfully learn from that environment,” says psychologist Michael Mumford, a director of the Center for Applied Social Research at the University of Oklahoma in Norman. “We need exams that ask students to deal with both real-world problems as well as ambiguous academic problems.”

Farrar thinks that a change in emphasis could help. Rather than thinking of the thesis and viva as an exam, it should be viewed as the culmination of a long project. “You need to look at the PhD in the context of those four years of research, not just as revision for one big test.”

Mewburn stresses that whatever form the assessment takes, it should focus more on the individual than on their work. “My preference is to assess the researcher,” she says, “but we haven't developed the tools and curriculum to do that.”

Few failures

It's difficult to find figures on how many students fail their PhD if they get to the point of submitting a thesis but, anecdotally, scientists say that few flunk it outright. More often, students are sent away with minor or major corrections that have to be completed before the PhD is awarded.

There are theories that few students fail because universities want to keep their number of graduates high for the rankings. But most researchers dispute this, and point to other reasons. One is that weak students are likely to have dropped out before they reach the final assessment. Furthermore, supervisors and the supporting institutions typically work hard — through regular reviews and assessments — to make sure that a candidate and project are of a sufficient standard before the thesis is submitted. “You haven't done your due diligence as a university if a student is getting to a stage where they are sending out theses that are going to fail,” says Simon Hay, a global-health researcher at the University of Washington.

Nerad sees no need to reform the final PhD assessment. For her, the problem lies with the variability of graduate education as a whole. “Now that research is becoming more globalized, the PhD needs to be too.” That process is under way, Nerad says: the pressures of economic globalization, international policies and national drives to house world-class universities have led to a more standardized PhD experience across the world.

During her tenure as Princeton's president, Tilghman was often asked if there was a perfect way to assess a PhD course. Not many liked her answer — that she could only really evaluate a student at the 25-year reunion. “In the end, the only way you can assess it is whether the graduates of the programme become successful scientists. If they do, you've done a good job. If they haven't, you haven't.”

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Back to the thesis 2016-Jul-06

The past, present and future of the PhD thesis 2016-Jul-06

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How not to deal with the PhD glut 2014-Oct-22

Education: The PhD factory 2011-Apr-20

Seven ages of the PhD 2011-Apr-20

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Council of Graduate Schools

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Gould, J. What’s the point of the PhD thesis?. Nature 535 , 26–28 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/535026a

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Dissertation Instructions

The dissertation is an original piece of scholarly research on a topic that has been jointly agreed upon by the student and her/his Supervisory Committee members. It is a major undertaking that should reflect the highest standards of scholarship and make a significant contribution to knowledge and practice in the field of social welfare and the profession of social work.

“A candidate must present a dissertation demonstrating original and independent investigation and achievement. A dissertation should reflect not only mastery of research techniques but also ability to select an important problem for investigation and to deal with it competently.” ( University of Washington Graduate School )

Dissertation Research

After the dissertation prospectus has been approved by the Supervisory Committee and the PhD Steering Committee, the student normally works primarily under the direction of the chair. The extent to which other members are involved during the course of the dissertation research is determined on a case-by-case basis. If a dissertation study significantly changes as it progresses from that originally approved in the Prospectus by the Supervisory Committee and Steering Committee, the changes must be reviewed and approved by the Reading Committee members of the Supervisory Committee. 1

Dissertation Research Colloquium

At some point during the dissertation process each candidate is required to make a 30-minute presentation of her/his research at a Dissertation Colloquium. 2 The colloquium is an open assembly of Social Welfare Faculty, PhD students, and others (e.g., faculty from the School of Social Work and other departments, MSW and BASW students, and community persons) who have interest in the proposed research. The Dissertation Colloquium provides (1) a forum for the productive and timely exchange of ideas, suggestions, and resources with doctoral candidates as they work on their first major independent research endeavor and (2) an opportunity for doctoral candidates to articulate to others their research goals, plans, and questions. The timing of the colloquium will depend on the specific needs of each student and be determined by the student and Supervisory Committee. Two options are available:

• At any point during the dissertation research process when the student and Supervisory Committee determine that a public presentation of the research and findings would be useful for the student. (This could be as a practice job talk or for the general purpose of sharing the research with the community.) The student’s Supervisory Committee is typically in attendance, and one member serves as discussant and facilitator of the Colloquium.
• As an opening presentation during the Oral Dissertation Defense. (If this option is chosen the Social Work community must be invited to the presentation. Note: Graduate School guidelines recommend that at least a portion of the Oral Dissertation Defense be open to the public.)

Consistent with the program’s emphasis on providing opportunities for students to strengthen their skills in presenting their work, students are strongly encouraged to invite not only social work faculty and students but also any other relevant university colleagues or community members to attend the Colloquium. At least two weeks prior to the date of the Colloquium the student sends an email announcement with the presentation information and an abstract.

Writing and Submitting the Dissertation

Two general formats have been approved by the Graduate School and the social welfare faculty. The first, more traditional within the Arts and Sciences, is the monograph or ‘book’ format for a dissertation. In this format, the dissertation is organized as an integrated set of chapters written as a logical progression of ideas pertaining to a central topic. The second dissertation format, more prevalent in the health sciences, is a series of three to four research papers that may differ in topic but are clearly reflective of a coherent program of research. (*When the dissertation is composed of a set of research papers that are inclusive of co-authored manuscripts, the candidate must be the primary contributor and lead author on all published papers.) Each format has advantages and disadvantages having to do with publication goals and career plans, and these should be carefully considered by the candidate in consultation with his/her dissertation committee.

For instructions on formatting the Dissertation, follow the School of Social Work Dissertation Style Guidelines . Also referenced in the guidelines document are templates for the required preliminary pages and for paragraph styles . The final dissertation must be submitted to the Doctoral Program Office for approval before it is submitted to the Graduate School, thus students need to contact the Program Office during the final stages of writing to ensure that all the guidelines are understood and complied with. For submitting the final to the Graduate School, students must follow the procedures outlined in the Graduate School’s Dissertation Submission Guidelines for Theses and Dissertations. This document outlines the process for submission of doctoral dissertations.

All members of the Supervisory Committee must be provided a draft of the dissertation chapters at least 6 weeks in advance of the Oral Defense and a complete draft of the dissertation (with all required sections) at least 2 weeks in advance of the Defense. 2

Resources for Dissertation Research and Writing

All-But-Dissertation Survival Guide This monthly newsletter provides practical strategies for successfully completing your doctoral dissertation, periodic interviews with scholars about the tips they wish they’d known at the beginning of their own careers, and teleworkshops.

Phinished A discussion and support site aimed at helping people finish their dissertations.

Summary Notes of Writing for Social Scientists Presents an outline of Howard S. Becker’s suggestions for writing. Taken from his book, Writing for Social Scientists: How to Start and Finish Your Thesis, Book, or Article (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986).

Thinking About Your Thesis This article by Erika Simpson provides guidelines for finishing a thesis or dissertation.

Writing and Presenting Your Thesis or Dissertation This article by S. Joseph Levine provides guidelines for thinking about a thesis or dissertation, writing a proposal, completing the project, and defending it..

Final Program Office Check

Before scheduling the oral defense, the student must contact the PhD Program Assistant Director for a final degree check, which will be done via email. This will ensure that all degree requirements have been met.

SSW Approval of the Dissertation

Once the entire dissertation is complete, it must be submitted it to the School of Social Work Doctoral Program Office for approval before submitting the final to the Graduate School. Each document will be checked page-by-page, and notations made of all errors to be fixed.

As a general guideline, the SSW check should be arranged at least 2 weeks prior to the time the final will be submitted to the Graduate School. For formatting guidelines, see the School of Social Work Dissertation Style Guidelines . Contact the PhD Program Assistant Director in advance to request this check. Provide electronic files for checking instead of paper copy. This check can usually be accomplished in 1-2 working days if scheduled in advance.

Final Examination: Oral Defense

When the dissertation is complete and the doctoral Supervisory Committee agrees that the candidate is prepared to take the Final Examination (Oral D efense), the Program Director, Assistant Director, and Graduate School must be informed of the decision . 3

All members of the Supervisory Committee must be provided an initial draft of all chapters at least 6 weeks prior to the Oral Defense and a complete draft of the dissertation (with all required sections) at least 2 weeks in advance of the Defense. 4

All members of the Supervisory Committee (including the GSR) must be consulted by the student and approve the date, time, and location for the Oral Defense. The student then logs in to MyGrad to request scheduling of the Defense . (This must be done at least 2 weeks prior to the date of the oral defense.) As soon as the request is made, the student must send an email to the Assistant Director of the Social Welfare Program indicating that the request has been made (the MyGrad system tells students that the departments are being notified, but that’s not true). The Assistant Director will approve the request through MyGrad.

The Final Oral Defense is intended as an opportunity for the student to clarify, elaborate, or justify the procedures used and the findings obtained. At least four members of the Supervisory Committee (including the Chair, all other members of the Reading Committee, and the GSR) must be present at the defense, and all members of the Reading Committee (composed of at least 3 members of the Supervisory Committee, including the Chair) must approve the final product. (The GSR must be there in person; any other members may participate by phone or video-conferencing.) The student may choose to present the public Dissertation Colloquium as part of the Defense (see Dissertation Colloquium section above).

The defense session is normally about 2 hours. The committee Chair completes the Dissertation Evaluation Form . After the defense has been conducted, the committee may approve the dissertation or require the student to make additional modifications or additions. Upon a successful defense and acceptance of the dissertation by the SSW and the Graduate School, the PhD in Social Welfare is conferred.

The Reading Committee approves a dissertation through an online process. All members of a Committee must log into MyGrad Committee View , including non-UW Reading Committee Members. Members log in using their UW NetIDs and will see the option to approve the dissertation after the student’s final exam has been scheduled. Any non-UW Reading Committee members must obtain a UW NetID when the join the committee. The PhD Program GPA can assist in this process.

Participating in Commencement Exercises

Consistent with the eligibility criteria for participation in the University of Washington’s June commencement exercises, individuals are eligible for participation in the School of Social Work’s June commencement exercises if the doctoral degree has been earned during the preceding Summer, or the Fall or Winter term of the current academic year. Alternatively, if a doctoral candidate has a reasonable expectation of graduating in either Spring or Summer of the current academic year he/she may choose to participate. ‘Reasonable expectation of graduation’ is interpreted as having progressed sufficiently in the writing of a dissertation that is of sufficient academic standard that there is strong consensus by the candidate’s Reading Committee that a dissertation defense can be scheduled in sufficient time for graduation by the end of the Summer term (after the commencement exercises).

The PhD Program Director must approve commencement participation for any student who has not completed all requirements, including submission of the final dissertation to the Graduate School.

• For information on participating in the School of Social Work commencement . To apply and participate in the University of Washington’s June commencement exercises go to the Graduation, Commencement, and Diplomas page .
• Approved by Steering Committee, 5/26/98.
• Approved by the PhD Steering Committee, 11/6/2012.
• Graduate School revisions in General Examination and Defense Process instituted May 2009.
• Approved by Steering Committee, 12/7/2010.

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Once offered admission as a PhD student, you are matched with a faculty adviser. Your adviser provides guidance and helps answer questions until you select a supervisory committee chair (between years one and three). Your chair then serves in an advisory capacity and as the supervisor for your dissertation.

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Students who enter the PhD program with a BSN can earn an MS in Nursing Science during the program following successful completion of the first year of the PhD program and the preliminary examination.

After the first year of full-time study and the first two years of part-time study, courses and other scholarly activities are determined by you and your supervisory committee to comprise your individual program of study. The supervisory chair is a School of Nursing graduate faculty member whose research approach, interest, or research methods align with your proposed dissertation project.

You and your chair complete the supervisory committee by selecting faculty members from the School of Nursing, the UW at large, and other appropriate experts outside the University. This committee approves your program of study and guides you through the general examinations, dissertation research, and final defense.

The Nursing Science Statistics Area of Concentration requires a minimum of 14 credits of advanced statistical methods coursework above and beyond the 10 credits of statistics required for the PhD degree. Of these, two credits are fulfilled by the CSSS Seminar, and a minimum of 12 credits are fulfilled by at least four advanced statistics courses, three of which must come from the list of CSSS courses approved for the concentration.

All courses taken as part of the statistics concentration must be graded.

However, a 500-level course that is graded credit/no credit may be considered for inclusion in your Area of Concentration proposal if:

• In the course, you submit an individual project (i.e., not a group project); and
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CSSS seminar: minimum two credits

A minimum of two quarters in CS&SS is required. The most up-to-date course descriptions for statistics course options can be found on the CSSS website .

Approved CSSS advanced statistics course options

The most up-to-date course descriptions for statistics course options can be found on the CSSS website .

Variation in area of concentration coursework

One advanced methodological course in nursing, political science, psychology, public health, sociology, statistics, economics, educational psychology, social welfare, and other related fields may be considered as part of the Nursing Science Statistics Area of Concentration four course requirements if it contributes to the overall coherence of the student’s program of study and is consistent with the student’s research goals.

This course would be in addition to the ten credits of statistics courses required for the PhD in nursing.

Admissions Requirements

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How to Write a Dissertation or Thesis Proposal

Published on September 21, 2022 by Tegan George . Revised on July 18, 2023.

When starting your thesis or dissertation process, one of the first requirements is a research proposal or a prospectus. It describes what or who you want to examine, delving into why, when, where, and how you will do so, stemming from your research question and a relevant topic .

The proposal or prospectus stage is crucial for the development of your research. It helps you choose a type of research to pursue, as well as whether to pursue qualitative or quantitative methods and what your research design will look like.

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What should your proposal contain, dissertation question examples, what should your proposal look like, dissertation prospectus examples, other interesting articles, frequently asked questions about proposals.

Prior to jumping into the research for your thesis or dissertation, you first need to develop your research proposal and have it approved by your supervisor. It should outline all of the decisions you have taken about your project, from your dissertation topic to your hypotheses and research objectives .

Depending on your department’s requirements, there may be a defense component involved, where you present your research plan in prospectus format to your committee for their approval.

Your proposal should answer the following questions:

• Why is your research necessary?
• What is already known about your topic?
• Where and when will your research be conducted?
• Who should be studied?
• How can the research best be done?

Ultimately, your proposal should persuade your supervisor or committee that your proposed project is worth pursuing.

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Strong research kicks off with a solid research question , and dissertations are no exception to this.

Dissertation research questions should be:

• Focused on a single problem or issue
• Researchable using primary and/or secondary sources
• Feasible to answer within the timeframe and practical constraints
• Specific enough to answer thoroughly
• Complex enough to develop the answer over the space of a paper or thesis
• Relevant to your field of study and/or society more broadly
• What are the main factors enticing people under 30 in suburban areas to engage in the gig economy?
• Which techniques prove most effective for 1st-grade teachers at local elementary schools in engaging students with special needs?
• Which communication streams are the most effective for getting those aged 18-30 to the polls on Election Day?

An easy rule of thumb is that your proposal will usually resemble a (much) shorter version of your thesis or dissertation. While of course it won’t include the results section , discussion section , or conclusion , it serves as a “mini” version or roadmap for what you eventually seek to write.

Be sure to include:

• A succinct introduction to your topic and problem statement
• A brief literature review situating your topic within existing research
• A basic outline of the research methods you think will best answer your research question
• The perceived implications for future research
• A reference list in the citation style of your choice

The length of your proposal varies quite a bit depending on your discipline and type of work you’re conducting. While a thesis proposal is often only 3-7 pages long, a prospectus for your dissertation is usually much longer, with more detailed analysis. Dissertation proposals can be up to 25-30 pages in length.

Writing a proposal or prospectus can be a challenge, but we’ve compiled some examples for you to get your started.

• Example #1: “Geographic Representations of the Planet Mars, 1867-1907” by Maria Lane
• Example #2: “Individuals and the State in Late Bronze Age Greece: Messenian Perspectives on Mycenaean Society” by Dimitri Nakassis
• Example #3: “Manhood Up in the Air: A Study of Male Flight Attendants, Queerness, and Corporate Capitalism during the Cold War Era” by Phil Tiemeyer

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If you want to know more about AI for academic writing, AI tools, or research bias, make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples or go directly to our tools!

Research bias

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The research methods you use depend on the type of data you need to answer your research question .

• If you want to measure something or test a hypothesis , use quantitative methods . If you want to explore ideas, thoughts and meanings, use qualitative methods .
• If you want to analyze a large amount of readily-available data, use secondary data. If you want data specific to your purposes with control over how it is generated, collect primary data.
• If you want to establish cause-and-effect relationships between variables , use experimental methods. If you want to understand the characteristics of a research subject, use descriptive methods.

A thesis or dissertation outline is one of the most critical first steps in your writing process. It helps you to lay out and organize your ideas and can provide you with a roadmap for deciding what kind of research you’d like to undertake.

Generally, an outline contains information on the different sections included in your thesis or dissertation , such as:

• Your anticipated title
• Your abstract
• Your chapters (sometimes subdivided into further topics like literature review , research methods , avenues for future research, etc.)

A well-planned research design helps ensure that your methods match your research aims, that you collect high-quality data, and that you use the right kind of analysis to answer your questions, utilizing credible sources . This allows you to draw valid , trustworthy conclusions.

The priorities of a research design can vary depending on the field, but you usually have to specify:

• Your research questions and/or hypotheses
• Your overall approach (e.g., qualitative or quantitative )
• The type of design you’re using (e.g., a survey , experiment , or case study )
• Your sampling methods or criteria for selecting subjects
• Your data collection methods (e.g., questionnaires , observations)
• Your data collection procedures (e.g., operationalization , timing and data management)
• Your data analysis methods (e.g., statistical tests  or thematic analysis )

A dissertation prospectus or proposal describes what or who you plan to research for your dissertation. It delves into why, when, where, and how you will do your research, as well as helps you choose a type of research to pursue. You should also determine whether you plan to pursue qualitative or quantitative methods and what your research design will look like.

It should outline all of the decisions you have taken about your project, from your dissertation topic to your hypotheses and research objectives , ready to be approved by your supervisor or committee.

Note that some departments require a defense component, where you present your prospectus to your committee orally.

Formulating a main research question can be a difficult task. Overall, your question should contribute to solving the problem that you have defined in your problem statement .

However, it should also fulfill criteria in three main areas:

• Researchability
• Feasibility and specificity
• Relevance and originality

Cite this Scribbr article

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George, T. (2023, July 18). How to Write a Dissertation or Thesis Proposal. Scribbr. Retrieved September 3, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/dissertation/thesis-dissertation-proposal/

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How to submit the final version of your PhD thesis

At the end of the examination process all successful PhD and MPhil candidates are required to submit the final version of their thesis to the appropriate College Postgraduate Office.

COVID-19 Update

The requirement for one hard copy thesis to be submitted has been waived during the current circumstances which require remote working for most staff/students. Submission of PhD theses will be electronic only.  A signed declaration is not required in the final version when the submission is deposited in Pure.  This concession from the regulations about physical thesis submission will continue for the foreseeable future, and will be reviewed by Academic Services once the pandemic is over. 

Before you submit your thesis

The University has an expectation that a PhD thesis is a document available for public consultation. As such, unless a legitimate reason for restricting access to the thesis exists, all PhD theses will be made publicly available on the internet via the Edinburgh Research Archive (ERA).

It is highly recommended that you discuss with your primary supervisor the implications of publishing your thesis online in ERA . If your thesis contains confidential or sensitive data it may not be appropriate to make the full text freely available online. Similarly if there is the intention to publish the whole, or extracts from, your thesis you may want to restrict access to the electronic version.

Submitting the PDF version

• Go to Pure and log in with your EASE account
• Click on the green ‘Add new’ button on the top right and select ‘Doctoral Thesis’, or alternatively click on ‘Student theses’ on the left-hand-side navigation bar followed by ‘Doctoral Thesis’
• The record should be auto-populated with most of your thesis award information. Please check for completeness, and add in the title of your thesis in the appropriate box.
• Upload your electronic thesis files by clicking on the ‘Add document’ button. If you require an embargo for the PDF add the date and reason in the appropriate boxes. The initial embargo length is one year from date of graduation. The date will be checked by Library staff and changed if a different value is added without permission.
• Please remove any signatures, personal postal and email addresses from the PDF version.
• Upload your Access to Thesis form alongside your thesis files.
• Supplementary data can be added alongside the thesis text. Change the ‘Type’ to ‘Supplementary materials’ and upload the files as described above. The record Visibility needs to be set to ' Backend - Restricted to Pure users ' 
• To finish, set the status to ' Entry in progress ', click the blue ‘Save’ button at the bottom of the screen and the submission is ready for validation by college office staff.

Submitting the final hardbound version is not required

Submission of PhD theses is now electronic only - see the steps above.

Data preservation and sharing

If your thesis has supplementary data (for example images, videos, source code or analytical data) we would like to store a copy of this data alongside the thesis text. We do this to try and preserve the fullest record of the work as possible. Datasets should be supported by good accompanying documentation which is appropriate to your subject discipline. The UK Data  Service offers some specialist advice in this area. We do not routinely allow public access to this data; however, if you wish to share your data with others we recommend the Edinburgh DataShare service.

Edinburgh Datashare

If you have a lot of supplementary files - for example lots of images, data in multiple spreadsheets or video formats - we don't recommend depositing them in PURE. Instead, contact the Scholarly Communications Team and we can advise the best way to send them to us.

Redacting material from your thesis

If you wish to make your thesis available to the public to consult, but there are  problematic elements that cannot be openly shared then it is possible to submit a redacted version. We typically recommend partial thesis redactions are suitable for the following scenarios:

Third-party copyright

Where third party copyright has not been obtained, students may submit an edited thesis, as an alternative to requesting an embargo. 

Sensitive material 

If the thesis contains confidential or sensitive information, e.g. transcripts of interviews, which cannot be shared or anonymised.

Photographs

If your thesis contains photographs of people and you do not have their permission to publish their image online.

It is possible to design your thesis in a way which means the problematic material is easy to remove. For example, if you are planning to use a large number of photographs, you could layout your thesis with the photographs in a separate appendix which can be  easily removed.

Students who have chosen to submit a redacted version of their thesis would also need to submit a full unedited copy which will be securely kept stored by the Library. This is important to preserve the integrity of the academic record of the University. Both versions of the files should be uploaded to the Thesis Module in Pure with the files clearly named to differentiate between the two. We recommend the following file naming convention:

<Last name><First initial>_<Year>_COMPLETE    

<Last name><First initial>_<Year>_REDACTED

e.g. SmithJ_2023_COMPLETE.pdf  

Reasons for requesting an embargo period

If the redaction option is not possible then students are permitted to embargo their thesis under certain conditions described below:

Planned publication

Normally a longer embargo period may be granted when there are firm publication plans in place, e.g. where a manuscript has been submitted to a publisher and is in a formal stage of publication (submitted, accepted, in press). Vague plans for publication are not normally accepted.

Commercial confidentiality

There may be contractual restrictions imposed by a sponsor, which could include industrial sponsors or governmental agencies.

Patent application

Patent applications can be rejected by the premature publication of research. Where the research might lead to a commercial application or patent then we recommend that the Intellectual Property needs to be protected.

Contains personal data

Where a thesis contains personally identifiable or ethically sensitive data or where material obtained in the thesis was obtained under a guarantee of confidentiality we would consider placing an embargo. These issues should have been addressed at an early stage of the research project.

Where third party copyright has not been obtained, students may submit an edited thesis, as an alternative to requesting an embargo. They would also need to submit an unedited hard copy which will be secured kept.

Publication could endanger health and safety or prejudice national security

The thesis contains sensitive material (political or otherwise) which could put at risk the authors or participants if made openly available. These issues should have been addressed at an early stage of the research project.

How to request a Thesis Restriction

How to request a 12 month embargo.

You can restrict access to the electronic version of your thesis for one year without any special permissions. If an embargo is required, this must be indicated on the Access to Thesis form, otherwise, the thesis may be made publicly available. This form should be deposited in Pure alongside the full text of the thesis.

At the end of the embargo period, the University is under no obligation to contact you about extending the period of restriction. If towards the end of your embargo period you have any concerns that the forthcoming public availability of your thesis would be problematic please contact the Library ( [email protected] ) and the Scholarly Communications Team will be able to help.

Embargo requests longer than 12 months

Requests for embargoes that exceed 12 months starting from the date the work is added to the Library’s collection require Head of School approval and must be accompanied by a clear rationale as to why a longer period is required. Complete Section 2 of the Access to a Thesis form to request an extended embargo. Extended embargoes beyond five years will not normally be approved unless there are very exceptional reasons. Normally any relevant evidence to support a request for an extended embargo should be attached to the request, e.g. publishing contract or correspondence from industrial sponsors.

Click here to download the  ACCESS TO THESIS & PUBLICATION OF ABSTRACT FORM  , or visit the general  Doctoral Thesis Submission webpages for more information.

Further help and information

Scholarly Communications Team

Contact details.

• Email: [email protected]

Availability

This article was published on 2024-08-21

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Dissertation Defense - Arash Modaresi Rad

October 17, 2023 @ 9:00 am - 11:00 am mdt, event navigation.

• « Advancing the Fuzzing Frontier: Extending Effective Software Testing to Today's Complex and Opaque Codebases
• Dissertation Defense - Chidi Agbo »

Inland Water’s Challenges in Ungauged International Basins: Identifying the Desiccation Drivers of Endorheic Hamun Lakes

Presented by Arash Modaresi Rad Computing PhD, Data Science emphasis City Center Plaza Conference Room 352

Dr. Mojtaba Sadegh (Advisor), Dr. Hans-Peter Marshall , Dr. Kevin Roche

Inland waters face unprecedented pressures from climatic and anthropogenic stresses, causing their recession and desiccation globally. Climate change is increasingly blamed for such environmental degradation, but in many regions, direct anthropogenic pressures compound, and sometimes supersede, climatic factors. This study examined a human-environmental system – the terminal Hamun Lakes on the Iran-Afghanistan border – that embodies amplified challenges of inland waters. Satellite and climatic data from 1984-2019 were fused, which documented that the Hamun Lakes lost 89% of their surface area between 1999 and 2001 (3,809 km2 versus 410 km2), coincident with a basin-wide, multi-year meteorological drought. The lakes continued to shrink afterwards and desiccated in 2012, despite the above-average precipitation in the upstream basin. Rapid growth in irrigated agricultural lands occurred in upstream Afghanistan in the recent decade, consuming water that otherwise would have fed the Hamun Lakes. Compounding upstream anthropogenic stressors, Iran began storing flood water that would have otherwise drained to the lakes, for urban and agricultural consumption in 2009. Results from a deep Learning model of Hamun Lakes’ dynamics indicate that the average lakes’ surface area from 2010-2019 would have been 2.5 times larger without increasing anthropogenic stresses across the basin. The Hamun Lakes’ desiccation had major socio-environmental consequences, including loss of livelihood, out-migration, dust-storms, and loss of important species in the region.

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Department of History

College of Social Science

History PhD Candidate Spotlight: NAEd Spencer Dissertation Fellow Gloria J. Ashaolu

Posted on August 14, 2024 August 20, 2024 Author mcdon625

 By: Patti McDonald 

Gloria J. Ashaolu, a Michigan State University History PhD candidate majoring in African American history with minors in U.S. history and Black comparative/diaspora history, was recently named a 2024 National Academy of Education (NAEd)/Spencer Dissertation Fellow.   

This prestigious fellowship was only offered to 35 graduate students nationwide. The fellowship supports these students with the writing phase of their dissertation. The fellowship is comprised of three key components: fellows receive $27,500 for one academic year (distributed in two installments), students participate in two professional development retreats facilitated by NAEd members and other distinguished scholars, and have the opportunity of selecting an NAEd member or another respected scholar as their mentor to offer advice and assistance during the school year. 

We sat down with Gloria and asked her about her dissertation, how grateful she is for being recognized as a NAEd/Spencer Fellow, and why she decided to major in African American history and minor in U.S. history, and Black comparative/diaspora history. 

What were you thinking when you found out you were awarded The NAEd/Spencer Dissertation Fellowship?   

I was overwhelmed with joy and a deep sense of gratitude. 

What is this fellowship going to allow you to do? How is it so helpful you received this?   

The financial support from the NAEd/Spencer Dissertation Fellowship alleviates the need for significant employment and will allow me to dedicate more time to my dissertation—toward meeting the goals I set for my time to degree trajectory. I am also immensely grateful for the unique opportunity to engage with members of my cohort and distinguished scholars in the field of education at the two professional development retreats organized by the National Academy of Education. Participating in the discussions and sessions will provide me with the resources and insight to meaningfully contribute to the field and the improvement of education. Furthermore, fellows are paired with mentors who will provide further research and career development over the academic year.  

What is your dissertation about? Tell us about it in a few sentences.   

Between the late 19 th and early 20 th centuries, the model of educational vision Black teachers fostered and were deeply committed to greatly mirrored what we today regard as anti-racist systems of knowledge and educational practices. My dissertation attends to the understudied educational activism, pedagogies, and praxes of local Black teachers during the Early Black History Movement through a biographical analysis of the life and times of Jane Dabney Shackelford, a Black female educator from Terre Haute, Indiana who was most active during the era of Jim Crow segregation. The educational trajectory and systems of teaching Shackelford and her peers embodied serve as a useful tool for conceptualizing the significant ways in which local schoolteachers cultivated an intentional educational and intellectual practice that challenged the beliefs, politics, and policies of Jim Crow segregation. Driven by what Anna Julia Cooper referred to as the “moral forces of reason and justice and love,” these educators inspired Civil Rights Movement participants, Black Power Movement activists, and Black Studies revolutionaries.  

Why is this type of research so important?   

Amid the regime of violence, discrimination, and disfranchisement of Jim Crow segregation, local Black teachers played critical roles in the lives of countless Black youth by educating them about their rich history, heritage, and culture. This study situates the underappreciated presence and pedagogies of these educators within their rightful historical legacy. The first contribution of this project entails the study of the life and times of an influential—yet understudied—historical actor as a window into the education-activism of Black teachers during the Early Black History Movement. Second, this project attends to the principles and conventions of Jim Crow North, by challenging static, flattened, and selective narratives that loom in popular remembering of the era of Jim Crow segregation. Third, the use of the robust repository that makes up the Shackelford papers seeks to excavate the scholarly and intellectual work and the service ethos that guided her educational activism and that of her community of educators.  

Why did you decide to major and minor in African American history, U.S. history, and Black comparative/diaspora history?  

The decision to major and minor in African American history, U.S. history, and Black comparative/diaspora history in the Michigan State University History PhD program was inspired by the trajectory of my research, the opportunity to learn from leading scholars in the fields, and my aspiration to create meaningful historical work that helps us better understand the present through our collective history towards a just and inclusive society. 

    Who have been some of your mentors within the History department?   

My mentors within the department include my major Advisor, Dr. Pero G. Dagbovie (University Distinguished Professor of History, Associate Provost for Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies, and Dean of the Graduate School), and Dissertation Committee Member, Dr. LaShawn D. Harris (award-winning historian, Organization of American Historians Distinguished Lecturer, and Associate Professor of History). I am sincerely thankful for their instrumental guidance and supportive mentorship.  

    Anything else you would like to include?   

  I am also grateful to God for the scholar-friends in the Department of History and College of Education who have been thought-partners and for their community of support.  

Gloria J. Ashaolu 

The Department of Political Science

Phd candidate iván ruiz-hernández wins fulbright-hays fellowship.

PhD Candidate Iván Ruiz-Hernández was awarded the Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad . The Fellowship will support Iván’s dissertation research in Mexico. Congratulations, Iván!