i hate writing my dissertation

Researcher, Writer, Artist

“i hate my dissertation” and other writing barriers, posted on august 7, 2023 august 7, 2023 by monica.

I knew it was coming. I’d seen enough students complaining online to know that it seemed to happen to everyone. This summer I finally felt it: I hate my dissertation.

I’m entering year 6 of my PhD program and I’ve heard all the complaints before. At this point, they’re either boring (I’ve been hearing/seeing the same complaints for years) or discouraging (nothing ever seems to change).

At the same time, as I wade through the murky middle stages of dissertation writing and prepare the enter the job market, I find myself referencing others’ complaints as a sort of pessimistic guide. So when suddenly, I found myself frequently and consistently thinking, “I hate my dissertation,” it was like coming to a fork in the road, leading to two very different reactions.

In isolation, that thought might have caused alarm. It would have been easy to spiral: Did I pick the wrong topic? Is my project not interesting enough? Am I not cut out for academic work?

But the last five years of witnessing graduate student complaints had prepared me well. My internal thoughts sounded more like: Ha, so this is what it feels like. Oh, I’m in the Valley of Shit . I’ve made it to the hating-my-dissertation stage!

Complaints, even when they are unoriginal, put words to our struggles. Lately, those struggles have been intensified for me (see again: preparing for the job market), but that has forced me to find workarounds.

Power in Naming

First, I’ve found it useful to name my struggles. I gleaned this idea from recently having read Michelle Boyd’s book, Becoming the Writer You Already Are , and revisiting Steven Pressfield’s The War of Art , a book I read regularly during my time as a freelance writer. Pressfield refers the amorphous force that prevents us from doing our work as Resistance ; Boyd lays out multi-faceted reasons why we as academic writers get stuck . With these authors in the back of my mind, I started a writing session one day listing out the reasons I was currently hating my dissertation. Put into list form, the reasons I had that day were:

• It’s agonizing.
• It doesn’t seem important.
• It’s not tied to some big, important, popular-topic research question.
• It doesn’t contribute anything to the literature.
• It’s boring.
• It’s not worth it.
• It won’t get me a job.
• No one will care.
• No one will hire me.

And there it was. The trail of mental vomit on my screen led me to my fears around the job market. I didn’t really hate my dissertation; I hated all the weight and pressure attached to it.

Following this train of thought, I realized this pressure didn’t just apply to the immediate future either. Recently, I’d been witnessing the success of an assistant professor I admire, who was publishing award-winning articles from her dissertation research and finishing up a book. So I’d inadvertently taken on this pressure too: my dissertation has to be award-winning. I have to produce award-winning articles from it, then an award-winning book, and that will lead to tenure. My fears turned out to be incredibly proactive, worrying years into the future.

Okay, Now What?

Writing out these thoughts was a wake-up call. I sounded unhinged. It was no wonder I’d been feeling incredibly resistant to and even resentful of my dissertation. Beyond recognizing that I needed to let go of the unrealistic and debilitating pressure I was placing on a single project, responding to other items on my list helped too.

Some of the reasons on my list are completely false: I’ve written a dissertation proposal and multiple fellowship/grant applications in which I explained why my topic holds importance, connected my project to larger research questions, and highlighted the contributions I hope to make to various literatures.

Some reasons just reflect that this work isn’t easy. It can feel agonizing at times (nailing down the right framing) and boring at others (in a word, transcription).

Beyond the list, it was no coincidence that hating my dissertation coincided with a period when I was overwhelmed and exhausted. I was at the tail end of teaching a six-week summer class that met 5 days a week and had been doing a good deal of new course prep nearly every day, all while trying to make regular progress on my dissertation and prepare job market materials.

The main solution to my problems was to get some good rest, once final grading for my class was done.

In the meantime, my temporary solutions were to set my fears aside and treat my dissertation like a job. Catastrophizing about my future wasn’t helpful; I just needed to show up and complete the nitty gritty tasks in front of me that day. Since teaching had to be my priority during that period, my dissertation was like an hourly job. It might not be a lot, but this (metaphorical) side hustle was going to help pay my (intellectual?) bills. Or something like that. The metaphor breaks down. The point is that I showed up, “paid myself,” and trusted that would be enough, even if it wasn’t a lot.

So as a counter to the list of reasons I hated my dissertation, here’s a list of what I did to trick myself into writing a hated dissertation:

• Brain dump/vent/freewrite about why I hate my work or don’t want to do it. Now that that’s off my chest…
• Read writing books. Little snippets at a time. I enjoy reading writing about writing. Writing books are usually well-written and force me to think about writing, which is only a short jump away from feeling motivated to write for myself.
• Change of scenery. A coffee shop or favorite spot on campus works well for me.
• Have a treat as I work. Get the café pastry that looks extra nice today. Listen to nice music. Keep snacks on hand.
• Set pomodoros or time limits of some sort. If I just need to get going, I’ll start with 10-15 minutes. Otherwise my standard is 30. Your sense of time gets warped while writing and it’s good to stand up and take breaks anyway.
• Social media accountability. I don’t think anyone else cares, but a short post announcing my goals for a writing session is usually enough pressure for me to close the app and work. I used to do this on Twitter (RIP); now I use Spoutible or Mastodon . Afterward, you can share your progress. Even if no one else cares, it feels satisfying to me.
• Real-life accountability. I’m grateful to friends who invited me to write or accepted my spontaneous, “I’m thinking of going to [café] soon” invitations to write together.
• The promise of rest or something enjoyable afterward. Hanging out with friends, eating out, or catching up on your favorite shows all work. “Work hard; play hard” is a tried-and-true cliché; getting the work done means I can “play,” or enjoy my downtime more fully. Doing nothing never felt so good.

There’s nothing particularly special or unique about any of these suggestions. But this is what’s working for me now. And after getting that much-needed, post-teaching rest, I just might have tricked myself into figuring out a decent contribution to the literature.

My advisor will let me know soon.

Wish me luck.

Image credit: @ Saydung89 on Pixabay

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15 things to remember if you’ve started to hate your PhD

Jun 1, 2021

Have you checked out the rest of  The PhD Knowledge Base ? It’s home to hundreds more free resources and guides, written especially for PhD students. 

It’s entirely normal to hate your PhD from time to time. The further you travel on the PhD journey, the more you start to resent the thesis. 

That’s natural – spend years working on something, often with little immediate reward, and it natural that you will start to crumble. 

Here we’ve put together a list of 15 things to remind yourself of if you’re started to lose motivation. They’ll remind you of all that’s special about your thesis and, hopefully, inject some enthusiasm back into your relationship with it. 

Interested in group workshops, cohort-courses and a free PhD learning & support community? 

The team behind The PhD Proofreaders have launched The PhD People, a free learning and community platform for PhD students. Connect, share and learn with other students, and boost your skills with cohort-based workshops and courses.

1. you should work less.

I find that most people fall into one of two camps.

There are those who throw themselves into their work, always chained to their desk and never feeling like they’re on top of things.

Then there are those who get easily distracted, putting things off to the last minute and feeling guilty that they’re always a little behind.

In both cases the outcome is the same: long hours spent working, with the fatigue and the stress that comes with it.

But what about doing less work? What about being more selective with your time, and more selective with what’s on your to do list, such that you didn’t have as much to do at all?

It means accepting that your value and output is not measured on the basis of how many hours you put in, or how much work you get done. It’s measured instead on the quality of the work, and on the level of focus you can achieve.

So if you find yourself burning the candle at both ends, ask yourself whether what you really need to do is work less.

2. Don’t Push Away Negative Thoughts

3. remember that your phd is trying to drown you, 4. routines come and go.

For many, the simplest way of making the PhD journey more manageable is to develop consistent routines. 

For me, that involves going on a morning walk, exercising a few times a week, getting my emails and admin done first thing in the morning, and going to bed at roughly the same time.

But it’s easy to slip out of routines. We may be away from home, or the holiday season may disrupt our daily rhythm.

Whatever it is, we can start to drop the good habits we carefully nurture and start to pick up unhealthy ones – we might start exercising less, eating more processed foods, or staying up late.

When that happens to me, I can quickly start to feel anxious about whatever it is I’m working on. That makes sense; if routines introduce stability into our lives, it’s logical that disrupting those routines can mean we feel ungrounded and out of sorts.

If you can relate this holiday season, go easy on yourself. Like everything in life, this is temporary. As long as you’re conscious of what good routines looks like, and as long as you’re conscious that you’re temporarily departing from them, it won’t be long before you get back into healthy habits once the thing disrupting your routine has passed.

5. Ask Yourself: Are You Biting Off More Than You Can Chew?

6. set your intentions, 7. embrace the crappy drafts, 8. remind yourself that phds are hard.

Finding your PhD hard is kind of the point.

Repeat after me: if you’re finding your PhD hard it doesn’t mean you’re a failure, it means you’re doing it right.

9. Keep failing

10. remember that you’re never going to please everyone, 11. you’re going to get criticised, 12. don’t focus (too much) on the problems, 13. you have to admit when you’re wrong, 14. ask yourself: am i a perfectionist.

Most of the PhD students I talk to are perfectionists. You probably are too. 

With perfectionism comes a desire to have control over day-to-day life, knowledge of what’s going to happen in the short term, and the certainty that the PhD thesis will be, well, perfect. 

And then along comes coronavirus. 

Your day-to-day life has been disrupted as you work from home and away from you normal routines, you’ve got no way of knowing what will happen in the short or long term, and you may worry that your thesis will be sub-optimal as you step away from fieldwork, labs and supervisors.

The perfectionist in you is panicking, right? 

Perfectionism is a double-edged sword. On the one hand it can fill you with drive, passion, dedication and motivation. It can inspire you to try your hardest and do your best. It’s likely what got you on to your PhD programme in the first place. 

But at the same time, it has a dark side. For as much as it can inspire, it can lead to panic. Anxiety, worry and dread often follow in the footsteps of perfectionism, such that when you lose control over your reality, or when you get things wrong, make mistakes or produce something sub-optimal, you panic. What starts off as a simple mistake can quickly become the end of the world.

Part of the challenge of doing a PhD, and particularly in the current context, is learning to embrace imperfection and recognising that sub-optimal does not necessarily mean failure. Managing perfectionism involves reminding yourself that you’re only human, and that humans face stresses, make mistakes and sometimes struggle to produce their best work. Even the brightest and most competent of people have off days. 

The more you can remind yourself of that, the better equipped you’ll be to deal with what life throws at you and your thesis. 

15. Lastly, Remember That It’s Okay Not To Be Productive

Your PhD thesis. All on one page.

Use our free PhD structure template to quickly visualise every element of your thesis. 

Share this:

Thanks for the encouragement and all… but, I keep failing, and I understand it is a process. But because of my failures I’m about to be fired from my PhD. 🙁 It is hard, yes. I keep messing up and failing, yes. I’m getting fired, yes.

Thanks for the kind words. I hope things work out for you.

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I absolutely hate my PhD and I don’t understand the purpose of it

I am in the fifth year of my PhD and seriously depressed. In my first year of graduate school I was not funded. In my desperation for funding I chose an opportunity that came my way even though I did not like the topic. The research I would say is pretty mundane, I was providing experimental support for an FEM group. I did t have any freedom until the end of my 4th year. Also my advisor was the co-PI and the project was not in his area of expertise and he had no clue about the work being done. Whenever I get lost and ask him for advice, he would commonly uses the phrase “Do what the industry sponsor wants, keep him happy ”. I literally felt like a contract employee and not a PhD researcher. As expected the work did not yield any papers. My lab mates working on other topics (areas of my advisors expertise) get to present at academic conferences and are writing journals. When I point out this fact I get chided for comparing myself with others and that my work is “unique”. At one point my advisor himself said that the project was ill conceived. You can understand my frustration.

Now I am depressed, lost, and hardly do anything. I wake up, go to the lab and pass time. I absolutely hate my “thesis”, I don’t have anything meaningful or useful for my future career. I don’t even know the purpose of my thesis topic. initially I was scared to leave, now I feel it is too late to leave.

please advise me on what to do? Thanks.

• research-topic

• which are are you working in, FEM sounds like engineering? also, which country / how long is your program supposed to take? –  FirefoxMetzger Commented Jan 20, 2020 at 5:13
• Perhaps this comment is ill-conceived, but I'm wondering if there's likely to be any consequences to the supervisor/advisor if none of the solutions presented here manifest, and whether this could be used as bargaining power in case things turn sour. If you've done work or been committed, then you shouldn't be leaving with nothing. Especially not if someone made a mistake in the project design or neglected rather than nurtured you. –  Brayton Commented Jan 20, 2020 at 9:04
• Well the purpose of a PhD is not to make sense, or even to have a useful result (a result is nice to have, but secondary). PhD is a title that states that you have delivered the proof of being able to work systematically, find literature, read, and write it up, again systematically. Much like passing university is not about knowing or learning and mastering anything, but merely a proof of being able to deliver according to a strict time schedule, pass tests, perform exactly as required when required , and move on. (Also, PhD exists to have people work for free.) –  Damon Commented Jan 20, 2020 at 14:34
• Offtopic, but it might help you a little. Keep in mind that being a PhD student was one of the hardest period in many researchers life. You are not alone with this situation, even if the others in the lab seemingly advance faster than you. You need to follow the suggestions in the answers, but firstly: do not be affraid, you are not alone. Unfortunately, this is way more common than it should be. –  SnOwl Commented Jan 20, 2020 at 17:04
• 1 I find it hard to imagine aproject where the co-PI "had no clue about the work being done"; if you weren't already in your fifth year, I'd advise you to get out. But under the current circumstances, your best bet is probably to (1) get counseling to deal with your depression and (2) do whatever is needed to finish your Ph.D. as quickly as possible. Item (1) will probably be a necessary prerequisite for (2) and also for subsequently repairing the damage caused by your unfortunate Ph.D. experience. –  Andreas Blass Commented Jan 20, 2020 at 22:18

3 Answers 3

Now I am depressed, lost, and hardly do anything. I wake up go to the lab and pass time. I absolutely hate my “thesis”

This is the problem; you are stuck in a vicious cycle. You need to meet with your advisor and come up with a solid plan - including a timeline - for what will happen in the next year or two.

Given that it has already been 5 years, I suspect this plan should involve you finishing your current work, writing a dissertation, and graduating. But, you and your supervisor could also choose a different direction (i.e., starting a new topic or choosing a new advisor).

I don’t have anything meaningful or useful for my future career. I don’t even know the purpose of my thesis topic.

At this point it's probably time to decide what your career goals are and make sure your plans are aligned with reaching those goals.

• This could mean spending 1/3 to 1/2 of your time learning skills that will be useful for an industry career, and spending the rest of your time preparing for graduation. Given your level of burn-out, I suspect this is the wiser course, but I'm just guessing.
• Or, it could mean switching topics / advisors / institutions so that you will be competitive for academic positions in topics that interest you more.

• 2 Upvoted. The most important thing is to reflect and take a decision in a limited time. The situation is not ideal, but people get stuck at different points in their career and a PhD is a more likely phase than others to get stuck in. A decision will be liberating. –  Captain Emacs Commented Jan 20, 2020 at 8:45

I am not a psychologist, and even if I was I woudn't try to diagnose over the internet, but this:

Sounds like you should seek professional help from a counselor. Even if you are not clinically depressed, a good counselor and help you work through your feelings and difficult decisions you have to make. They might help you decide to leave your PhD, so they might help you decide you should finish it having come this far, and help you develop strategies to get it done as quickly and painlessly as possible. I can't speak for your school, but we have a university counselling service here that can provide up to 8 sessions to any student or staff member for free. Have a look if your school has anything similar.

I'm going to take a slightly different approach, but bear in mind that the other answers are very right. A PHD program is challenging, and as with anything else in life taking care of your health (and mental health) should be a top priority.

That being said, my answer assumes you have evaluated that and are still intent on continuing. The challenge of a PHD program is supposed to come from working on ground breaking problems, not from your advisor's lack of support. Without further details, it's hard to say, but it does sound like he's prioritizing his career (finishing an industry sponsored project) over yours (publishing papers, working on interesting topics). And he's apparently far enough out of his areas of expertise that he can't effectively guide you. That is a recipe for frustration. Been there, done that, with an added helping of arrogance and failed commitments on the side. So, what can you do?

If there are resources offered by your graduate school that would be a good place to start. I'll list some things that helped me, although I may not recommend all of them for your situation.

• Treat it like a job. You seem to be giving yourself a hard time since the research isn't working out how you think it should. Just put in the hours and emotional commitment that you would for a job and trust that eventually your advisor will hold up his or her end of the deal and help you defend.
• Get a solid timeline. Already mentioned in the other answers, but I'm repeating it here since suggestion 1 doesn't really work if it turns out the research you're working on won't lead to a dissertation. At the very least you should have an approximate timeline, what problems and approaches will go into the dissertation, and what scope of work you are expected to do, and what will happen if the project continues to fail. And get it in writing.
• Work with your committee. As with suggestion 2, make sure your committee is clearly aware of what work you intend to do. Make sure they consider it notable enough for a dissertation. Then, give them regular (monthly) updates - what progress has been made, what issues you've encountered, what problems need to be solved, and follow up on the rare suggestions they may give.
• Take responsibility - unfortunately it sounds as though your professor may be incapable of supporting this area of research so you will need to take the initiative on ideas and experiments.

Those are just some suggestions. I would strongly encourage you to consider what exactly you want from the program, and whether you can complete it with the current level of support from your advisor ( edit : and take a week or two off to vacation, spend time with family, or whatever makes you relax before making any choices). Depending on your goals, you may very well be better off switching advisors and research areas.

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Is it normal to hate your dissertation and pray for it to be over?

I’ll be happy when I’ve finished my literature review.

I’ll be happy when I’ve handed in my dissertation.

I’ll be happy when I’ve finished my degree.

Have you said anything like this recently?

If so, you are not alone.

In this blogpost, I’m going to tell you why this “ I’ll be happy when… ” malarkey is stopping you from doing your best work and what you can do right now, today to overcome that.

Yes, this one is all about mindset, because the way you think and feel about your dissertation and the way you talk to yourself about it, is absolutely fundamental in shaping the quality of your work.

We’ll be covering the following things:

Gap or gain?

How to get out of the gap, top tip for living in the gain.

I recently read a really good book called The Gap and The Gain , by Dan Sullivan and Benjamin Hardy .

It is so, so relevant for dissertation students.

In a nutshell, this book argues that we need measure success backwards rather than forwards .

What the hell does that mean? Let me explain…

It means that if we’re constantly looking to the future, to this thing that we want to achieve - but haven’t yet achieved - we tend to constantly live in deficit.

We focus on what we haven’t got, what we haven’t finished, what we haven’t accomplished.

We are living in the gap. The gap between what we have and what we want.

We’ll be happy when we get there.

However, we’re not there now.

If this is the way we look at things, it is clearly going to make us feel pretty crappy about our present situation, right?

However, the alternative way of looking at things is living in the gain, focusing on what we have already accomplished . We look backwards at how much we’ve achieved in the last day, the last week, the last year. As such, we measure our success backwards.

Now, think about what you’ve said about your dissertation recently.

What was the last conversation you had with someone about it and was it all gap or all gain?

How’s your dissertation going?

How are you feeling about your dissertation?

Notice what you just thought, or said out loud. Exactly what words did you use?

Now, if you said something gappy in response to that question, here’s how you can turn that around.

If your answer was, “ I’m not as far ahead as I’d like to be, I wanted to have written 6,000 words by now and I’ve written 3,000. I’m really annoyed with myself ”, here’s how you can reframe that. You can say, “ This time four months ago, I had zero words written for my dissertation. Now, I have written 3,000 words. I’ve come a really long way. Yes, there’s work I still need to do, but I’m on my way. ”.

If your answer was, “ My literature review is a total mess, the structure is all over the place ”. Instead you might say, “ This time three months ago, I hadn’t even started my literature review, I’d read literally nothing. Now, I’ve done a fair amount of reading and I’ve made notes on what I’ve read. I’ve even started putting that into my literature review chapter and right now, I’m focused on tidying that up ”.

If your answer was, “ I have literally done NOTHING on my dissertation ”, that’s not actually true, is it? Try this instead. “ Today, I read a blog about dissertation mindset it made me realise how important it is to focus on what I have achieved so far. Earlier, I was in a really negative place about it, but now, I’m starting to feel better and ready to get started ”.

See? Simply by reframing how you look at things, you will start to feel better about your dissertation, and that is going to be massively helpful for you in moving forwards.

One thing you can do from this point onwards, is to set a reminder on your phone once a week, or a couple of times a week if you like. When that reminder goes off, you’re going to stop what you’re doing and identify three gains you’ve made since the last time you checked in with yourself .

It doesn’t have to be anything huge, like “ I drafted my entire literature review ”, but if you did, definitely put that on there! However, think about the smaller gains:

“I learned how to reference a journal article properly.”

“I had a meeting with my supervisor.”

“I spoke to a professor I like about my ideas.”

“I spent half an hour brainstorming about my methodology chapter.”

“I got my notes organised so they’re not in 12 different places”.

If you make this a habit, you will start to shift your mindset about your dissertation. By focusing on what you’re doing, and celebrating the little victories, you will be so motivated by the successes that you already have that you’ll find the negative thinking starts to fall away.

How you think about your dissertation affects what you do about it, and that in turn impacts on your more generally. There’s a quote that I’ve seen pinging around the internet for several years now, which sums this up wonderfully:

Watch your thoughts, they become your words; watch your words, they become your actions; watch your actions, they become your habits; watch your habits, they become your character; watch your character, it becomes your destiny. (Lao Tzu, Chinese Philosopher)

Further reading on all things mindset

The Gap and the Gain: The High Achievers' Guide to Happiness, Confidence, and Success , by Dan Sullivan and Benjamin Hardy.

Stop Thinking, Start Living: Discover Lifelong Happiness , by Richard Carlson.

Change Your Thoughts - Change Your Life , by Wayne Dyer.

If you’re ready to get more organised with your dissertation, check out my Dissertation Planner Shop for PDF planners, worksheets and cheat sheets!

This blogpost contains affiliate links and I will receive a commission for any purchases you make through my links.

How to write your dissertation introduction chapter: top tips for sociology and criminology students

What are the aims and objectives of a social science dissertation.

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What to do if you dislike writing research or academic papers.

BY DAVID GUTIERREZ

Unfortunately, even if you hate writing academic papers more than anything else in the world, you still have to do it if you want to graduate successfully. However, it is possible to alter one’s attitude towards something – often to a greater degree than you may believe. Here are some techniques that can make writing your next academic assignment bearable, if not outright pleasant.

1.    Take breaks

Taking regular breaks is important in any kind of work, and writing is no exception. Divide your assignment into a number of reasonably small parts and promise yourself to take a break after you successfully complete each of them. Both the parts and the breaks may be as large or small as it is useful for your situation. For example, if you write an essay, you can take 5-minute breaks every 200 words. If you write something more substantial, both the parts and the breaks can be larger. Do something pleasant in the course of your breaks – this will motivate you to complete each part faster.

2.    Eliminate distractions

When you do something you hate, every potential distraction is twice as enticing as it usually is. This means that if you are surrounded by distractions while you write your academic paper, you are likely to get distracted all the time. To prevent this, single out the things that are likely to attract your attention as you work and remove them from you. If it is structure and general layout of the paper that give you trouble, consider custom term papers for sale. Block distracting websites using Leechblock or RescueTime, turn off notifications, switch off your smartphone, block out the external noises by some music in your earphones.

3.    Find a writing place that works for you

If you do something you hate, you should at least do it somewhere you feel comfortable. Where it exactly depends on your preferences: some like to work at home, others prefer a nice café; still others find it inspiring to work in the park. Take your pick.

4.    Don’t try to write like somebody else

One of the reasons why you may hate writing is because you believe that you shouldn’t write in your own voice. You think you need to imitate either someone else or to write in an affected manner that has little in common with your own way of thinking and writing. Most likely, you are wrong, and your writing will only be improved if you choose to follow your heart and write the way you like.

5.    Practice

Another reason why students hate writing academic assignments is that they are not very good at writing. The reverse is true as well – once you learn how to write more or less well, you start feeling pleasure doing it. Do a bit of practice writing assignments of the type you have to write most often. Who knows? Perhaps, it will grow on you.

6.    Don’t be perfectionistic

Perfectionism is equally deadly both for enjoyment received from writing and the results achieved. Don’t try to make every sentence perfect – it is impossible. Write reasonably well, don’t go crazy correcting what you’ve already written because you will never finish doing it.

Learning to love writing is hard and long work, and we don’t claim that everybody is capable of doing it at first attempt. But making writing pleasant is achievable – and you can do it.

David Gutierrez has worked in the field of web design since 2005. Right now he started learning Java in order to get second occupation. His professional interests defined major topics of his articles. David writes about new web design software, recently discovered professional tricks and also monitors the latest updates of the web development.

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Advice for surviving your PhD dissertation

Tips for each step of researching, writing and refining a PhD dissertation

From initial research and writing to revision, defence and award, the journey to completing a PhD is often described as a marathon. Here, academics offer their insight on each step towards producing an original work of scholarship. Starting with choosing a supervisor and establishing healthy habits, the advice goes on to cover how to structure a PhD dissertation, establish a writing routine, write an abstract, prepare for a viva and beat procrastination when motivation flags.

.css-7qmtvr{overflow:hidden;max-height:108px;text-indent:0px;} Get a head start in the first year of your PhD

Andreï V. Kostyrka

University of Luxembourg

How to start writing your PhD thesis

Strategies for writing a dissertation: write before you’re ‘ready’

Monique Dufour

Virginia Tech

How to navigate the PhD thesis

Luis R. Rojas-Solórzano

Nazarbayev University

How to write a PhD thesis: a step-by-step guide

Kelly Louise Preece

University of Exeter

One thesis, two supports, three months

Mariam Shadan

Dubai Medical College for Girls

How to tackle the PhD dissertation

Dalhousie University

Get your PhD thesis beach ready

John Sinclair

Colorado State University Global

Finding supervision and support

Top tips for choosing a PhD Supervisor

Near East University

Buddy system: creating community through writing

Lena Steveker, Laura Spadon

Individual consultations can help PhD students to complete their studies

Szabolcs Várbíró , Judit Réka Hetthéssy, Marianna Török

Semmelweis University

Transitioning to a PhD: common struggles and how to overcome them

Camille Bou

The London School of Economics and Political Science

Protect your emotional well-being for a happier writing experience

Burcu Totur Dikmen

Why getting a PhD is like building a Lego duck

The University of Edinburgh

Advice for doing a PhD by publication

Why get a PhD by publication (and other career tips)

James Derounian

University of Bolton

Publication-based doctorate: is it for me?

Northumbria University

Advice for supervising a PhD by published works

Alison Brettle

University of Salford

How to write an abstract for a research paper

Ankitha Shetty

Manipal Academy of Higher Education

Read this before you write your abstract

Michael Willis

How to find motivation, keep going and finish your thesis

Five ways to beat the procrastination monster

Glenn Fosbraey

University of Winchester

Bad news, kids (and academics): the magical motivation fairy doesn’t exist

Hugh Kearns

Flinders University

What is your academic writing temperament?

Rachael Cayley

University of Toronto

How to develop a researcher mindset as a PhD student

Shaif Uddin Ahammed

University of the West of Scotland

Evidence synthesis: what every student (and researcher) should know

Alessio Bellato

University of Southampton

Preparing for the viva or defence of your PhD

‘Augmenting’ the doctoral thesis in preparation for a viva

Edward Mills

How to answer viva questions

Jenny Scoles

Tips for writing a PhD dissertation: FAQs answered

Campus team

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 ...

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20 Comments

thankfull >>>this is very useful

Thank you, it was really helpful

unquestionably, this amazing simplified way of teaching. Really , I couldn’t find in the literature words that fully explicit my great thanks to you. However, I could only say thanks a-lot.

Great to hear that – thanks for the feedback. Good luck writing your dissertation/thesis.

This is the most comprehensive explanation of how to write a dissertation. Many thanks for sharing it free of charge.

Very rich presentation. Thank you

Thanks Derek Jansen|GRADCOACH, I find it very useful guide to arrange my activities and proceed to research!

Thank you so much for such a marvelous teaching .I am so convinced that am going to write a comprehensive and a distinct masters dissertation

It is an amazing comprehensive explanation

This was straightforward. Thank you!

I can say that your explanations are simple and enlightening – understanding what you have done here is easy for me. Could you write more about the different types of research methods specific to the three methodologies: quan, qual and MM. I look forward to interacting with this website more in the future.

Thanks for the feedback and suggestions 🙂

Hello, your write ups is quite educative. However, l have challenges in going about my research questions which is below; *Building the enablers of organisational growth through effective governance and purposeful leadership.*

Very educating.

Just listening to the name of the dissertation makes the student nervous. As writing a top-quality dissertation is a difficult task as it is a lengthy topic, requires a lot of research and understanding and is usually around 10,000 to 15000 words. Sometimes due to studies, unbalanced workload or lack of research and writing skill students look for dissertation submission from professional writers.

Thank you 💕😊 very much. I was confused but your comprehensive explanation has cleared my doubts of ever presenting a good thesis. Thank you.

thank you so much, that was so useful

Hi. Where is the excel spread sheet ark?

could you please help me look at your thesis paper to enable me to do the portion that has to do with the specification

my topic is “the impact of domestic revenue mobilization.

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How to Write a Dissertation: Step-by-Step Guide

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• Doctoral students write and defend dissertations to earn their degrees.
• Most dissertations range from 100-300 pages, depending on the field.
• Taking a step-by-step approach can help students write their dissertations.

Whether you're considering a doctoral program or you recently passed your comprehensive exams, you've probably wondered how to write a dissertation. Researching, writing, and defending a dissertation represents a major step in earning a doctorate.

But what is a dissertation exactly? A dissertation is an original work of scholarship that contributes to the field. Doctoral candidates often spend 1-3 years working on their dissertations. And many dissertations top 200 or more pages.

Starting the process on the right foot can help you complete a successful dissertation. Breaking down the process into steps may also make it easier to finish your dissertation.

How to Write a Dissertation in 12 Steps

A dissertation demonstrates mastery in a subject. But how do you write a dissertation? Here are 12 steps to successfully complete a dissertation.

Choose a Topic

It sounds like an easy step, but choosing a topic will play an enormous role in the success of your dissertation. In some fields, your dissertation advisor will recommend a topic. In other fields, you'll develop a topic on your own.

Read recent work in your field to identify areas for additional scholarship. Look for holes in the literature or questions that remain unanswered.

After coming up with a few areas for research or questions, carefully consider what's feasible with your resources. Talk to your faculty advisor about your ideas and incorporate their feedback.

Conduct Preliminary Research

Before starting a dissertation, you'll need to conduct research. Depending on your field, that might mean visiting archives, reviewing scholarly literature , or running lab tests.

Use your preliminary research to hone your question and topic. Take lots of notes, particularly on areas where you can expand your research.

Read Secondary Literature

A dissertation demonstrates your mastery of the field. That means you'll need to read a large amount of scholarship on your topic. Dissertations typically include a literature review section or chapter.

Create a list of books, articles, and other scholarly works early in the process, and continue to add to your list. Refer to the works cited to identify key literature. And take detailed notes to make the writing process easier.

Write a Research Proposal

In most doctoral programs, you'll need to write and defend a research proposal before starting your dissertation.

The length and format of your proposal depend on your field. In many fields, the proposal will run 10-20 pages and include a detailed discussion of the research topic, methodology, and secondary literature.

Your faculty advisor will provide valuable feedback on turning your proposal into a dissertation.

Research, Research, Research

Doctoral dissertations make an original contribution to the field, and your research will be the basis of that contribution.

The form your research takes will depend on your academic discipline. In computer science, you might analyze a complex dataset to understand machine learning. In English, you might read the unpublished papers of a poet or author. In psychology, you might design a study to test stress responses. And in education, you might create surveys to measure student experiences.

Work closely with your faculty advisor as you conduct research. Your advisor can often point you toward useful resources or recommend areas for further exploration.

Look for Dissertation Examples

Writing a dissertation can feel overwhelming. Most graduate students have written seminar papers or a master's thesis. But a dissertation is essentially like writing a book.

Looking at examples of dissertations can help you set realistic expectations and understand what your discipline wants in a successful dissertation. Ask your advisor if the department has recent dissertation examples. Or use a resource like ProQuest Dissertations to find examples.

Doctoral candidates read a lot of monographs and articles, but they often do not read dissertations. Reading polished scholarly work, particularly critical scholarship in your field, can give you an unrealistic standard for writing a dissertation.

Write Your Body Chapters

By the time you sit down to write your dissertation, you've already accomplished a great deal. You've chosen a topic, defended your proposal, and conducted research. Now it's time to organize your work into chapters.

As with research, the format of your dissertation depends on your field. Your department will likely provide dissertation guidelines to structure your work. In many disciplines, dissertations include chapters on the literature review, methodology, and results. In other disciplines, each chapter functions like an article that builds to your overall argument.

Start with the chapter you feel most confident in writing. Expand on the literature review in your proposal to provide an overview of the field. Describe your research process and analyze the results.

Meet With Your Advisor

Throughout the dissertation process, you should meet regularly with your advisor. As you write chapters, send them to your advisor for feedback. Your advisor can help identify issues and suggest ways to strengthen your dissertation.

Staying in close communication with your advisor will also boost your confidence for your dissertation defense. Consider sharing material with other members of your committee as well.

Write Your Introduction and Conclusion

It seems counterintuitive, but it's a good idea to write your introduction and conclusion last . Your introduction should describe the scope of your project and your intervention in the field.

Many doctoral candidates find it useful to return to their dissertation proposal to write the introduction. If your project evolved significantly, you will need to reframe the introduction. Make sure you provide background information to set the scene for your dissertation. And preview your methodology, research aims, and results.

The conclusion is often the shortest section. In your conclusion, sum up what you've demonstrated, and explain how your dissertation contributes to the field.

Edit Your Draft

You've completed a draft of your dissertation. Now, it's time to edit that draft.

For some doctoral candidates, the editing process can feel more challenging than researching or writing the dissertation. Most dissertations run a minimum of 100-200 pages , with some hitting 300 pages or more.

When editing your dissertation, break it down chapter by chapter. Go beyond grammar and spelling to make sure you communicate clearly and efficiently. Identify repetitive areas and shore up weaknesses in your argument.

Incorporate Feedback

Writing a dissertation can feel very isolating. You're focused on one topic for months or years, and you're often working alone. But feedback will strengthen your dissertation.

You will receive feedback as you write your dissertation, both from your advisor and other committee members. In many departments, doctoral candidates also participate in peer review groups to provide feedback.

Outside readers will note confusing sections and recommend changes. Make sure you incorporate the feedback throughout the writing and editing process.

Defend Your Dissertation

Congratulations — you made it to the dissertation defense! Typically, your advisor will not let you schedule the defense unless they believe you will pass. So consider the defense a culmination of your dissertation process rather than a high-stakes examination.

The format of your defense depends on the department. In some fields, you'll present your research. In other fields, the defense will consist of an in-depth discussion with your committee.

Walk into your defense with confidence. You're now an expert in your topic. Answer questions concisely and address any weaknesses in your study. Once you pass the defense, you'll earn your doctorate.

Writing a dissertation isn't easy — only around 55,000 students earned a Ph.D. in 2020, according to the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics. However, it is possible to successfully complete a dissertation by breaking down the process into smaller steps.

Frequently Asked Questions About Dissertations

What is a dissertation.

A dissertation is a substantial research project that contributes to your field of study. Graduate students write a dissertation to earn their doctorate.

The format and content of a dissertation vary widely depending on the academic discipline. Doctoral candidates work closely with their faculty advisor to complete and defend the dissertation, a process that typically takes 1-3 years.

How long is a dissertation?

The length of a dissertation varies by field. Harvard's graduate school says most dissertations fall between 100-300 pages .

Doctoral candidate Marcus Beck analyzed the length of University of Minnesota dissertations by discipline and found that history produces the longest dissertations, with an average of nearly 300 pages, while mathematics produces the shortest dissertations at just under 100 pages.

What's the difference between a dissertation vs. a thesis?

Dissertations and theses demonstrate academic mastery at different levels. In U.S. graduate education, master's students typically write theses, while doctoral students write dissertations. The terms are reversed in the British system.

In the U.S., a dissertation is longer, more in-depth, and based on more research than a thesis. Doctoral candidates write a dissertation as the culminating research project of their degree. Undergraduates and master's students may write shorter theses as part of their programs.

Explore More College Resources

How to write an effective thesis statement.

How to Write a Research Paper: 11-Step Guide

How to Write a History Essay, According to a History Professor

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Screw you thesis!

Last time we met my friend, PhD student and working academic ‘Dave’ he was walking through the Valley of Shit . Dave emerged from the deathly valley soon after I published that post, but he has now hit the last phase of PhD study, which I call “PhD detachment”. Dave, somewhat more colourfully, calls this phase “Screw you thesis!”.  He tells us why in this post, but caution – there’s some strong language!

Them: “Do you hate it yet?” Me: “Huh?” Them: “Do you hate it yet… your thesis? You know you are ready when you begin to hate it.” Me: “Uh… well, uh…no. Not yet.” Them: “You will.”

I’ve had this conversation a few times over the past few months and it was really starting to bug me. I never knew how to deal with it so I usually just smiled, nodded and said something like “I guess I will… eventually”, but that always felt false to me because on the available evidence, I didn’t really have any reason to hate my thesis.

Sure, I had my moments of doubt about the quality of my work and the worthiness of my contribution, but from what I can gather, this is all pretty normal stuff . After all, it’s not until the examiners have given it the Big Red Tick do you know with any certainty how good it is.

I couldn’t see why anyone would hate their project. That seemed counter-productive to me. Don’t worry about how you feel about it, just get on and finish it. I couldn’t understand why anyone would want to waste energy on emotions about a project.

That is, until this morning when, all of a sudden, I hated it.

Not just hated it, but HATED it. The kind of burning hatred that consumed me with the heat of a thousand suns . I was pissed off and this realisation hit me, like many other realisations, in the shower.

You see, this morning I looked down in the shower and noticed that I was sharing the shower with two rubber ducks, a small rubber chicken, a tugboat, a plastic shark and my two year old son. When did all these things get in the shower with me? How long had they been there? Have I always had children’s toys in the shower, or is this a new thing? And what’s with the chicken? All the others at least have something to do with water, but a chicken? That’s just odd.

Come to think of it, what was the conversation about over the breakfast table this morning? What plans did I make with my wife? What did I agree to do later this week? What are the plans for today? I mean, I know what my plans are; I’ll be writing. But what will the rest of my family be doing?

Will they be going out in the sunshine? If so, with who and to do what? Was I invited? Even if I was, I would have said no, but the point is, I can’t remember if I was invited or not. AND if I wasn’t invited was that because I always say no anyway or has it become normal that my family make plans without me? When did THAT start?

This was starting to turn into a pretty heavy shower.

And that’s when I realised that I hate my thesis. Well, not my thesis exactly, but the all-consuming nature of it. I hate the fact that I can’t think about anything else. I hate the fact that my son is growing up fast and I can’t find the time to enjoy it with him.

I hate the fact that everything in my life is on auto-pilot and I don’t want to change anything. Change would mean I’d have to put energy into thinking about how I would have to re-enter the world again, for a little while, until I can put that part of my life back on auto-pilot again. I hate the fact that I haven’t had a good night’s rest in months. I hate the fact that I’ve lost nearly all of my friends as their patience for me finishing runs out. I hate the fact that I have come to hate my thesis.

But really, is that right? Maybe this hate thing is not hate at all, but resistance to change. Maybe I’ve mis-diagnosed hatred as resistance? Is that possible?

I’m reminded of some work done by William Bridges on organisational change.  He argues that there are three stages of transition that people go through when they are faced with change: Endings; The Neutral Zone; and New Beginnings.

Briefly, when people are faced with change, something comes to an end. For people to transition successfully, Bridge suggests, they need to recognise that they will lose something , or indeed, they will lose part of their current identity.

When people accept this loss, they move into the Neutral Zone where they spend time examining the way they do things. What different behaviours and attitudes might better suit the new (changed) state? This examination can take longer than the change itself.

Finally, once the first two transition stages have been navigated , people begin to work towards New Beginnings. However, while this appears to be a neat little theory, people often find the psychological transition stages difficult and so they resist going through them.

Maybe that is what is happening with me and my thesis?

I’m nearly at the end of my project. I’ll be done in December. Come 2013, I’ll be doing something else. Something different. Something NOT my thesis. So I guess there is a sense of loss there.

I’ll no longer have to spend my weekends worrying about such things as methodologies, or qualitative codes. I won’t have to feel guilty because I didn’t hit my minimum words-per-day target. And, I suppose, I’ll no longer have the excuse of having to work on my thesis to get out of various social obligations.

I guess that also means that I’ll have to re-think the way I plan my time and focus my attention. I am already doing that to some degree – even though it’s only September, I’m already thinking about my teaching and research obligations in 2013 in light of the fact that the thesis will be done – it will no longer compete for time. How will that look, exactly? What routines will I have to change?

And finally, what does all this mean for me and my family once I’m finished? How do I begin to act as a Post-Doc father? I’ve never had to do that before. Where do I begin? What do I do?

As my project winds up, I realise that the deadline is approaching faster than I’d like it to. The change is coming , but I haven’t completed the transition and so I’m feeling a little edgy about that; I’m resisting and it’s manifesting as a strong emotion: hate. As the wonderful Leela James sings: “Whoever said it was ‘teasy, they lied; it ain’t easy…” but at least now I know what it is that I’m up against.

So, Screw You Thesis.

The change is coming and there’s nothing I can now do about that. But how I respond, well that’s up to me and I’m done with the hating bit. I see you for what you are now Thesis. I understand that once you are finished, I can get about living differently; a better life.

So I’m going to embrace you as I race to the finish. I’m going to look forward to this new life I am about to begin. I’m going to stop hating you and use you as a springboard into the future. The next time someone asks me “do I hate it yet”, I’m going to say: “I did. Briefly. But I’m over than now and am looking forward to finishing.”

Are you looking forward to finishing? Or resisting change? We’d love to hear how you are feeling about The End of your thesis journey in the comments.

Related Posts

The Valley of Shit

PhD Detachment

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The Thesis Whisperer is written by Professor Inger Mewburn, director of researcher development at The Australian National University . New posts on the first Wednesday of the month. Subscribe by email below. Visit the About page to find out more about me, my podcasts and books. I'm on most social media platforms as @thesiswhisperer. The best places to talk to me are LinkedIn , Mastodon and Threads.

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How to Pick a Masters Thesis Topic

Giving your career trajectory.

Peter Campbell

Beginning graduate school is overwhelming. Graduate programs are not simply continuations of undergraduate degrees, but an introduction into academia- it is a process of acculturation.

Undergraduate degrees open you to a range of potential jobs; conversely, graduate degrees put you on a specific track. There is no wrong Masters thesis per se, but if you realize that your degree is part of building a career (as opposed to setting yourself up for various and unrelated jobs ) then you will understand why a thesis is valuable for giving your career trajectory . Your thesis and Masters degree should be the first step on a career path.

I was a Masters student back in ’07 and I chose my thesis topic (dissertation if you are a UK student) based on some very sound advice from Dr Fred Hocker. Having completed my MA and since helped many others complete their degrees, I have added to Fred’s advice to create some useful tips for choosing a quality thesis topic. These guidelines are written by an archaeologist, but can applied to most fields.

1. Pick something you can get done quickly.

Let’s rip this bandaid off- No one is going to read your MA thesis. I hate to admit it after I spent 2 years writing my thesis, but after my committee approved it I don’t think a single soul has read it cover to cover. My thesis has been viewed over 800 times and I gave hardbound copies to family and friends, but even my father couldn’t make it through that chloroform in print. How do I know? I found some errors when I read through it recently- big enough that anyone paying the slightest attention would notice.

Pick a topic that you can finish quickly. Every topic expands as you start writing, so pick something concise. In archaeology everyone wants to excavate a site or make the next big discovery. Rather than re-invent the wheel, choose something that is easy data where there is an established path. Your role is to push it forward or in a new direction. Don’t overextend with scope, funding, or time commitment. You want to make an impact, but if you spend 5 years on your Masters then you are sure to be disappointed when no one notices or cares. A Masters thesis is not a professional standard, it is a competency test.

And the competency threshold is low.

2. What Jobs Need.

You probably aren’t thinking beyond the completion of your degree, but you should be. What do you need to actually be successful in your field? Consider that even short gaps in your CV are problematic for employment and you likely need to find work in your research area within the first 6–12 months or your career is likely over before it began. After a year there is a new batch of freshly minted MAs that look a lot more attractive on paper than your Swiss cheese CV. Use your time as a student to make yourself as attractive to employers as possible.

What do they require? Are they looking for peer-reviewed journal articles? Then pick a topic that can be quickly turned into an article. Speak to your supervisor about writing it as an article and then you can get free feedback throughout the thesis writing process.

Are jobs looking for people who can write technical reports? Government reports? Find ways to coauthor reports with your supervisors, or intern or volunteer with jobs that will get your name on reports. Simply helping or being in the acknowledgements isn’t enough- put in the time to be a co-author. It is stressful and adds work to your busy schedule, but how do you think it looks when two CVs are side by side and one has “student experience working on a government project” and the other “co-authored a report submitted to the Ministry of Culture.”

Here is a big secret: No one from this point forward will really care about grades. Employers don’t care. Will you be applying to a PhD program? If your research is good enough and your grades aren’t tragic, then you have nothing to worry about. Your time is better spent getting work experience and a B than having no work experience and an A. When you finish your Masters program, there are going to be 50 or 100 or 1000 people worldwide with an identical degree and all looking for jobs at the same time. How will you distinguish yourself from the others? Work experience in your field goes much further than either grades or your thesis topic.

[In the same vein but unrelated to Masters topics, do not start applying for jobs when you need them. Everyone is applying for jobs as soon as they are awarded their degree, so start contacting employers several months ahead so they know who you are. They hire based on their schedule, not yours.]

3. You need to like it.

Pick something bite-sized and smart, but also something that you like. When you spend countless hours on something you develop a complex relationship with that subject. If you start off lukewarm to a topic, you will struggle to make it through the entire process. Most of the graduate students I know who exited programs early or failed their vivas had topics that they were not excited about.

More importantly, you need will need to sell it when you interview for jobs or PhD programs. Everyone is better salesperson when they are genuinely excited about their thesis topic. Communicating excitement about your thesis also communicates engagement with your field of study, which should translate into successful work/research with your new employer.

4. Finding trajectory.

Choose a topic that creates a trajectory- you don’t need to necessarily take it, but it keeps your options open.

You may never do a PhD, but it sure is nice to have the option available. At both my MA and PhD universities are highly successful young professors only a few years older than myself. How did they rise so quickly through the academic ranks? They are brilliant minds to be sure, but they also took the smart approach to their degrees. If you look at their undergraduate capstone, MA, and PhD, you find they are all the same topic. Only the scale of the question changes for each subsequent degree.

It is unrealistic for everyone to find a topic that they will enjoy for 4–7 years and not everyone wants to do a PhD; however, it doesn’t hurt to have the option even if you don’t take it. Choosing a topic that can grow into a PhD not only gives options, but it makes the admission process into a PhD program much easier since you will be able to show data. If you decide to do a PhD, then you will finish more quickly and likely save money on fieldwork or data gathering. Choose a topic that has growth potential. This is something I failed to do and I paid the price in time and money.

Use the same principle for jobs. Your Masters is a time where you can cultivate skills. Take time to learn about the job market in your field, you’ll use this information throughout your career. I am guessing that as thorough as your MA courses may be, they do not teach all of the latest methods, equipment, or software that employers are seeking. Picking a topic with trajectory means that you will learn these in demand skills while working on your thesis and be able to step into a job upon completion. Remember, you need jobs have a common thread, building upon each other. The easiest way to do this is do leave school with a trajectory.

If you want to be successful you don’t need jobs, you need a career.

In another example of me doing it the wrong way, I knew little about the actual specifications of my field. My MA focused on post-processing of excavated shipwrecks. Underwater archaeology jobs are ~95% commercial, which are primarily survey for construction of coastal buildings, pipelines, oil rigs, and wind farms. These jobs require experience with remote sensing equipment and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) software, which I did not have due to my topic (if you are a maritime archaeology student, DO NOT leave school without remote sensing and GIS experience).

It is not your professor’s job to teach you marketable skills. It is your job to identify the skills you need and make sure you have them. No one is going to pity you if you did not bother to research your field prior to taking and completing a Masters degree.

5. Go forth! And conquer your Masters fears.

In summary, do yourself a favor by giving yourself a trajectory. You don’t have to know where you want to be in five years, but if you have a rough idea then enable that possibility by choosing a thesis leading in that direction. Have absolutely no clue where you want go after graduate school? Pick the most successful, highest paid, or most respected individual in your field and find out the steps they took to get their job (PhD, work experience, hot subjects/research areas, etc.). Choose a thesis that allows for a similar trajectory.

A thesis can be a big choice, so don’t be afraid to speak with faculty and friends. Similarly, don’t become paralyzed by overthinking- just get your degree done and get out into the real world. It’s just one step in your long career.

Please comment if you have suggestions to add to this article! Articles on finding jobs, preparing for interviews, and creating an online presence will be added in the future for readers of MaritimeArchaeology.com .

Written by Peter Campbell

Underwater archaeologist. I write about culture, philosophy, and the past. Now you say something.

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| | | | | | ( ) 577 points by | | | | | even it's an abomination, it gets your brain thinking about it and working on it, and it's so much easier to make the obvious improvements, and then more, and eventually you are just doing things normally. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Viable for production. That said, TDD (with emphasis on driven) is no silver bullet either, especially when working that way - the tests are equally affected and I've seen enouph code bases where the initial test surface was so off compared to what was needed/sensible that it ended up being solely a hindrance and stifling to actual rework/refactor - with people ending up throwing it away and rewriting the tests from scratch, or worst case, simply setting them to be ignored on build. | | | | | | | | | | | | | potentially harmful if other people can read it. OP describes it as a personal method and it may work by breaking some psychological issues, like a fear of under-perform or something like. But to do this one need to overcome all fears, to get rid of anxiety, and it needs a safe environment where you can write anything. Literally anything, to try it and to show to your mind that it is harmless thing, nothing bad happens, it is ok to write not good enough, because you can dump it later. | | | better than that." I use to have days at work where I didn't accomplish much, and say to myself "I'm a horrible father because I could have spent today with my kids." It's true that procrastination eats away hours of our lives, but there's no reality where most of us would have been able to say "I know I'll procrastinate the next three days, I'll take a beach vacation with those hours instead, and then do the job promptly the next day." This kind of (common) thinking is no better than any other kinds of regrets in life, staying awake and thinking "what if I had asked that person out in high school?" etc etc. | | | And is basically what you can take out after half a Ph.D. program. In many technical schools in Sweden you are expected to do Lic. on the way to Ph.D. or if you burn out you at least have a Lic. | | | but I very clearly also remember just sitting and staring at the task at hand, doing absolutely nothing, because I couldn't stomach how bad everything about the task that needed to be done was - bunches of redundant tables, illogical linking of data, lots of overcomplication, no documentation and no examples of helpful queries whatsoever. > If you're not just making slow progress but literally unable to make a single bit of progress, my goto strategy is similar to what writers call a vomit draft. In the end, just forcing myself to get started, writing out the dozen of different things I needed as a part of the query and then working backwards through everything, was what worked. It took hours of uninterrupted work, I felt miserable throughout it, but I got things done in the end, all because of that decision to actually work on it and deal with the pain and suffering, very much how someone would need to make the leap to dive into legacy code, or an issue for a project that doesn't have monitoring or instrumentation, or writing a thesis. I think that's why techniques like Pomodoro also get recommended, because if you trick yourself into saying that you'll only do a bit of suffering (work on the horrible thing) now and will take a break later, it's more tolerable: I'm just writing this because to me it feels different from how people commonly view procrastination: just getting distracted and wanting dopamine, as opposed to being able to stare at the computer for an hour without doing anything, just because doing the thing would be horrible. The latter feeling makes you want to quit your academical program (which seems like what the author is dealing with a little bit), or maybe draft your resignation and leave the job market for a bit instead of dealing with the codebase or whatever (which I did, albeit for different and less negative reasons in my case). | | | ) and in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, with the rhetorics professor facing 'my students are stuck write even the simplest essay' problem. Yes, write something, anything, then edit. These are two different states of mind, two completely different personality parts, and I wish we taught the first one better (and the second one too...). Shut down the critics part when writing. Should down the ego part when editing. | | | you are stuck and describe what would go there if you weren’t stuck. Sometimes this gets you to the solution, but if it doesn’t you still have your thoughts on it for latter. | | | | | | | | | Oh, this historical paper is slightly different angle, but also relevant, helped me quite a bit: Upper, Dennis. "The unsuccessful self-treatment of a case of “writer's block”." Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis 7.3 (1974): 497. | | | ) | | | It deletes all your work if you don't keep typing. Good motivator. | | | (albeit poorly), not nothing 2) it can be improved upon. | | | | of experience (like, decades of it, and being a professor with a stable career so you can take the punch and still stand up). Now that you're back to basics, it'll be easier. Start by making it worth it to you. Work for a few hours a day, like maybe two or three, then go do something you like that. Soon you will realize that doing the stuff you like you work a few hours is MUCH more enjoyable than procrastinating (it really, objectively, is). So you'll train your brain to get the reward from the work: hey, if I work for two hours, I can then do X or Y which will be awesome. (Do not plan to work 8 hours a day. You won't). Third, remember that you (as in, you, a person, a living being) are more important than all of this. It's just work; it doesn't deserve all the attention it gets. So what if there are a few people disappointed with you here and there? You are also disappointed with some people and that doesn't make them go home and cry in the dark. In all probability, there will always be a few people disappointed with you for the rest of your life. Actually, the list will probably grow. :) Good luck! | | | for failing to meet a deadline, or even failing a class - the rules can be bent quite a lot if they see you're making an effort and to complete your thesis / learn something. Just as long as you don't hit an blocker, that is. In my case, I never submitted the thesis, because my request to extend the time coincided with the faculty being split in two and completely overhauled - so instead of extension, I was told that, because of "syllabus changes", I would need to repeat the entire MSc level (2 years) to be able to submit the thesis now. I politely declined. | | | the alert is not solved then it was a real false positive, right?) and so on. Also based on confidence scores decrease sampling rate for stuff that doesn't tend to break. Oh and also the local agent should pull the some pretrained predictors from the controller so it can locally switch to higher sampling if some patterns occur, this would catch those pesky hard to debug transient bugs/errors. ... truth be told I got lost in chapter 1, because I had no idea what to actually write and implement from all this. so no thesis, but years later I got a nice part of an ADHD diagnosis out of it! | | | to complete everything you start, that wouldn't be fair to you. I know a good few that didn't complete for a myriad of reasons and they're all doing great. I think you should give it a go but the world won't end if you don't. Best of luck, will be thinking of you today. | | | I for one appreciated reading this post and as you can see below there are a lot of well off people who have had similar experiences. | | | <3, stranger | | | | | | I appreciated the post. | | I was going to procrastinate on this project and even that knowledge wasn't enough to stop me. The planning, organization, calendars, todo lists and so on didn't help. Later in life I was diagnosed with ADHD. With medication and coping techniques things are getting better. If you struggle with procrastination on a grand scale you have an emotional problem, not an organizational one. No amount of planners, charts, calendars or todo lists will solve it(though they are good to have for other reasons). You need emotional solutions. Therapy, medication, meditation, introspection. For anyone struggling with procrastination I wish you all the best. It is a lifelong problem. Don't expect to be able to solve it over night, but it can get better. | | To anyone who has felt this way, I am so sorry and you are not alone and there is help. If you're in school, access student health and the graduate programs health resources and leave programs. There still is so much unnecessary stigma and shame around mental health, but if you had similarly severe physical health problem, getting treatment and help would the first step. Not trying to brute force your way through it. | | | what ultimately works is asking for help, accepting that yes, it might not be what you want, but it gets you through this hurdle. maybe the next one will be easier. and get up to speed and then work on doing it alone, and then work on doing your best. | | You need to be able to be two personas in one. From a person that only cares about planning and making decisions to someone who only cares about what is in front of his or her until the work is done. | | dread leads to no progress and depression. I wish I had some magic trick to reset my mind in times like that, but I don't. I wound up dropping out and went to industry instead... and while the failure stung at the time, it was the best decision I ever made. Academia is a job. If your job is making you miserable, it's probably time to move on to another job -- especially if you have marketable skills. For me at least, it was so much easier to reset facing new problems, problems that I didn't go to work dreading. My big takeaway was that this a failure state for me, and that I need to be aware of myself and head it off before I'm trapped. I need to therapy, coaching, or other help before the death spiral sets in. But breaking of it and making progress on the hell-project? I dunno, sorry. I'll also say that, if you're like me, you may have struggled with suicidal thoughts. The thought that kept me sane, prior to leaving, was reminding myself that it would be to kill myself over work. Work isn't the purpose of living, being at the top of your field isn't the purpose of living, even being an academic isn't the purpose of living. There's billions of people on earth living fulfilling lives with boring, mundane jobs, finding satisfaction in friends and family and hobbies instead... so I would remind myself that, worst come to worst, I'd go find a boring, mundane job to pay the bills and find my satisfaction elsewhere. | | a choice can be the sort of self-empowering step that leads to very good things in life. So, my advice is to make a choice. It can be time-limited, if that helps, e.g. "I'll give this another month, and if I'm not happy, I'll leave." Please note the word here. That is very important. Life is short. Life also proceeds in a directed fashion -- you can't go back and change something that happened years ago. Make your future be good for you. Hope for -- no, -- that you will be happy, and productive, and that you will use all the experiences of your life to find ways to make others happy, and productive. This is all very vague, I admit. But I've seen many students get into a rut that is really quite corrosive to the soul. Making a choice, knowing that it's choice, can be quite freeing. There are many paths in life, many ways to contribute to this world. Don't underestimate your ability to find the path that's right for you. | | of work that lead to sub-results that lead to . A Ph.D. thesis is a marathon, not a sprint, and you need to plan accordingly, with milestones every now and then so that the supervisor (and his funders!) can be fed interim results in the form of publications. These milestones also motivate yourself, and they de-risk your project, so that at the end, your thesis can be produced by (slightly simplifying here but only slightly): Think about what sub-questions your overall research question can be split into? What code do you need to write and what experiments do you need to run to support your "central thesis" (which one poster in the above writing advice rightly recommended should be formulated as a question with sub-questions)? In the papers I read about procastrination, the reason commonly given is being overwhelmed by a huge monolithic problem. The good news, then, is: you as a computer science know "divide and conquer" the technique that is the cure for monolithic disease - create little chunks that you can solve, publish, and use as building blocks. Each of them won't be scary. It follows that a finite sequence of non-scary steps won't be scary. Ask experienced researchers around you for help in dividing up your research into manageable, implementable, publishable chunks. Remember: A Ph.D. thesis is an argument that your "central thesis" holds, so think hard what you need to show and how you can decompose bigger items into sub-questions. I wish you success, and most of all, stay sane! I know you can do it, because I read your very well articulated post, and problem analysis is 90% of the solution, you also seem to know how to ask for help when you get stuck. | | you must fight to the death with your own torpor. | | it. (although that's a bad example, because I could learn it one hour per week and finish it in 10 years. I'm not starting it because the process is intimidating in a toil-y way rather than a spark-my-creativity way) If you could do only one thing with your life, with no problems for money, time, motivation, etc, what would that be? Go do that. Because no matter how hard it is, it's the one thing you want to do with your life. And you only get one life. Before you leave the PhD, what can you do to take advantage of where you are in life right now? Meet more people around you, attend a lecture series, go dancing with fellow classmates, take an art class, join a theater troupe. You don't know - maybe you'll meet your future wife while you're distracting yourself from your PhD, and later this will be the funny story you tell about how you met. Don't take it so seriously. Just find something that feels valuable about your current situation, enjoy it, and let go of the guilt. | | a thesis. But OP is mostly complaining about not making progress in that will end up in the thesis. OP mentioned of an elephant in the room: not having any progress for the last X months. But there may be a second elephant that has gone unnoticed: OP may have already done enough to formulate and defend a coherent thesis. Or, the missing part isn't required to be as grand as the OP had imagined for their latest project, when it started. Many people may have a strong sense of pride and want to finish what they start. But this is really one of the times one needs to push their pride aside and be practical, mostly for the sake of their mental health. I would recommend to anyone in similar position to (a) compare their research output with that of past PhD students in their group, (b) openly discuss with their supervisor the minimum requirements for approving their thesis. Another practicality to keep in mind is that from a professor's perspective, a PhD graduate with a less than stellar thesis is preferred over a dropout student. Also, for PhD students interested in pursuing academic career, these days postdoc work is probably more important than a stellar PhD thesis. | | | | Discussing some issues with friends and/or others in your cohort will likely make you feel less alone than browsing other doomposts on r/GradSchool. With writing in particular, I've recently felt handwriting to be the limit of my writing production, i.e. given a fixed length of time, my output will be independent of whether I wrote or typed it. The affordance of writing slows me down just enough to craft the same text I would've (re)^(n)typed on computer. Writing is also more expressive and makes it easier to forget about my butt in the chair. | | | | Is Bear the new Xanga or something | | I coauthored a series of papers on a rock mechanics experiment while avoiding working on my PhD (which was in computational social science). Procrastination seems to have only demonstrated to me in my life that nothing actually matters all that much and you can do whatever you want. And most certainly you will do the things you want to do while you procrastinate assuming you avoid Reddit and video games. | | He's doing everything except actual work. Procrastination is a horrible thing. Meet the sporadic voters who could decide the 2024 election Neither Joseph Mitchum nor Laura Brooks participated in the last presidential election four years ago. But they and voters like them could very well decide the outcome of this   November’s race for the White House. Mitchum, who hails from battleground Georgia, and Brooks, who lives in Michigan, both participated in NBC News surveys this year and told pollsters that they’d support former President Donald Trump over President Joe Biden — reflecting a broad trend across public polling showing Trump with a sizable advantage among those who didn’t vote in 2020. Findings from NBC News’ last three national polls — all taken before last week's debate — show a whopping 25-point swing toward Trump among voters who didn’t participate in both 2020 and 2022, compared to voters who cast ballots in the last two national elections. If those voters turn out this time, it could make the difference between winning and losing for Trump. And both Mitchum and Brooks underscore the big question of whether these non-2020 voters will actually show up in November. Mitchum, 24, said he’s definitely voting in 2024 — after not being registered to vote in 2020. “Yes, I am going to vote,” he told NBC News in a follow-up interview. “I really don’t like what’s going on with our border,” he added, explaining why he supports Trump. “Another is I am partial to my gun rights.” But Brooks, 25, said in her follow-up interview that she’s probably not voting in November, though she said she’d support Trump in a poll. (Like Mitchum, Brooks wasn’t registered to vote in 2020.) “Biden, he seems to be just a little senile now,” she told NBC News. “And with Trump, there’s all the legal stuff around him that’s happening.” “I’ve never seen such a pony show,” Brooks added. Biden’s frequent voters versus Trump’s infrequent ones In 2020’s presidential election, a record 159 million Americans turned out to vote. Still, tens of millions of eligible people like Mitchum and Brooks didn’t participate, representing a significant segment of the potential electorate that could tip 2024’s outcome. NBC News’ polls in November 2023, January 2024 and April 2024 interviewed a combined total of 3,000 registered voters, most of whom were matched to historical voter files across the states. Of those who participated in both the 2020 presidential election and 2022 midterms — representing 56% of all interviewed voters — Biden led Trump by 5 percentage points, 49% to 44%, according to the merged polling. But among those who voted only in 2020 — representing 17% of the interviews — Trump was ahead by 12 points, 50% to 38%. And Trump’s lead over Biden was even bigger among those who didn’t vote in 2020 (by 16 points) and those who didn’t vote in both 2020 and 2022 (by 20 points). Looking at it this way, this election could come down to Biden’s frequent voters versus Trump’s infrequent ones. “Trump’s positive margins over Biden are coming from more infrequent voters — people who voted in 2020 and skipped the midterm election in 2022, or who have not voted in either election,” said Republican pollster Bill McInturff, who co-conducts the NBC News poll. It’s not just the NBC News national poll that finds Trump overperforming with infrequent voters; surveys from The New York Times  and the  Cook Political Report with Amy Walter  also show it. Will the infrequent voters show up in November? The challenge for Trump, however, is that these non-2020 voters show far less interest in the upcoming presidential election — and thus are potentially less inclined to actually vote in November. The same merged NBC News polling finds 73% of voters who participated in the 2020 and 2022 rated themselves as having high interest in the upcoming presidential election, giving themselves a “9” or “10” when asked to rate their interest on a 10-point scale. Only 44% of those who didn’t vote in 2020, and 37% who voted in neither 2020 nor 2022, rated their interest in 2024 as that high.  These findings represent   an enormous shift in American politics, given that Republicans used to produce the most reliable voters, while Democrats were more sporadic. “Forty years ago in a special election, the joke was ‘pray for rain,’ as the most dependable voters were college-educated, affluent Republicans who always voted,” said McInturff, the GOP pollster. But today, he added, “the data is clear that the consistent voter tips towards Biden.” Who are the voters who didn’t participate in 2020? According to NBC News’ polling, the non-2020 voters disproportionately describe themselves as political moderates. They tend to lack college degrees. And they are more likely to be younger voters. But some of them are older, like Maria Calderon, 52, of Houston. She explained why she didn’t participate in the 2020 election: “I had a lot going on in my life at the time.” Yet she told NBC News she will vote in November. “I’m gonna vote this year,” she said. “It would be for Donald Trump, 100%.” The infrequent voters also have much more negative opinions of Biden than they do of Trump. According to NBC News’ combined polling, Biden’s net favorability rating sinks from minus-9 among 2020 and 2022 voters to minus-31 among those who didn’t vote in either of the past two national elections. Trump’s trend is the reverse, from minus-6 among those who didn’t vote in 2020 and 2022, to minus-21 among those who participated in both. “I’m not voting,” said Vivian Lambert of Augusta, Georgia, who didn’t participate in 2020. “But it would be Trump.” “I just hear so many bad things about Biden,” Lambert continued. Still, not all of these infrequent voters are Trump backers. Kelly Torz of Michigan, 25, says she didn’t vote in 2020 but will vote for Biden in November, because of her support for abortion rights, the environment and LGBTQ issues. “I care a lot about the environment, and Biden is going to hopefully help keep the ecosystem in a better condition than I believe Trump would,” Torz said. And again, it’s not a certainty that all of these voters who didn't participate last time will participate in 2024. “Most likely I am,” said Noah Fimon, 19, of Louisiana, who supports Trump. Mark Murray is a senior political editor at NBC News. Katherine Koretski is a 2024 NBC News campaign embed. Career Advice Advancing in the Faculty Supporting Dissertation Writers Through the Silent Struggle While we want Ph.D. students to be independent, our practices can signal that we’re not available to support them when they need it, writes Ramon B. Goings. By  Ramon B. Goings You have / 5 articles left. Sign up for a free account or log in. shapecharge/iStock/Getty Images Plus Consider the following discussion. A student tells me, “I have so much going on right now. I’m trying to write this dissertation, take care of my mom and raise my kids. I’m giving to everyone else and have nothing left to write.” “Thanks for sharing,” I respond. “Have you reached out to your adviser to discuss what is happening and see what resources you might be able to access?” “My adviser said they will meet with me when I have a document ready for them to review. They are too busy,” the student says. “I’ve just been struggling in silence and don’t know what to do.” This conversation highlights the reality for many doctoral students—they may experience hardships in silence. The doctoral journey is an interesting experience during which students are provided structure through coursework and then, once they enter the dissertation phase, that structure is removed. They usually are in a position where they have to manage everything themselves. As faculty members, we try to provide the space of intellectual curiosity for our students and allow them to explore their dissertation topics. However, while we want students to be independent, our practices can signal that we are not available to support them when they need it. What are some strategies that we should consider implementing to support our students who too often struggle in silence? Below are three that I have implemented in my chairing process. Create an environment where students can share. Students want to meet our expectations and standards. Yet in efforts to not burden us, some students may choose not to reach out to us when they are experiencing challenges. In some instances, they also do not come to us due to the fear—and, at times, the reality—that they will face adverse consequence for doing so. While that can occur during the coursework phase, it is even more common when students are writing their dissertations, because they believe they must be independent scholars and figure everything out on their own. To combat those situations, we as dissertation chairs must first create an environment where students can feel comfortable to share what they are going through. One simple way to foster that type of relationship is to first ensure that you make time to meet regularly with your advisees. While that may seem to be an obvious practice, I often hear from doctoral students, like the one in the opening vignette of this article, that they find it challenging just to get on their chair’s calendar. That can unintentionally signal to them that we as faculty members are not available. As a faculty member, I know we have many demands on our time. To support my students, I have dedicated times each week when students can meet with me as needed. Making the time consistent on my calendar allows me to ensure other activities do not get in the way of meeting with students. To be more efficient, I created a special Calendly meeting link that has time slots open for students to schedule. Programs should also have regular faculty meetings to discuss student academic progress, along with any well-being challenges such as mental health and/or life challenges. Sometimes a student is more comfortable talking with a faculty member who is not on their dissertation committee, and having such conversations can provide a space for all faculty members to learn what is going on and potentially troubleshoot before a student’s difficulties gets worse. Choose your words with care. As dissertation chairs, our words hold significant power with our advisees. Those words become even more important when our students are experiencing personal and/or professional challenges. To illustrate this point, I offer you one word that, when used, can be a trigger for students: concern. Students have told me that if we use the word “concern” when talking with them, it signals something is drastically wrong with what they are doing. So if I am relaying information—especially feedback—to students, I ask myself the following before I speak: Is what I need to share truly a concern? For example, some students receive a concern comment when minor or moderate editorial changes—grammar, syntax, formatting and the like—are needed. While those must be fixed, they don’t usually rise to the level of concern that impacts the integrity of the study, a misalignment between the research questions and methodology. Can I express my thoughts in a more detailed way rather than just expressing concern? In the example above, if I thought the student’s editorial work needed updates, I would explain that to them and provide examples on how the student can make the changes that I am requesting. I am certainly aware that interpretation is important, but while students can take feedback from us on their work, I have learned to be reflective about what I say. It can influence their self-confidence, a key component for completing the dissertation process. Editors’ Picks DEI Ban Prompts Utah Colleges to Close Cultural Centers, Too Supreme Court Decision Weakens Education Department The Only Certainty Is Uncertainty Understand your role is not a problem solver but solution facilitator. When I talk with other faculty members, some are quick to declare they are scientists, not therapists, so supporting their students’ distinct life challenges isn’t in their job description. I also agree that it’s not our role as faculty members to solve students’ problems for them. But we can provide a listening ear and, most of all, connect students to the various resources that can support them in their decision making. For instance, a chair I know was advising a doctoral student who was communicative when writing their proposal and moved through the process fairly quickly. Then, after the student collected their data, the chair noticed that the student slowed down their progress and that when they met the student exhibited some uncharacteristic behaviors. Fortunately, the two had established a positive rapport, so the faculty member was able to learn that the student was unexpectedly taking on caregiving responsibilities for a sibling while experiencing some housing instability. In that case, the faculty member was able to connect the student with a campus resource for caregivers and, through it, the student was able to find housing support. I know many faculty members are already engaging in the practices that I’ve suggested, but I continue to encounter doctoral students at the dissertation phase who are suffering in silence. I invite you to share with me in conversations on X any other successful strategies you’ve implemented to support your doctoral students. My mission is to bring to light some of these ideas so we can make our graduate programs spaces where our students can flourish. Ramon B. Goings ( @ramongoings ) is an associate professor in the language, literacy and culture doctoral program at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and founder of Done Dissertation . After the justices struck down a 40-year precedent last week, experts warn of chaos for higher education amid doubts Share This Article More from advancing in the faculty. 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VIDEO I wish I knew this when writing my dissertation! 😳 spend 9-5 writing my dissertation with me! #shorts I hate writing the title but I do it anyways 🙃 Why You Need To Start Writing Phase 2 of BTS is CRAZY! the australia vlog you’ve all been waiting for COMMENTS Is it normal to hate my thesis and feel like it is going to ... the thesis you're imagining defending right now will not look much like the thesis you will be defending. as you continue researching and learning about whatever problem you mean to address, the more context you'll have for what has been done already, what idiosyncrasies exist in the problem space, etc. the thesis you want to write will become ... Surviving the Dissertation: Tips from Someone Who Mostly Has In the sticky, sweltering heat of late summer, I wrote a little post called "How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Dissertation," which translated my writing struggles into a therapeutic list of writing tips. This post was written as I despairingly grappled with many of the negative emotions that can accompany slogging through a long form project like a dissertation (guilt, self ... How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Dissertation Print it out, stick it on a wall, and get writing. 1. You are not alone. Nothing I am feeling is unique to my situation. Almost every academic has felt anxiety over their projects, and many people before me have felt the urge to quit. It is perfectly normal to hate my dissertation at some point, and to feel hopeless. How to Avoid Failing Your Ph.D. Dissertation The majority of failed Ph.D. dissertations are sloppily presented. They contain typos, grammatical mistakes, referencing errors and inconsistencies in presentation. Looking at some committee reports randomly, I note the following comments: "The thesis is poorly written.". "That previous section is long, badly written and lacks structure.". "I Hate My Dissertation" and Other Writing Barriers So as a counter to the list of reasons I hated my dissertation, here's a list of what I did to trick myself into writing a hated dissertation: Brain dump/vent/freewrite about why I hate my work or don't want to do it. Now that that's off my chest… Read writing books. Little snippets at a time. I enjoy reading writing about writing. 15 things to remember if you've started to hate your PhD 8. Remind Yourself That PhDs Are Hard. Finding your PhD hard is kind of the point. Repeat after me: if you're finding your PhD hard it doesn't mean you're a failure, it means you're doing it right. Life is hard: commitments, bills, family, suffering, loss and day-to-day stresses. Life and doing a PhD is doubly hard. What to do when I hate my thesis : r/AskAcademia It is work, even when you like the topic. Take a break, don't think about the thesis, then come back to it. Write out a detailed plan for what else you need to write and how long it will take to write each section. Then stick to the schedule, but take breaks when it gets monotonous! Also, since you already know you're doing a masters, all you ... thesis 14. Now I am depressed, lost, and hardly do anything. I wake up go to the lab and pass time. I absolutely hate my "thesis". This is the problem; you are stuck in a vicious cycle. You need to meet with your advisor and come up with a solid plan - including a timeline - for what will happen in the next year or two. Is it normal to hate your dissertation and pray for it to be over? My dissertation is killing me. I'm behind with my dissertation. Why is it so hard to write my dissertation? What can I do when I'm struggling with my dissertation? If you've said any of these things to yourself recently about your sociology or criminology dissertation, we need to talk about your mindset! What to Do If You Dislike Writing Research Or Academic Papers Here are some techniques that can make writing your next academic assignment bearable, if not outright pleasant. 1. Take breaks. Taking regular breaks is important in any kind of work, and writing is no exception. Divide your assignment into a number of reasonably small parts and promise yourself to take a break after you successfully complete ... I hate my thesis and I can't change it. : r/GradSchool It can be disappointing that one's thesis didn't turn out to be the inspiring, satisfying project one would hope for (blame this on the romanticized myth of graduate school). Don't lose sight of your end goal of graduating with your degree. Two month in sounds awfully early to be in so deep you can't change. Advice for surviving your PhD dissertation Here, academics offer their insight on each step towards producing an original work of scholarship. Starting with choosing a supervisor and establishing healthy habits, the advice goes on to cover how to structure a PhD dissertation, establish a writing routine, write an abstract, prepare for a viva and beat procrastination when motivation flags. How To Write A Dissertation Or Thesis 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. Draw a conclusion and discuss the implications. Is it normal to hate your own dissertation? Hey, I'm coming close to my science dissertation submission date after seriously struggling with it for months. I suppose I enjoy the act of writing itself and easily managed to bang out 12,000 words, but every time I try to proofread it I get major anxiety, as I have a strong feeling there's absolutely no substance to it with lots of filler content. To be fair, the biggest issue was coming up ... How to Finish Your Dissertation First and foremost, when I encourage you to write at least 30 minutes per day, the most important part of that phrase is "at least.". It doesn't mean that you're going to complete your dissertation in one semester by writing for only 30 minutes per day. It's advice given to people like you, who are not writing at all. How to Write a Dissertation: Step-by-Step Guide Most dissertations run a minimum of 100-200 pages, with some hitting 300 pages or more. When editing your dissertation, break it down chapter by chapter. Go beyond grammar and spelling to make sure you communicate clearly and efficiently. Identify repetitive areas and shore up weaknesses in your argument. The Thesis Whisperer And that's when I realised that I hate my thesis. Well, not my thesis exactly, but the all-consuming nature of it. I hate the fact that I can't think about anything else. I hate the fact that my son is growing up fast and I can't find the time to enjoy it with him. I hate the fact that everything in my life is on auto-pilot and I don't ... How to Pick a Masters Thesis Topic 3. You need to like it. Pick something bite-sized and smart, but also something that you like. When you spend countless hours on something you develop a complex relationship with that subject. If ... I just submitted my thesis, and I still absolutely hate it I ended up rushing the thesis so much at the end that I didn't even proofread it once. Now that it's submitted, I have no intention to ever read it again and I don't want a single copy to be printed and bound. If the school does print it and give it to me, then I'm throwing it straight in the trash. I hate that project, I hate the thesis, and I ... Why Graduate Students Can'T Write: Implications of Research on Writing thesis, "Even the best of my own writing seems lazy and slipshod in comparison with excellent professional models. I know I'm supposed to write a publishable thesis that's an original contribution to the professional. 106 Journal of Advanced Composition literature. But I haven't had the experience to be able to write that I've procrastinated working on my thesis for more than a year I took a similar approach with my thesis, I used voice typing while writing my first draft. The other approach I use in combination is writing every heading and subheading to create a document outline, then fill the gaps. The power of these approaches are breaking down the work into smaller manageable chunks. I have having a tough time writing my thesis, any advice? I thankfully have a background in science writing (5 years as a bench chemist doing monthly 100+ page reports for projects). It's still hard, because I am not getting paid to put 8 hours a day into writing my thesis. So I put an hour a day, sometimes 2, in writing. Even if its bad writing, I can go back and edit it later and fix it up. I finished writing my thesis!! Oh boy does it suck!!! I don't ... IceStationZebra93. I finished writing my thesis!! Oh boy does it suck!!! I don't even care anymore!! Vent. So, I have finally finished writing my dissertation. Every section has been filled out and everything is in its place. I hate every single sentence in it. I have literally spent the last few months cringing at it whenever I opened Overleaf ... Meet the sporadic voters who could decide the 2024 election If those voters turn out this time, it could make the difference between winning and losing for Trump. And both Mitchum and Brooks underscore the big question of whether these non-2020 voters will ... Supporting Dissertation Writers Through the Silent Struggle While we want Ph.D. students to be independent, our practices can signal that we're not available to support them when they need it, writes Ramon B. Goings. Consider the following discussion. A student tells me, "I have so much going on right now. I'm trying to write this dissertation, take care of my mom and raise my kids. I'm giving to everyone else and have nothing left to write ... I hate grad school and I don't want to finish my thesis I'm leaving too, only have a thesis left. It's literally the worst time to be in grad school. Lack of funding, mental health of students teachers and advisors, low pay, low moral. Give yourself some grace, grad school sucks even in the best of times. And you're correct, even my fellow cohort members that graduated cannot find work right now. phd analysis phd audit phd writing thesis template thesis writing