The Dissertation Writing Blues

Top 12 Tips in Writing a Dissertation

Very often, when doctoral candidates complete their dissertations, they seek dissertation editors to give them guidance on the structure and organization of their writing. Such guidance can range from the document or chapter level to the individual clause level and includes proofreading for typographical and grammatical errors. However, no matter how capable your dissertation editor, the dissertation will be stronger if you consider the following tips early on during your doctoral studies.

Selecting a Dissertation Topic

1.     Find a topic that you love and care about. Choose a topic that you will be able to live with, think about constantly, and even dream about for a few years. When you complete the dissertation, you should be, for a brief time at least, the world’s foremost expert on your topic. In order to reach that goal, you must care about your topic enough to become deeply involved with it and want to know everything about it.

2.     Begin thinking about your dissertation topic from the beginning of your studies. Every course you take will require you to submit a paper or some sort of project. Try to make an original observation about the topic in every paper or project you submit. Doing so may result in a viable dissertation topic. Consider each topic available for you to write about in terms of whether you could live with that topic for an extended period of time, whether it fits with your long-range career goals, and whether you would really have anything original to say about the topic.

3.     When considering original research topics for your dissertation, don’t overlook the possibility of synthesizing subdisciplines. It isn’t unusual to find two different disciplines or subdisciplines that address the same problem on different domains or with different methodologies. Would using an entirely different methodology from another field reveal any new information about your area of interest? Can you build a bridge or make connections between findings from separate subdisciplines and view your topic from a new perspective?

Take Charge of Your Learning

4.     When taking classes and reading assignments, make a note of every term, concept, and reference to another work that you are not familiar with. Then, take the time to learn about unfamiliar ideas. Unfortunately, many people don’t learn how to be true lifelong learners during their undergraduate studies. If you haven’t learned how to facilitate your own learning and intellectual growth before now, then now is the time to learn this crucial skill. The ability to recognize gaps in your own knowledge and take steps to strengthen your areas of weakness is one mark of a person with a sound education.

5.     Learn all you can about research methods in your discipline. While research methods are broadly divided into quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods, within those general areas are many specific submethods. Understand the methodology that is generally used in the subdiscipline you are focusing on and how it compares to other methodologies you could use. Learn to use the terminology correctly, making it part of your everyday vocabulary.

6.     When doing research on your selected topic, work on understanding and evaluating all sides of the issues, both in terms of research methods used and in terms of theories pertaining to your area of interest. Be open-minded when reading viewpoints that oppose your own, think clearly about why you don’t agree with an author’s stance, and build clear, specific arguments that directly address the points that you don’t agree with. Again, understand and learn to use terminology correctly.

7.     If you will be using statistics, consider auditing a stats course or, at the very least, invest in a good textbook on statistics. Learn to talk and write about statistics correctly and knowledgeably. Being able to input numbers into SAS or another software program and then run a function is not the equivalent of understanding statistics. For your use of statistics to be meaningful and professional, you must understand and be able to talk knowledgeably about population selection, the use of variables and forms of measurement, the appropriate equations to use for your analytical purposes, and what you have actually “found” or “revealed” as a result of the method or methods applied. You need to be able to explain why you are inputting certain numbers, where those numbers came from and what they represent, why a certain statistical function is being used, and what the results indicate about your topic. Practice applying your knowledge of statistics whenever you read about a study using quantitative data.

Organize, Organize, Organize!

8.     Set up a good organization system for your library of articles and books at the very beginning of your graduate studies. If you have hard copies of articles, invest in a small file cabinet and folders and file the articles according to topic, subdiscipline, or author name. Use a system that makes sense to you. If you can’t decide how to file a particular article, use a note system within your filing system to indicate the location of a file. For example, if you have an article about research conducted on the effectiveness of using live chat in online learning, but the article begins with an informative discussion about the methodology used, you may want to file the article with others addressing research on the effectiveness of using live chat, but, in folders that contain info on methodology and online learning in general, note the location of this file. (Make brief, clearly written notes on the inside covers of the folder or on sticky notes attached to the inside covers.)

9.     Learn and use good file management on your computer. Many articles today are available as PDFs. Such files can be searched for key terms, but you can’t search in an article if you can’t find it. Learn to create folders on your computer and nest them. For example, a folder on online learning could hold folders about specific theories addressing online learning as well as tools that can be used in facilitating online learning.

10.   As part of your file management, begin building a spreadsheet file (or a database if you have the software and know-how) of all the articles, books, webpages, and videos you have found. For books containing chapters written by different authors, create an entry for each chapter. Along with the authors’ names (ALL authors’ names) and titles, include the date, publication information, page spans for articles and chapters, original publication information (if applicable), main points about the source (thesis statement, research methods used), and the location of the item in your filing system. For example, “Paper-online learning-live chat” would indicate that the item is a hard copy in your file cabinet in the live-chat folder in the online-learning area or drawer, and “PDF-online learning-quantitative-transcript analysis” would indicate you have a file on your computer in the transcript-analysis folder that is within the quantitative-methods folder within the online-learning folder. If you accessed the item online, be sure to record the DOI (preferred by most documentation styles) or the URL for pages or PDFs at websites. You may also want a field that indicates the various subtopics that the source touches on. (For instance, an article on using live chat in online learning may be also be marked as having information on quantitative research methods and constructivist learning theory.)

Know Your Documentation Style

11.   Early on in your research process, determine the documentation style you will use. Your grad school or program may mandate a particular style, or you may be free to select your own. If you can select your own, learn the style that is used most often in your discipline. If the choice is still open, choose an author-date style (references at the end of the document and in-text parenthetical citations within the text) because it is the easiest and least time-consuming to use and is easily revised.

12.   Once you know which documentation style you will use for your dissertation, buy the appropriate manual and use it as often as possible for papers written in classes. Note that “documentation” styles include much more than simply how sources are cited. They often specify how numbers are to be treated in the text, how tables and figures are displayed, how sources are referred to (e.g., APA requires past tense when writing about a source while literary works cited in MLA are generally written about in present tense), and even which prefixes occur with hyphens and what types of phrases are hyphenated. Becoming familiar with the documentation style before you actually begin writing the dissertation will make your writing process much easier. Again, being thoroughly familiar with the documentation style for your discipline is one mark of having a sound education.

Taking the time to consider these tips early on in your graduate studies can make the process of writing your dissertation go more smoothly and strengthen the integrity of your work. Tips 4-12 can actually save you time when you move into that time-intensive period of writing parts of your dissertation and passing them to your committee for comments. These tips can also help you avoid embarrassment as a result of the types of comments your committee members could make.

The stronger your dissertation is before you send it to a dissertation editing service, the better your final product will be.

10 Steps to Writing a Research Paper in 5 Days

These steps do not need to be completed all at once (or even at all if you feel you’re all set in the rough draft department). Space them out over the next five days. If you sit down for about one hour a day between now and then, you will have ample time to write an engaging and effective rough draft.

Day 1

1. Write a tentative thesis statement that meets the following criteria:

Narrows your subject to an appropriate scope

Claims something specific and significant

Conveys your purpose

Offers a debatable point of view

2. Sit down for 30 minutes. Spend 10 minutes each on three of the following prewriting exercises:

Brainstorming

Listing

Clustering

Freewriting

Asking Questions

Journal Writing

Day 2

3. Spend 30 minutes searching through the online library to identify four more sources. Print them out. At this point, you should have at least 8-10 sources at your disposal.

4. Sit down for one hour. Read through your sources and for each, write a three-sentence summary and identify three quotes you could use.

Day 3

5. Sit down for 30 minutes. Write a 2-page informal letter to a friend, teacher, or other recipient (it won’t be sent), telling them what you know about your topic, what your position is, and why. Do not spend time on grammar or organization at this point – just write complete sentences. When done, put the letter aside.

6. Choose your four favorite sources. Develop a prompt for your topic similar to those used for in-class essays. For example:

In the near future, it is possible that robotics will replace many jobs that are currently held by humans. In his articles “Robots Prepare for the Battlefield by First Fighting City Traffic” and “Robot-Assisted Rescuers Seek Answer in Wake of Utah,” Larry Greenemeier describes how robots are being used to complete tasks that are too difficult or dangerous for humans. It is also feasible that robots will substitute for other humans in social relationships. In the article “Could Robots Become Your Toddler’s New Best Friend?” Nikhil Swaminathan relates the details of an experiment where toddlers befriended a robot and treated it like another child. Robert Epstein, in his article “My Date with a Robot,” shares his own experience of dating Repliee Q1expo, a humanlike robot.

Write an essay in which you compare the robot/human relationships each author describes, making sure to summarize each article briefly before quoting from it. Develop a thesis in which you put forth your views as to what extent you believe robots can replace humans in various facets of life, such as labor and social relationships. Support your argument with reference to all four essays, outside texts (books, films, television, news, etc.), and/or examples from your own experience.

Day 4

7. Sit down for one hour and respond to the prompt you have written, exactly as you would during an in-class essay. (Later, revise your response to submit as the synthesis essay assignment due on Tuesday.)

8. Read over the letter you wrote in step 5 and the prompt response you wrote in step 7. Imagine you have been asked to break down your topic into four smaller two-page sections. Create evocative titles for each section. For example:

Robots: Friend or Foe?

Crash Test Dummies Exist for a Reason

After Dinner, A Robot Does the Dishes

What Would I Be Able to Do Instead if a Robot Could Write This Essay?

Put the titles aside.

Day 5

9. Write an outline to determine the best way to organize your essay. Do not use the titled sections yet. Try to get by without them at first to see if you can.

10. Put your prewriting, the source summaries and quotes, the letter, and the synthesis essay into one document. Move the text around using cut and paste until all usable text has been organized following the outline. Fill in the blanks so that all outline points are addressed and the document reads like the rough draft of an essay. Edit for grammar and flair. Proofread and let go!

 

APA Tutorial

Here’s an excellent tutorial in the basics of APA: http://www.apastyle.org/learn/tutorials/basics-tutorial.aspx

Defining Your Terms to Win the War of Words

Is there any kind of communication or conversation that we have to negotiate and deal with more than argumentation? I don’t think so. While performing dissertation editing, I always concentrate on the strength and soundness of the writer’s thesis or argument.

All communication is an argument of some kind

In a practical sense, who isn’t always arguing—excuse me, talking—with your spouse, partner, friend, boss, underling, or complete stranger in the tube or a bar or while standing in line for a table, tickets, or tram? Arguments—I mean, discussions, of course—break out routinely, nauseatingly, incessantly, as we homo sapiens tend to want our way, viewpoint, gripe or gut reaction heard, known, and heeded. Or maybe you don’t. Maybe you’re the passive, silent, non-confrontational type and you keep it to yourself. But it’s highly likely that your silence is just disguising a raging interior dialogue with the offending person who can’t hear what’s going on inside your head.

All those arguments and disagreements, conflicts and debates can be broken down into four types of claims, inferences, appeals, or approaches to whatever topic is being bandied about. It helps to understand yourself, if not the other person. We’re all coming from our own paradigm, our own set of assumptions, perceptions, biases, and experiences. To successfully argue, it helps to know where we’re all at, so to speak.

It all starts with definitions

So many contentious conversations and positions are stuck in park, frozen in stone, two fists striking at each other, knuckles cracking over sheer misconceptions about definitions. We’re arguing about two different things. We don’t define our terms the same way. You think a word, a concept, a subject means one thing, while your opponent or adversary thinks it means another. I even have such debates with the staff at my dissertation editing service. Even fellow PhDs regularly disagree about the exact meaning of certain terms or words.

The dictionary has multiple definitions of a word

As with the other three types of claims, we have to be honest with ourselves, go to the source, perhaps even a dictionary, to be sure we’re on the same page. Usually, it takes more than a dictionary. It takes articles, studies, books (plural) to straighten out the fundamental meaning of what we’re arguing about.

Take conservatism vs. liberalism. There’s as many conceptions of those terms as there are people on the planet. I was perusing Quora today (a great Q&A social media site) and that was one of the hottest questions du jour. What do the terms mean? You can’t even begin to intelligently and soberly debate the issues affected by the dichotomous terms until you know the person you’re discussing the issues with agrees with you on the meaning of the terms themselves.

And then there’s the denotation and connotation of the definitions

They lift (or lower) us into 3-dimensional chess match of meaning. How about pro-life and pro-choice? The entire flaming intense debate starts with the definition of life. Or how about this: Does pornography exploit women? Depends on your definition of “exploit.” And did you know that major land developers lobbied for years to have Congress rewrite the definition of “wetlands,” so that once the new definition took effect, what was a wetland and off-limits on Tuesday, became a non-wetland and was open for development on Wednesday?

The author is the authority

Definitions are written by authorities. There’s power in the pen. So when conducting your own thesis editing,pay strict attention to definitions.