This month complex topic of writing your PhD thesis is covered in our YouTube video just released. Writing a thesis is NOT like writing a paper. It is a rather long and, for some, exhausting process. Shall we dive in to discover more?
We have recently looked at how to write effectively a scientific paper. A paper is concise, gives credit to the writer and to the supervisor, and contains mainly new stuff. The PhD thesis is nothing like this. It is rather long, at times can be loosely connected, and looks at many aspects which have been covered already by other researchers.
If you are looking for quick and useful tips on how to approach the actual writing of your PhD thesis, then you should have a good read and probably master most of the tips in this Time Higher Education article. This other very detailed reference from a lecture at Imperial College will give you lots of tips and guidance. You will need many of them in order to strive through these long hours sat down on a chair.
Yes, writing a PhD thesis is tough. For some can become excruciatingly difficult. It should not be like this. Actually, for a number of students, writing the thesis is even enjoyable and very rewarding. In order to sail through the writing months ahead, you should prepare yourself physically and mentally for a deep dive. This is nothing like any other project you worked on this far. Writing your thesis requires method, discipline, and, above all, a lot of stamina.
The person that would come out of the other end of this long and tortuous tunnel will be a quite different one. In both cases of an extremely joyous outcome and that of a less positive one, writing your thesis will leave on you an indelible print.
In this month video, we cover general aspects of writing your PhD thesis. We will also give you a sample of the key parts of a PhD chapter from my own thesis. From the sample, you can have a look at the structure and the writing style as well.
In the following months, we will continue covering several aspects related to writing. In order to lend a hand to both PhD students who are concerned about writing a paper and those whose primary focus has become the thesis, we will pivot each month from the former topic to the latter. We will be starting in July with a real example of how to write the Introduction section of a scientific paper from scratch. We will also select an Open Access published paper and will dissect it all, piece-by-piece.
Stay tuned!
We will be back soon with some more great content.
