UNIT 11 - Dissertation Writing

Study Skills

Unit 11 - Dissertation Writing

Thoughts for your Final Year!!

Introduction

On many courses at UWIC you will be expected to prepare and write a dissertation in your final year. The dissertation forms a very important part of a course. It is important to understand why you are asked to write it and more importantly how you should structure it. Understanding this will help you get a good grade and make graduation day really seem worthwhile.

This unit will explain why you are asked to write a dissertation and suggest a way in which you should structure it. It is only a general guide and you should consult your DISSERTATION MODULE HANDBOOK for further specific guidance before embarking on your dissertation.

Only browse through this unit quickly, unless you are already thinking about your dissertation.

Learning Outcomes

If you work through this unit you will be better able to:

explain why you are asked to write a dissertation
explain what the role of your dissertation supervisor is
choose a topic to write about
begin preparing for your dissertation by researching your topic
write your aims and objectives
determine the methodology to be used
write up your dissertation based on a structure similar to:

Purpose (Introduction)
Review of the Literature
Methodology
Systematic Presentation of the Data
Discussion, Analysis & Interpretation of the Data
Summary and Conclusions

know who you can get help from
be aware of the importance of the Submission dates.

Why should I write a dissertation?

For many courses, a dissertation forms part of the coursework for a degree. For some courses it is linked with work experience. It provides you with an opportunity to undertake a piece of individual research work and really examine an aspect of the subject you are studying closely. Your first attempt at serious 'research'.

You could consider it as an extended essay or assignment. However, although a dissertation can be seen as a difficult piece of work, it is a good idea to think of it as providing a real opportunity to explore something that you are really interested in within your course. Working on it should be a very exciting time for you.

You may be wondering what a completed dissertation looks like. There are plenty in the library for you to peruse. When you examine them, notice how varied they are. There is no single 'recipe' for a dissertation.

When should I begin doing it?

You should select an area of study which you wish to pursue for your Project/Dissertation as soon as possible and discuss this with your Project/Dissertation Co-ordinator. If this is before the end of your penultimate year then you may get the opportunity to research in an industrial environment (if you are on a sandwich course).

The exact starting time will vary depending on the particular course you are studying. Your Project/Dissertation Co-ordinator will advise you when you should begin to start to think about and plan what you might do.

What Topic should I choose?

Your choice of topic should be something that you are interested in and which is within your and your School's capabilities.

Will I be given any help?

Yes. Project/Dissertations are co-ordinated by a number of Project/Dissertation Co-ordinators within the School. Check who is the Project/Dissertation Co-ordinator for your particular programme. Project/Dissertation Co-ordinators can often advise about potential areas of study and can match you up with an appropriate supervisor who has a specialist interest or expertise in your chosen subject area. You will have had some formal input on data collection and analysis and research methodologies earlier in your course programme and you can go to the people who gave that input for extra help on specific areas.

At the start of your final year you will be allocated a supervising tutor who will guide and advise you throughout your dissertation. Your supervisor will advise you about appropriate research methods and the detailed approach you should take to your work.

Use your supervisor only as a facilitator. Some supervisors wish to see students for short meetings at regular intervals, others prefer a more substantial discussion at particular milestones in the research, and others vary the approach. You should discuss the frequency of meetings at the initial meeting with your supervisor.

Your supervisor will indicate at each consultation when he/she expects to see you again. If you find that you hit problems before the next scheduled meeting then arrange an extra appointment. It is your responsibility to contact your supervisor, as and when necessary, by arranging a mutually convenient appointment. You should observe the normal courtesies of attending appointments promptly or advising your supervisor of any changes to the appointment that you wish to make. Make sure that there is no question of "Whose Project/Dissertation is this anyway?" by owning the decision making process and being in the driving seat.

Preparing for your Dissertation

If you would like to find out more there are various books available and one strongly recommended is the text book by JUDITH BELL, entitled - DOING YOUR RESEARCH PROJECT published by the Open University Press, I.S.B.N. NUMBER 0335 - 19094 - 4. It provides an excellent overall guide to the task in hand.

Early on in the conception of the Project/Dissertation and in consultation with your supervisor, you should discuss your ideas and formulate a more precise description of your Project/Dissertation. This should include:

Title
Clear indication of the content of the Project/Dissertation.
Aims
An overall statement of the nature of the original research and what you intend to do.
Objectives
The specific questions you will expect to answer in your Project/Dissertation. You will probably find it impossible to identify sensible questions as objectives until you have done a literature survey.
Methodology
Identification of the ways you will achieve your objectives. This section should contain some critical evaluation of why you selected a particular method of data collection, analysis, target group, etc.
Timescale
List the tasks involved in the Project/Dissertation and estimate the timescale involved for each so that you can set milestones by which you and your supervisor can assess your progress. Time is your worst enemy in the Project/Dissertation and you will find that good time management will help you considerably. Make sure you allow enough time to write up your Project/Dissertation and also to get it word-processed and bound by the submission date.

You may find computer based project management programs (PERTmaster or Microsoft Project) useful, especially for identifying any tasks you can carry out in parallel.

Choosing your Title.

Before you begin your investigation you should check systematically through the literature relating to your subject area to see what has already been published. Reading will indicate current trends in your chosen area and ensure that your work is original and not a duplication of someone else's work. Most authors include an indication of opportunities for future work, as you will at the end of your Project/Dissertation and hopefully in a paper (if that emerges later).

Consider the scope of the literature you wish to search carefully. Use an encyclopaedia, specialist dictionaries and textbooks to get an overview of the topic and to clarify terminology and identify synonyms. A bibliography of your subject may have already been published. The Campus Librarian will show you how to find out this information. The library staff at UWIC has always been extremely supportive of students undertaking Projects/Dissertations but you must not abuse their good nature by making unreasonable demands.

Check the major abstract journals in your field. Abstracts provide an index (usually on an annual basis) for all major journals in their subject area. Many abstracts contain not only the full details of where the article can be found but also a summary of the article. The summary is particularly useful for articles in other languages. It is best to start with the most recent issue and work your way backwards. There are several new CD-ROM and WWW-based abstracting systems available, some of which can give you full-page text on-line. You will use keywords to find references and would be well advised to prepare a list of search terms and synonyms in advance.

You can find a list of all the articles quoting a particular article in the Citations Indexes. They show clearly that some papers are regarded as more important than others because everyone quotes them. Ask the librarian for help on this.

Books, particularly those recently published, can be very valuable. The librarian can help you to trace books on particular subjects. Technical reports and patent specifications are also valuable resources. M.Phil. and Ph.D. theses are listed in the Index of Theses and can usually be borrowed through the Inter-Library Loans Service. Again, ask for help.

Ongoing research in your field can be traced through "Current Research in Britain" available in the reference section of the library and is a great way of identifying who is working on what across the country. However, the lists can be a bit dated and you should bear this in mind.

Having done your initial literature survey you should be ready to finalise the precise nature of your investigation and list the specific aims and objectives knowing the background of your chosen area of study.

Update your literature study at intervals throughout your research and particularly before you write up the final Project/Dissertation to ensure that you keep track of what is happening in your area.

Setting your Aims and Objectives

Draw up a statement of the overall nature of any original work together with a clear list of objectives for your work. As your work progresses, these will be useful to you as indicators of whether you are achieving what you set out to achieve in your Project/Dissertation. If you find the identification of aims and objectives difficult, it is probably an indication that you have not clearly sorted out what you are doing. The objectives should not change much as you go through the Project/Dissertation. If you don't achieve a particular objective there may well be a good reason. Don't change it, critically evaluate it! There is no right answer to the Project/Dissertation but those that do not show critical evaluation will be scored much lower than those that do.

Deciding your Methodology

You decide the methodology which will best answer the questions set in your objectives. There may be only one way that you can achieve some objectives (e.g. by observation, by a structured interview or by a questionnaire) and therefore you would describe this method. For other objectives there may be several ways in which you could achieve them. You should describe the decision making process which aided your choice of any particular method. You may use several different research methods to achieve your different objectives.

Having selected your research method(s) you should describe how you are going to implement the method(s) and identify the sampling frame: for example, for a questionnaire you may initially use a structured interview to identify issues and to draw up a pilot questionnaire which can be refined before being used in the actual survey. Justify your selected tool.

Data Collection

Collecting the data is a time-consuming process. The quality of the data you collect will determine the quality of your resultant argument. If you use a postal questionnaire you are likely to need to chase people up to complete their questionnaires or get a low response. If you do use a questionnaire then make sure each question on it provides data, that is why it is there. Think about what you will do with the data afterwards. Collect the data in the way you want to use it. Make sure that the questions are appropriate to your target audience. Do not use jargon or TLAs (three letter abbreviations!!!) your audience may not understand them and therefore bin the questionnaire.

Data Analysis

You need to identify at a very early stage the statistical techniques you will use for the analysis of the data. This will help you to identify the amount of data you will need to collect (nominal, ordinal, interval, ratio). You can get lots of clues about how data is analysed from your literature survey. You may already be familiar with MINITAB, a general purpose statistical package for the quantitative analysis of small data sets, or SPSS or some other appropriate computerised analytical tool. If so, use them. You may prefer to analyse your data manually or with the aid of a calculator or spreadsheet package. Check that you understand how you will carry out the analysis before you embark on data collection.

How should I structure and write a dissertation?

This section offers you a model on how to lay out and structure your dissertation.

The length of the dissertation is normally about 10,000 words (check your requirements).

As a general guide, dissertations very often contain 6 main chapters. It is a good idea to begin each chapter by stating the purpose of the chapter, and at the end of the section, has this purpose been achieved. Chapter content can obviously vary but usually contains the following points.

Chapter 1.

INTRODUCTION

(approx. 10% of total words)

'The context'. Why do this study? Why now? Why here? Why me? The aims of the study.

Chapter one is very important and is possibly best compiled by answering a series of questions as follows.

Is there a problem?
What is it?
Why does it need to be solved?
What is your hypothesis (hunch)?
Who will benefit from your investigation?
In what sense will they benefit?
In what sense will my contribution add to what is already known?
How in general terms are you going to solve the problem, e.g., collect data, analyse data?
By what methods? E.g., a case study approach.
What are the constraints or limitations of the study?

A good way to end the introduction is to state the dissertation objectives.

Chapter 2.

REVIEW OF LITERATURE

(approx. 25% of words)

This is a review of what is already known and of the main themes or issues. It covers past research and studies and articles from relevant journals, books, newspapers, etc. It is a summary of what other people have written and published around the theme of your research. It is very important that you acknowledge the authorship of other people's work.

The literature chapter can, and should be drafted very early. As you find the literature, read it, and write about it. Think of the literature review as a patchwork quilt - made up of paragraphs you have written about individual texts. Highlight the findings that are relevant to your theses. Be critical of the literature - don't just report it.

Chapter 3.

METHODOLOGY

(15-20% of words)

'The framework': What I did? How I did it? Why did I do it that way?

This is a description and evaluation of the methods, techniques and procedures used in the investigation. It describes the scope and aims of the dissertation in some detail. It is also very important that you justify the methods used.

Chapter 4.

SYSTEMATIC PRESENTATION OF THE DATA

(approx. 10-15% of the words)

What was observed and what was discovered/found out?

This is a presentation of the data - not a discussion in this section. It may involve the creation of tables, charts, histograms, etc., each of which should have an appropriate title or heading.

Chapter 5.

DISCUSSION, ANALYSIS & INTERPRETATION OF THE DATA

(approx. 15 - 20% of words)

(a) Interpretation of findings. What patterns have emerged?

(b) The difference between your findings and those of other people. The difference between the views of various other authors.

Chapter 6.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

(approx. 10 - 15% of words)

(a) Summary of main findings as a series of statements.

(b) Conclusions and directions for further research.

Finally, after the last Chapter, you should include

Appendices

Bibliography.

What style should I write it in?

The dissertation should be written in the 3rd person, past tense, e.g., "The author (or It was) found that all hotels in the study . . . . . . . . . . . . "

not "I find that all hotels in the study . . . . . . . . . . . "

It is a formal report and should be written in that style.

When will I have to give it in?

Submission dates for both draft and final copies will be clearly stated and meeting these hand-in deadlines is EXTREMELY important.

Do not treat the dissertation like coursework assignments, which can be completed in a short time period. Dissertations require consistent work over several months and regular contact with your supervisor.

In the final analysis the onus for completing this work lies with you, it is not the supervisor's task to chase you.

Is there anything I need to be careful about?

Yes. Besides remembering the points made above, you should remember that in this kind of work, it is easy to blunder and offend without meaning to do so. Consider the ethical and professional implications of your activities when you are planning your approach.

Do not plagiarise. Other people's ideas must be recognised and not included as your own. Obvious plagiarism will disqualify completely the whole project. The literature review should not be a collection of quotes from other writers but a critical review of relevant literature. Do not include wads of unassimilated theory. Remember, the purpose of theory (the reading you do of experts' work) is to help you to reflect more clearly on your experience. It is an aid to, not a replacement for, thought and argument on your part.

Summary

This unit has provided you with an overview of the purpose of a dissertation and suggested how to plan and structure it.

What Should I Do Now?

Consult your DISSERTATION MODULE HANDBOOK before you begin preparing your dissertation.

Refer back to this unit and your DISSERTATION MODULE HANDBOOK regularly during the preparation and writing of your dissertation.

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This page last updated 28 Apr 2005