Well done, Lindalou, sounds like great progress.

My test interview went well, and I only need to slightly tweak one question and I'm ready for the next test interview on Thursday. Yay. So now I'm back to data analysis - I ran a PCA analysis on one sample this morning and would love to be able to do the same analysis on my other two samples, but that might be pushing it, we'll see how far I get.

Tomorrow is a day of seminars and stuff so no chance of doing anything then - but it does mean I get to have a lie-in and also go swimming before the first seminar - that's not bad!

Printing out is necessary preparation work :-)

It may be lovely and sunny out there, but it's also really cold - or it is round here! I'm shivering already and I've only been at my desk less than half an hour.

I made reasonable progress yesterday. Today is a similar day - meeting someone at lunchtime to run a pilot version of my interview questions, so before then I want to get some statistical analysis done, and actions afterwards will depend on how much revision my questions need.

Interesting survey. Hope she gets lots of useful replies!

Ha, I've already eaten way too much chocolate today! Especially bad as I can only go swimming once this week instead of the usual twice. Oh well.

Sounds like we're all being very productive. I just did the first pilot test of my interview questions and have no revisions to make to the questions (a miracle!) so once I've had a sandwich for lunch (and no more chocolate!) I can get on with goal 4. Excellent!

Ooh, a holiday in the sun sounds wonderful!

Hello both of you, sounds like you're both making great starts to the week already. And yes, we had a fantastic weekend after Wales won the Grand Slam on Saturday - really good fun. Though a little worse for wear yesterday!

Goals for today (now I'm finally ready to start work!):
1.) Go through interview questions for final time
2.) Meet first pilot person to test interview questions
3.) Revise interview questions in light of first pilot
4.) Finish one set of data analysis on third sample
5.) Plan next set of data analysis and get started on it

Sounds like you're doing really well today Lindalou, that's great.

I realised when I started goal 1 that I'd completely misjudged how much work was involved, so that's turned into pretty much the only thing I'll get done today!

Oh well, I can make a start on the other goals tomorrow morning (before heading out for a hedonistic day watching rugby in the pub with my Welsh partner, a really good Irish friend and a load of other mates of various nationalities (go Wales, you can win the grand slam!). Silly amounts of beer will be drunk - it is St Paddy's Day and also the end of the Six Nations competition, so there's no excuse not to party!) I've really been looking forward to this weekend, and as I've made some really good progress this week I feel like I've earned it too!

Hi Lindalou

I'm not really sure, so feel free to ignore me! But it sounds like you've got everything in place, it might just be where the emphasis lies in the work. With my literature review, I've done what you've described, but rather than focusing on what I'm going to do for my research I've looked at the various approaches to my topic, the themes and concerns coming through the whole literature, the debates and key issues, other studies using the approach I've chosen, and then gaps in the literature that I'll address. It's more a discussion and exploration of where the field is thematically, leading logically to why I'm doing my study, rather than setting out the options and drilling directly towards what my study will use.

Not sure that's a very clear answer, or much help at all, unfortunately! Good luck with it anyway.

You were up early, Lindalou! Good luck with the chapter.

I've already tidied my desk and done some filing this morning, but now it's time to get down to some work. I'm going to continue with data analysis today. Goals:
1.) Look at attitude statements and demographics in all 3 samples
2.) Think through scale building
3.) Create scales in all 3 SPSS files
4.) Initial analysis of scale results

Good luck with the abstract, Lindalou! It's generally worth a shot.

I have had a busy day today, but a good one - I've now achieved all of my goals and am feeling back on top of things after being very much under pressure at the start of the week. I'm going to surf the net until I can go for the bus in 20 minutes, and I may even celebrate the progress with a glass of wine tonight!

Ha, good luck with supervision Lindalou - hope yesterday's moaning session got that out of your system! And hope you're feeling better today Button.

Started the day with a 2km swim, which was exhausting at the time but has now left me strangely exhilarated and ready to get cracking.

Goals for today:
1.) Go swimming - DONE
2.) Read and make notes on draft journal paper in preparation for meeting with co-authors
3.) Meet with co-authors
4.) Meet with student who knows about measuring devices and software, figure out what I'm doing
5.) Go through draft interview schedule again and print out

Hi Button, welcome back! Sounds like you had a nice time, not jealous at all!!! Good luck with getting into the work.

I've made pretty good progress today - done all my goals apart from making notes on my journal article before tomorrow's meeting, which I think I'll do tomorrow morning. Now I'm going to make a curry - cooking and eating that may use up all the time I have before I need to go out! But that's okay, I'm happy with today's work.

Good luck with it Lindalou. Sounds like you are having some of those doubts today (I know those feelings only too well!) - I'm sure if there really were any problems your supervisors would have talked to you about them!

I was planning to wokr late tonight but just found out a friend from another city is in town - I haven't seen him for well over a year, so will give up the late working to meet up with him. But that means I need to get lots done during the day to justify the time off! At least I'm getting lots of positive responses from the potentials I invited for interviews yesterday - no refusals so far!

Goals for today:
1.) Quickly revise interview questions
2.) Carry out simple analysis on all 3 samples
3.) Plan next stage in analysis
4.) Read and comment on draft journal paper before tomorrow's meeting with co-authors
5.) Household stuff - shopping and post office, cooking, laundry, housework

I'd agree with that advice - keep it simple. If the audience aren't specialists in your topic then don't assume they'll know anything about the major issues in your field. I'd think about what would be particularly interesting for them - and that may not be the same as would be interesting for someone who does understand your field. Presenting something that shows how your work relates to a real-world problem, or to the main issue that unites everyone in the room (assuming that there is some kind of central theme!) would probably work well. Good luck with it!

Hope the chapter's going okay, Lindalou! I find that going through a Word document and adding notes in green (or some other colour) about what I want to add or change really helps me get through that kind of work.

Hmm, selecting my interviewees took longer than anticipated! Oh well, it's done now, and I have a reserve list in case of refusals/lack of availability, so that's good. The invitation is almost written so I'll get that finished and sent today. Then I'll probably spend the rest of the day doing admin type jobs. Thrilling stuff!

I'd agree with all of the advice given so far. I've entered a few poster competitions (and won one) - strong images, good balance of colours, clear fonts and readable text, not too much text, all these things are important. And I'd agree that you don't want to focus too much on literature - if you can put across what's exciting and unique about your topic or the approach you're planning to take, that would be much more likely to get attention.

Ultimately, though, poster competitions are fairly arbitrary - in all the competitions I've entered or seen, there might be one stand-out poster that wins because it's just very very good (balance of text and images, presents interesting results, has great images illustrating topic and results), but there are also usually one or two posters that win where most people react with, "Really?! Why that one?" It's down to the particular interests of the judges, and that's impossible to second guess.

I suppose what I'm saying is, poster competitions are great - I actually find it useful to think about how to present my topic, it clarifies what the key points are - but don't count on winning one just by putting in lots of effort! Good luck with it anyway, though!