Ady and Keenbean,

Thank you both for helpful posts and for the pointer to the papers. I am hoping that by changing the way the request is made I can improve response and am minded to do a small subsidiary study exploring with some of those who have declined reasons for their decision.

Again thank you

Dafydd

I am recruiting subjects for one of my PhD studies using an email invitation sent when they make a first appointment to attend a clinic. However half of those invited so far have hit the 'I do not want to participate' button and the other half are ignoring the message. Because of the software we know that these messages are arriving and being opened.

Lots of thought and advice was taken about the wording of the invite but it is not proving effective.

It has been suggested I offer a prize draw to participants however I am concerned about this causing problems with my sample - are those to participate for this reason the same as others invited but declining.

Any thoughts or suggestions gratefully received.

Age is no barrier to doing a PhD. I am closer to 50 than 40 and loving my second year!

Hi Cornflower,

I think you raise an important point and my experience echoes some of those below. Occasionally comments appear to be made in questions folowing presentation that do not appear to have much point beyond someone being seen to have their voice heard.

It can be difficult to hear comment or feedback that appears to be critical of our work - however this is part of the academic process. We both have to be able to defend what we are doing and the way we are doing it from a scientific stand point and we have to be seen to be aware of the limitations of our work.

Finaly rather than seeing critical questioning / feedback as negative it may help to be welcoming of it, especially in the earlier stages of a project. Addressing or acknowledging potential issues at this stage can help us produce a more robust output (results, conclusions and publications).

I am not sure about thick skin but developing the ability to assess the utility of any feedback and having a sence of perspective when taking it onboard would appear helpful.

Hope this helps a little.

Dafydd

BadHair,

Thank you or those too. Now I shall have to finish the bottle opened earlier...!

Dafydd

Hi Username,

I am doing a PT self funded program. I am 18 months in and loving it.

My work is fairly full on for 4.5 days per week (46hrs) I am doing 15 hrs good work on the PhD. I think I am about where I am expected to be at the moment.

The biggest problem early on was sorting out my priorities / responsibilities between work, family ( with kids) and study. None must be allowed to take over although each tends to rise to prominence through circumstances. At the moment this balance is good so I feelmpositive.

I have a data export from a computer software that always comes out with exactly the same format of columns etc. Each time it needs analysing in several ways in SPSS.

Is it possible to define a template setting out the data types into which the excel formatted data file can be imported rather than spending hours each time setting the definitions?

Also in my utopian world I am hoping that once imported and set up it will be possible to run the stats test as a stored routine or via macros.

Does anyone have any experience with this?
Dafydd

I was talking about something similar with my supervision team at a conference last weekend. There was a presentation of a not very impressive study (methodologically weak) that was from the thesis that had been recently successfully defended at viva.

It was explained that if a thesis demonstrated an in depth knowledge of the study, what was going on round it and how it fitted into the existing literature then it could be acceptable. Just as a fantastic study well designed and with good results but which was poorly described and discussed and with little insight into how it related with existing science could mean a fail. In an ideal world of course we would all have a bit of each.

I would suspect that if you could put your trials into a solid context and describe why they may have failed, and if you are able to rescue a snippet of something new from them or conduct a small trial so you can say something new you would be in a more positive position.

However you absolutely need advice from someone who both knows your area of work and understands the PhD process.

Dafydd

Are there issues with copyright? Where I have used figures from others work - even where these have been altered I have always contacted the publisher for permission to use them. They then give me the attribution text the would like to see used.

At the end of year one we undertook a transfer assessment. I believe that traditionally this was the transfer from a MPhil to a PhD program.

I like this type of review as it forces me to put things into a coherent context for me and those I am presenting too. I also more than welcome critical comment as praise does little to help me improve (but it is nice to be stroked once in a while). Much better to have potential pitfalls pointed out as early as possible.

Good luck with it :-)

Bella,

I was hoping to produce a meta analysis of studies in the clinical psychology field but because of methodological hererogeniosity was unable to, so ended up doing a comparative literature synthesis. Have presented and had published as an abstract but not tried submitting as a full paper.

Evening Blue,

Sorry to hear that the meeting is not yet arranged, but I'm sure it was not your message.

Blue,

Your reply is fine. Possibly a little formal but absolutely fine, this will not be the reason for the lack of reply.
It might be more usual to use a slightly gentler phrase in your reply such as ' I am available after 9 every day, when would be convenient for you?' however this is not a big issue.

Dafydd

Aaron,

Tried to help with this but problem with survey. I left one answer blank when submitting in error but having corrected this could not see any way to resubmit.

To put a different (and possibly not helpful) angle, I am a PT distance PhD student so I visit my Uni about once each three months. More if there a course that I want to attend.

I have my own desk with all my stuff round me which is good - but I think I miss not being around others doing similar things :-(

I work full time but am doing 15 hrs per week of good PhD stuff with fluffing about for another 5 hrs I guess.