OK, I am going to tell you a story. (If you have a wealthy family to support you, don't read the story)

There is this little student, who is very lazy... one day the funding runs out, but he hasn't finished writing up! He had used all his savings during his PhD so he was skint.

He needs to get a job. The only job he can get is a minimum wage part-time job. After he finishes his shift, no matter how tired he feels, he needs to sit down and work on the PhD. He can only afford porridge for breakfast and canned soup for dinner. Rent is too expensive, so he lives in a brown bag with ten other flatmates.

The end.

Hi incognito,

I got my first job "accidentally" . A common friend introduced us, and I did one project as a one-off thing, but it turned out to be a 5 years collaboration.

The second time after the masters I applied for only one PhD position with the support of my current supervisor, and after a long wait I got the scholarship.

Currently, I am struggling to finish off the PhD (editing is endless). I applied for some lectureships, but I didn't manage to get any interviews (aiming too high I guess). I plan to write two EPSRC proposals after I submit. Fingers crossed. Tough times.

Hey incognito,

sorry you are feeling so low.

I found myself unemployed twice: once after the undergrad and then after the MSc. Both times I was very depressed, and thought that I would be unemployed for ever. But it was only for a few months. I am sure you will find a job soon.

If I were you, I would try to set aside all negative feelings and try to enjoy myself somewhere warm and sunny :) before being snowed under work again.

I am copy-pasting like a boss right now!

I can't be bothered. Almost EVERY chapter in my thesis is a publication... I attach them in the Appendix. If they hunt me down to chop off my hand for self-plagiarism I ll let you know (I ll come back in the forum crying).

This whole traditional PhD (they won't let me submit by publication) is ridiculous. Pages and pages of excruciating detail and endless formatting (that no one will ever read).

I suffer from the same condition. There is a very simple way to make a schedule.

Whatever your supervisor says, change the unit of measurements. So if he says " it's only gonna take you 3 days", then it means it will take you 3 weeks. If he says it will take 1 month, then it means 1 year.

Works great for me :)

Hi Etienne7,

it depends very much if you want to do a systematic review of the literature. In this case there is a methodology that you need to follow. Try finding previous reviews that used this approach. It is not very complicated and it helps make the review transparent and reproducible.

http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pmed.1000097

Hope this helps.

Hi SazzyCzar,

it must be quite hard to deal with it right now, as the experience is still fresh.

Don't despair. Wait to see the report with the changes you have to make. It might not be so much work after all.

A friend of mine got major revisions as an outcome, but not because the thesis was weak, but because she started working on the main time, and the examiners wanted to give her plenty of time to complete the changes.

You also need to consider that academics from other disciplines come from different perspectives. They might suggest changes which will improve your thesis overall.

You can take advantage of this time to write up some publications too.

Good luck.

Hi,

would assume that a 7-point scale gives continuous data (ordinal or interval), if your data are normal, you can do a t-test. Otherwise you have to run a Wilcoxon-Mann Whitney test.

I don't know though, maybe in other disciplines they consider these data categorical then you can run a Chi-square or a Fischer's exact test.
Hope it helps :)

Hi Maebh,

the rules regarding thesis formatting and binding are very strict. So, if for example you need to include an A3 page, you should have asked written permission months in advance.

I assume that the same applies for all non-standard features you want to include. I very much doubt you are allowed to included loose pages. Check with the registration office in your school.

PS If it is necessary to include audio or visual material, you can include a cd in a plastic pouch attached on the front page.

Hi,

I just searched out of curiosity, and the TOP journal in my discipline has and impact factor of 2.7.... so you get the point: impact factor is not essential. New journals have lower impact factors too, as it is estimated over a five-year period.

From my limited experience it is more important to select a journal that many universities can access. The whole point of publishing is to get our work out there, and start a discussion with the other scientists on our field.

Well done for the chance to publish! Definitely worth pursuing it!

Hi,

in my field certain proceedings of international conferences are actually better than a paper in a low-rank journal with a much stricter peer-review process. These proceeding papers get many citations too.

xxx

Hi Minerva,

I guess it would be very hard to generalise, as each student faces different challenges and requirements.

Some people work from home and meet their supervisors fortnightly, monthly or even less often. Other students have supervisors that micro-manage them and expect them to be in the office/lab every breathing moment. Some people work 4 or 5 hours a day and they do great as they work very efficiently.... Most people in my office treat the PhD as a 9 to 5 job and they don't work in the weekends.

Personally, I put very long hours in my PhD: I work around 60 hours per week, and that includes weekends. I blame it to my multi-disciplinary topic that required a lot of reading in the first year to catch up, and also a very labour-intensive PhD, with extensive fieldwork, huge amount of data to be transcribed and a large database with complicated statistical analysis. Moreover, I am involved with teaching, marking, supervising dissertations and organising conferences and events that take place in the department. However, I still try to make time for the gym, socialise with my friends and read books (I can do these because I don't have a family).

In my university full-time PhD students are allowed to work up to 20 hours per week. I don't think that I would manage.Burn-out is a real thing.

Academics are aware about these discrepancies in marks among different institutions.

I also didn't get a distinction in the first degree or the masters , however I was also among the top 10% of my peers. I stated this in my application, and my supervisor also mentioned it in the recommendation letter.

I had a publication before starting the PhD. Marks are just a relative number and don't say much about a person's abilities.

Good luck

Hi PhDer,

just keep writing everything as clearly you can.

Self-doubt is haunting my nights too, I feel like my PhD is the sloppy work of a toddler attending early years in a nursery school.

Good luck. Just keep swimming.

Hi charliebrown,

internet hugs from me too. Hope you get better soon.

xxx