Overview of Hugh on PostgraduateForum.com

Overview of Hugh

Signup date: 12 Mar 2010 at 9:38am

Last login: 24 May 2017 at 8:31pm

Post count: 1264

Recent Posts

How did you come up with your title?

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Colon is really in. I'm also struggling with a snappy thesis title *sigh*

Final year support thread

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Zutterfly, really pleased to hear you are making excellent progress, well done! :)

I believe that's a good strategy to leave cutting up to the end. I partly dread that part of cutting out words. I always thought I'd have too less to say.

I've got to tackle the conclusion too after the literature review chapter, I think that's going to be a difficult task. I should worry about it when I get there ;)

Final year support thread

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Hi everyone, how are you all doing? I've been working on my literature review, and made good progress, although it feels too long, so I may to have cut out quite a bit, but I'm plodding along!

Final year support thread

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Quote From Naimat:
Hello,

I hope you are doing good.

I have read your thread, and i am interested in supporting you.
I also need some motivation.

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Regards,
Naimat

Welcome! :) We are a friendly bunch, so please join in! How long do you have left?

Final year support thread

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Quote From SarahSarahSarah:
I become increasingly sad waiting for response on my submitted manuscripts. That's so frustrating. I know it's normal, but still waiting for weeks after the reviewers completed their recommendation is really nerve wrecking

That must be really scary, especially because your thesis is dependent on publication. I wish you the best of luck!

Btw, does it matter which journal you publish in? Does it have to be in a well cited journal? I'm just wondering because I've been getting a lot of spam type emails from journals that I've never heard of asking me to publish with them.

First full draft to submission - how many months did it take?

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Quote From timefortea:
Three months for me - not that I have done it yet but it can't take longer than that or I am out of time (gulp!)

I've allocated two months and now I'm wondering whether it's realistic. I'm hoping it'll be enough.

Final year support thread

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Quote From Zutterfly:
Man I would really struggle with a 70k limit!

After writing my conclusion I think editing my literature review will be the first point of call which I am dreading :/ It is so difficult as I think there is always that fear of the examiners asking 'Why have you not included...?'

Could you move some of it to appendices?

First full draft to submission - how many months did it take?

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Hi,

I'm just wondering how long it took people to get from first full draft to submission?

I know this probably depends on how many changes are required, but in the worst case scenario or on average, how long should it take?

Final year support thread

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Thanks Zutterfly and chickpea!

We have a very very strict deadline of 70K. The graduate office will not let us submit even if it's one word over the word count. I need to keep my literature review to a minimum but it's already looking lengthy.

Literature review - how do you add the critical voice?

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Quote From chickpea:
I'm not trying to be critical about everything that's in my lit review - some stuff is in there just to describe the state of play with my field, and I'm being more critical with the parts where I'm identifying gaps or debates that will feature in my data chapters. I'm not sure whether this is 'critical' enough, but I think it would be hard to dig into absolutely everything you read in order to be critical about it.

Thanks Chickpea, that is reassuring to hear! Let's hope my supervisors agree :)

Final year support thread

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

How long are your literature reviews? I think mine will be about 15K.

I've also got a question about how to be critical when writing the literature review, would appreciate your response!

http://www.postgraduateforum.com/thread-47279

Literature review - how do you add the critical voice?

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Hi,

I understand that when reporting results from a study for example, one can be critical of the methodology used for example, or the claims made.

However, if I am reporting on say a given policy on an issue or a government initiative, how do I be critical? I have mentioned 'however critics argue X..' But not much reference to the strength of the argument.

I suppose I'm trying to ascertain how much criticality the literature review needs? I think what I've written currently is on par with a literature review in a journal paper, but I'm not sure that is sufficient for a literature review in the thesis?

Any advice much appreciated! :)

Final year support thread

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Well done myoldmonkey :)

I don't know why my supervisor keeps telling me that 15K is too large a chapter, and that it's dangerous. I think if it's well sign posted and easy to follow, the length of the chapter shouldn't be a problem.

Research methods/psychology/social sciences question

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Interesting question. I don't think it's a problem exploring other questions in addition to the one you originally wanted answered.

You could change your research questions when writing up or explain that the research question evolved from the data. I don't think either way it should be a problem.

NVivo for Life Sciences

Hugh 1264 posts
8 years ago

Look at endnote, I think that may be what you are looking for. NVivo can be temperamental and it's not organised well.

I also used Mendeley to organise files and notes, and word docs too.