Hi, just a small but polite point - it's better if you don't use text speak on the forum as not everyone's first language is English.

To answer your question, no, you don't get different "grades" at the final outcome - at least in the UK (not sure about elsewhere). You can pass at different levels after having the viva voce (oral) examination - this is determined by the amount of corrections you have to make to your final thesis. So you can pass straight away with a perfect piece work, or have to take longer to do major rewrites, but you still pass. Unless of course you fail. Which doesn't happen often.

Hi there, welcome!

I finished my phd, but am sticking around to offer any help and advice I can. There are afew of us on here who have completed as well as those in the midst of the process.

Hi KAtesays, thanks for replying

Yes, I've gone through tutorials but as per usual the simplest thing I want to do isn't in there.

Nevermind - I've since had a chat with my boss about it and was doing something totally different to what he wanted anyway! back to the drawing board..

it usually depends on how the journal your submitting to wants to present it. When I've done this, i've given the manuscript to an editor so it reads:

"Title of paper" by Kronk O'Dile (1)* and Other Person (1)#
* Belford University
# other place

Therefore the numbers denote equal responsibility and the symbols denote where we're from. Then it's up to the journal to list alphabetically by name/institution, etc.

Is there any chance that this arrangmeent will be reciprocated in your favour? (It bloody well should be!) That YOU can also benefit from joint first authorship through work completed by this other person? Might be worth sounding your supervisor out about this - if it is a distcinct possibility it would be advisable to grin and bear it.

However if there is no chance of this, you are WELL within your rights to speak to someone else (your departmental director of reearch maybe?). You say the person has developed a method that you will use? Developing a method is all well and good, but does not direcly constitute authorship if someone else uses it in a different context. If s/he has not been directly involved with YOUR work they have no claim to authorship whatsoever, let alone first author. If authorship worked on that basis, I'd have had a whole football team of authors on everything I wrote!

I know people who have done a PhD then gone on to do a professional doctorate (IE clinical psychology), which was different - in the latter the thesis was nowhere near as long as a "standard" PhD, and they did work placements and attended classes.

Don't know anyone with/doing 2 traditional PhDs though... nor do I understand why one would. Just the one was bad enough!

Afternoon all

Just wondered if any NVIVO users out there can help me? I want to print one of my source documents with the coding stripes but can't seem to do this... what am I missing? Or can you not do this?

Shani, I think it's great that you are planning now, and contrary to what others have said, I still think it's more feasible to become pregnant and have a bay during a PhD that with other contracted research posts.

It can take a healthy couple in their 20s up to a year to conceive. The odds become less favourable in 30s. Juno is right in that no one is an island and that decisions re. pregnancy don't just affect the couple conncerned - of course it affects others. But that doesn't apply just to PhD study - it applies to everything. If you work to the "PhD or planned pregnancy" rule, you have to apply it to all kinds of other careers, and in this day and age that's simply not acceptable. I accept that education in the sense of being at school is not an advisable time to become pregnant, but a PhD is different, and a stage by which women can, and should be able to make that call depending on what's right for them.

I am with Oz here - I wouldn't announce intentions to try for a baby whilst studying for a PhD. Not for fear of discrimination but simply because no matter what I did in life or work, a decision to start a family would be absolutely no one else's business but mine and my partner's.

Personally, I think trying having a baby during a PhD is a preferable option. A PhD student does not have the same contractual obligations as a member of staff, and can therefore have more flexibility in terms of childcare, hours worked, etc. And one more thing – if a person has been competitively selected for a PhD, the simple fact is they’re deemed the best person to do it. If I wanted to make sure a project was well-executed, I would rather it take longer to accommodate the best candidate's pregnancy break. I certainly wouldn't think wistfully about other candidates or think it was unfair on them. Granted, they might not have needed the extra time, but they simply wouldn't have been as good.

I can see your argument Juno, but it’s not just the PhD that presents this dilemma. When it comes to longevity of employment, a PhD IS (unfortunately) like a job. Temporary contracts are the norm rather than the exception, and not just in academia. Most research contracts, whether they are a PhD studentship or a research associate/fellow/postdoc are given time limits. Jobs where one “may be working there for 10+ years, and so may as well take time out at [their] convenience to have a baby” are simply not available post PhD, especially in academia. The luxury of deciding to start a family at a convenient time, to oneself or to anyone else, is not an option that readily presents itself.

So it’s not always a simple matter of waiting for 3 years, it can turn out to be even longer. And if you’re a certain age and want children, those years can be too long in fertility terms.

It sounds like you're not enjoying it at all, clariet707. How far are you into the process? Have you spoken to your supervisor or director of research about your concerns? It would be a shame to leave without seeing if anything could be done to improve your experience of the research.

Your thoughts towards the MPhil would also be a good thing to discuss with the supervisor anyway - if you are thinking of leaving as soon as you find a suitable job, you need to handle this carefully. If your supervisor is aware of your concerns it will make your circumstances a alot easier in terms of getting references for the work you have already completed. What you don't want is to expose yourself to the risk of getting a bad/questionable reference by "dropping a bombshell", especially without seeing if your situation could be improved first.

Hi there - I don't know anyone who has been/is in that situation, but I think you need to ask yourself exactly what it is you want from an MPhil/PhD.

You say that you are "really unimpressed with [your] project supervisor, lab work, prospects etc". That's a lot of discontent. If you are not happy with so many aspects of the whole process, switching to MPhil won't alleviate your dissatisfaction. Why? Because in practical terms, an MPhil is not much less work than a PhD. You still have to write a sizeable thesis (one of my friends wrote 60K words), you still have to have a viva and still have to go throught the same rigorous assessment processes. If you are unhappy on several levels, I think you should be questioning whether the whole thing is right for you, to be honest.

Many congratulations - well done!

It's a weird feeling. It actually took about 2 weeks afterwards for it to sink in with me. I hope you celebrate in style!

It's weird - in the run up to my viva I was set on having the party to end all parties! But it didn't quite happen like that. My viva was on a Tuesday, I had a couple of drinks with friends in the early evening, and I was straight back at work the following day, doing a conference the next week, going on holiday the week after that, then I became ill with flu while I was away! I was so run down, the marked celebratons didn't really happen. I wonder how many others had vivas at odd times, and the euphoria of passing gets lost within the subsequent routine of daily life!

Mine was also in early January, and my graduation is not until mid July, so quite a protracted time - sometimes I almost forget I did it! While it seems a long way off now, I'm going to do something for graduation itself, maybe have lots of people round my house or go out for a celebratory meal