Just interested really. I have noticed recently a lot of threads about people worrying about writing up. It ranges from people worrying about writing up in 3 months to a whole year. I'm curious, exactly how much time did people expect to get to write up? In my opinion, in a 3 year PhD (although it is often longer now) expecting more than a maximum of 6 months seems a bit pie-in-the-sky to me.

I've heard from several sources that for a science PhD (where you've got all the experiments finished) you should allow 3-4 months for writing up time.

really Jane? oh that's reassuring, because that's exactly how much time i do have...

and Adem., someone on this forum once told me, that if you have 6 months to write, it will take 6 months. if you have 3 months to write, it will take 3 months.

the shorter time you have, the more you will push yourself and work longer in each specific day.

like if you have 6 months. you will work maybe 2 or 3 hours a day. if you have only 3 months, you will try to work at least 6 hours in a day.

"when a man knows he is to be hanged in a week, it concentrates his mind wonderfully". before i got my letter saying I HAVE to submit. i was writing rather "slowly".. but now that i have this ultimate deadline. it's helped to keep me focused, and drop all other activities from my life. so literally i eat, sleep and drink my thesis, but then say to myself its only for 3 months, i can sacrifice not having a life for just 3 months.

i think what makes people panic and stressed, is knowing that they "ONLY" have a certain amount of time. it's the fact that they have a deadline (irrespective) of the length of it, that makes them panic. when a person knows they only have a certain amount of time to do something, it causes them to become panic and anxious.

i've seen it myself. that when i set myself "artificial" deadlines, even though i set them, i tend to become anxious about meeting them.

it's not a question how long a person wants to write up. its the fact that external factors have FORCED them to definately write up in that period of time, or they will FAIL. it's that what causes them to panic. not that they were expecting years to write up.

and some people can't handle deadlines at all. they become so anxious about it.

I agree. I just get the impression that a lot of people seem to think that a PhD can be done in your own time which isn't true. Part of the process is keeping deadlines, the biggest of which is the one to be finished on time. I think you've got the right idea. 3 Months isn't that long in the scheme of things if it means you get what needs to be done finished.

3-4 months to write up is a naive expectation. It takes much longer. Allow for endless supervisor comments, restructuring, corrections, re-casting etc... 9 months-1 year is realistic.

Perhaps your the type of person that works very productively and doesn't panic or stress about how long it will take to write up.

Adem, can i ask what stage you're at in your Phd?
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Joan Bolker writes about deadlines saying that people associate it with "meet it or your dead meat"..

"external deadlines ...neither kids nor adults like the feeling that someone else is controlling their lives. some of us get anxious in the face of adult deadlines and suddenly shrink to child size, with feelings of inadequacy,.sure we cant possibly meet the demands. some of us get desolate and want to give up before we've even tried, suire that meeting deadlines is out of the question"

the point is, we're all different and react in different ways.. although logically we know, we cant be expected to be given an infinite time to write up, but emotionally its hard to know that if you dont meet the deadline you will fail. some people are better copers than others.

Aloha, you would be suprised what people can accomplish, if they only have 3 months.

but yah i do agree, a year writing up, would be ideal. i just wish i had that luxury!

so my advice to those who are in your 3rd or 4th year, start writing up, even if it's just abit everyday. it does add up!

It simply won't be up to scratch with 3 months spent on it.

It all depends on the subject-matter though. For example, if you're a science student that has a mass of qualitative data that forms the findings and evidence of your thesis, I imagine it wouldn't take that long to disseminate that information, talk about the previous literature and draw your conclusions. In contrast, in a non-science PhD, particularly humanities and law, the evidence of the thesis is often presented in a more complex manner, and often does not have the structure of intro, lit review, findings, conclusions etc. but rather the argument and evidence has to run all the way through the thesis (at least for my discipline).

Sorry, that should read quantitative data!

^^ my comments are not intended to devalue or suggest a science Phd is easier, but rather the lab work etc. should surely be the more time-consuming part of the PhD, rather than the actual writing-up.

Aloha, that's true, but in my particular case, if i dont submit. i will automatically fail. so i really have no choice. so the thesis wont be perfect. but it's better that i fail because the thesis was crap, then fail out of default because i did not submit anything, because i was making it perfect.

Aloha, may I ask what year your in with your phd?

i know alot of science phd'ers that wrote their thesis in 3 months, full time writing though. so it can be done. and they passed just fine. besides the examiners can always say "rewrite" it and give you an extra 18 months to pull it up to good standard. i think positive thinking is important.