Hello everyone,
im a new PhD student and i have just started my first semester. My PhD is in Informatics and the topic is Information society. During my first semester i need to narrow down some topics for my dissertation and since the topic has a broad range of things i could write, im not sure what should i choose. So i decided to ask for help and ideas.
My topic contains, everything from web marketing, social networking, online gaming communities etc. Personally i find any of these 3 topics interesting enough although i have no idea what possibilities for a research there are for each one of them. Any ideas what i should do and how do i proceed?
Also i need someone to clarify for me if the research that i will choose should be a practical research or literature research. Personally i prefer dealing with books that people :-). Does a research need to be groundbreaking or could it be accumulation of various sources in order to read a conclusion?
Thanks in advance for the help. Im already searching what books are out there concerning my topic in order to find what is written and what i not but if a know what should i be looking for it would be better.

Hi
Firstly the topic you choose is very personal and you need to be extremely enthusiastic about the subject to stay the course - unless you are being funded then the criteria could be laid out for you.  But my advice would be to read key books, recently published in your areas of interest as they normally conclude with areas that could be further researched, then when you have narrowed down your choice start looking at the journal articles to see what has been done and what hasnt. The wider you read the more you will be able to define a topic, and anyway your topic and questions etc will be constantly refined/changed/updated, especially in your first year (only 5 months in myself!!).  This isnt an area that anyone else can choose for you and is part of the process of being an independent researcher and working at doctorate level.

The research doesnt need to be groundbreaking, and some universities differ in their opinion of what the originality content needs to be, but I'm sure most require that a PhD makes a contribution to the development of knowledge in some form or another, and there are many ways this can be achieved.

Hopefully you have a good supervisor to help you through the fog, good luck :-)

Thank you for your answer. I already took your advice and started searching for books around the subject. Hopefully after a lot of reading i will have a clear picture about it. Thing is that many things around my topic fascinate me and maybe this is another reason why its hard to pick some subject.
You spoke about journal articles. Do you know any sites that have big databases of scientific articles and research?

Hi

Google Scholar is very good, especially if you link it up to your university library - through advanced search, although quite often you need to be on campus to do this, then you should be able to access full text or at least be able to order them through your library.  Can you make an appointment with the librarian at your uni to show you how to do searches and access all the information, as they will be able to not only access all their electronic journals but access all british libraries, as well as having a good stock of hard copy journals. Sounds like you need to make a list of all the help you would like and speak to you supervisor or the head post grad person in your dept to get the most out of your university; I know its very a woolly area when first starting a PhD, and it is my understanding so far that you need to be a bit pushy to get the things you need, and it sounds like you could do with some help to get off the ground.  Keep asking the questions and I hope you dont meet too many brick walls! (up)

yeap i guess you are right i should start asking questions and help about these things. My supervisor is good and he can help me although he doesnt have much time so i have to do some things myself. Google scholar and university databases its a good start to see and search relevant material to my research.

choose something that has not been done to death yet. social networking has been quite a hot topic in recent years, web marketing is getting picked up right now, but online gaming communities for instance are not covered very well in research. it also helps to read papers in recent workshops/conferences about the subject - how advanced are the papers? sometimes, when a new field "comes up" it is quite easy to publish something, because the 'easy' ideas have not been covered yet.

initially i started out my phd on a field (in computer science) which has been treated for the past 30 years - not a very good choice it turned out, after 2 years i changed course and now i am doing something quite novel (only 5 years or so research in it), which is excellent for me - lots of publications, lots of ideas to try.

======= Date Modified 07 May 2009 17:36:46 =======
Online gaming communities is something that would be interest me cause i ve been a gamer since i was a little kid but the thing is i am afraid that if i choose a subject like this one, then maybe i wont be able to find many books about this matter thus making harder my research. Of course in this case i guess i could find some psychology/sociology books and try to find out if the same principals apply over these communities...maybe this could be my research. How people exhibit their emotional reactions over the web and how do these reactions differ from the real world.

Books may not be the answer. The route would be: academic journal articles, a tediously broad based and even frustrating literature search and your supervisor!

It's horrid sometimes but then we find our way :-)

Well about journals i found some at google journals but i want to ask, is there a database that contains every scientific article of the world? I know it does sound silly but only my university's database i dont believe it will cut it. If i need to be able to assess whats happening on the research around my topic all over the globe i will need to have a variety of sources(thats why im considering even books a good source of material for ideas).

First of all, you cannot begin by aiming to cover every article on the topic. That's not the way to do this. Start from a suggested list of readings from those who know the area and your interests. From there, see the readings these pieces list. Then branch off, you will begin to see overlaps, soon an 'idea' of the area will shape itself out, you will get to identify who the key voices are in the area.. then you shall try to attempt to read many things from a few authors, and some things from others... and it grows like that...

forget about books - there will hardly be any anyway. how long has ONLINE gaming been going on? a couple of years tops!

to find workshops/conferences/journals just use google....it took me 2 seconds to find

http://www.humlab.umu.se/cultureandcomputergamesstudyingonlineactivities

which seems pretty much up your alley!

What topics are the academics in the department publishing on? That's a good starting point for inspiration. Also join a journal club or start one, chat to academics and others in the department about your situation and what they consider interesting and topical.

I've no idea about your field but all those aspects (web marketing, social networking, online gaming communities) are part of 'Second Life', which is mainstream and obviously taken serious enough that IBM, Nature Publishing Trust, NASA, etc. are all actively involved with it.

Good luck finding your topic..