Hello,

I am very happy to be able to share my concerns on this site. I have started my PhD for three months in the field of evolutionary biology.

The great opportunity that I have is that I have the freedom to develop my own research idea. Although this is very exciting but as you can imagine, it is very difficult and I am constantly in the fear of what if my ideas will not be good enough and what if things will go wrong.

I wanted to share my concern with you to see how are your experiences in developing your own research ideas. In a four year PhD project, how much time is normal to be spent to develop ideas and plan? I am already three months into my PhD and I am extremely stressed as I feel I need to get things done and publish.

Thanks for your help!

To find a research idea and to develop a research proposal, it would be good to read existing research papers in the area of your interest and you may come up with some research idea and plan. I think, universities here in UK allow it to be 10 to 12 months to develop a good research proposal and completing literature review.