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Dissertation guidance

Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
edited March 27 in Work & Study
I will of course be asking my dissertation supervisor this when i next have a meeting with him, but he's not available for a few days and i really want to be getting some work done

Basically, a dissertation is about 10,000 words right? Well i have no idea how i am going to get that many words!!

I have designed my own study and at the moment i am writing up the methodology, but at the very most it is only going to take up about 800 words.
I dont want to babble on and write a load of non-concice crap, but at the same time i am a but stuck as to what to write.

Anyone done a dissertation before and know?

And i have another query, i ordered 11 journal articles which i will be using, i know that i need to refer to their findings in order to back up or contrast my own findings but do i actually need to do some kind of literature review type thing in my assignment? Or does that kinda get mixed in with the introduction and discussion? Basically what am i required to use them for?

Aargh

Would be extremely grateful if someone could shed a bit of light on it!
Post edited by JustV on

Comments

  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Just out of interest, how come you ordered the journal articles? Can you not search and download them on the uni computers? I haven't done a dissertation, but from what I've seen of other people's I think your literature review would be part of the introduction...I.e. propose your chosen area, explain what has (or has not) been discovered in this area so far, and then explain how you intend to further, confirm or disprove this knowledge.

    P.s. good luck with it! :thumb:
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Just out of interest, how come you ordered the journal articles? Can you not search and download them on the uni computers? I haven't done a dissertation, but from what I've seen of other people's I think your literature review would be part of the introduction...I.e. propose your chosen area, explain what has (or has not) been discovered in this area so far, and then explain how you intend to further, confirm or disprove this knowledge.

    P.s. good luck with it! :thumb:

    i got some journals from the virtual campus, some from the journal room in the library, but some are not available and therefore need to be ordered, my university doesnt subscribe to every single journal to exist.

    Ordering them is simple, i just had to fill in a form and then pay 50p per article

    ps. thanks, i'll need it :nervous:
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Blah wrote:
    i got some journals from the virtual campus, some from the journal room in the library, but some are not available and therefore need to be ordered, my university doesnt subscribe to every single journal to exist.

    Ordering them is simple, i just had to fill in a form and then pay 50p per article

    ps. thanks, i'll need it :nervous:

    Ah I see. We have signs up in the computer clusters telling us we can only download/print something like two articles...I don't really understand how they can enforce that though. I once got about 20 for this one presentation, haven't been thrown out yet though :D
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Blah wrote:
    I will of course be asking my dissertation supervisor this when i next have a meeting with him, but he's not available for a few days and i really want to be getting some work done

    Basically, a dissertation is about 10,000 words right? Well i have no idea how i am going to get that many words!!

    I have designed my own study and at the moment i am writing up the methodology, but at the very most it is only going to take up about 800 words.
    I dont want to babble on and write a load of non-concice crap, but at the same time i am a but stuck as to what to write.

    Anyone done a dissertation before and know?

    And i have another query, i ordered 11 journal articles which i will be using, i know that i need to refer to their findings in order to back up or contrast my own findings but do i actually need to do some kind of literature review type thing in my assignment? Or does that kinda get mixed in with the introduction and discussion? Basically what am i required to use them for?

    Aargh

    Would be extremely grateful if someone could shed a bit of light on it!
    Things like length, layout, style etc depend on your course and your uni. What's right for my dissertation could be completely wrong for yours.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    If you write your 800 words, then look at where you could helpfully expand and explain your theory/findings and the background to what you've said.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Hi. Just to put in my 2 cents worth. I've just not long finished a Master's dissertation, which was supposed to be 10000 words, but then ended up being about 20000. Getting to 10000 is just a matter of going into a ridiculous amount of detail about the areas you're writing about... If you think about it as 3 large essays joined together, that can help you get through it. Think of three main areas that you know you'll have to cover, and work through each section, trying to write about 3000 words for each section. Read, read and read some more, and try and talk about each study in as much depth as you can and how it relates to your work. Talk about how the works relate to one another as well. A lit review would be useful in terms of getting your word count up, but I never did one for either my undergrad or Master's dissertations. Lit reviews tend to be used primarily in PhD theses and journal articles, but some unis do expect them in their undergrad dissertations as well. Your methodology should be a bit longer than 800 words. Go into extreme detail, naming the type of equipment you used, when you did the fieldwork, how many sessions, how long they took, number of participant or whatever. It's difficult to give you more structured advice without knowing what kind of work your doing (experimental stuff, literature based, etc), but that should hopefully point you in the right direction. I know it might seem like it's a lot of words, but before you know it you'll be at 12000 words trying to cut it down! Everybody's been there with increasing word counts, and you'll get through it! Good luck! :)
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    what course are you doing?

    personally I would take a look at the journal articles you're using, your study is likely to be based around something similar. see how they do it, how much detail they go into etc. probs a good idea to brouse a load of journals just to see how different reports are set out, for example if you're doing a meta-analysis then go brouse a load of them...you'll get an idea pretty quickly of whats expected and how to bulk it out if needs be

    also 50p for a journal article thats amazing! our uni charges like £10 for inter-library loan, and the department pays so you have to be really sure its the one you want! grr
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