sources for dissertation

How to find resources by format

Why use a dissertation or a thesis.

A dissertation is the final large research paper, based on original research, for many disciplines to be able to complete a PhD degree. The thesis is the same idea but for a masters degree.

They are often considered scholarly sources since they are closely supervised by a committee, are directed at an academic audience, are extensively researched, follow research methodology, and are cited in other scholarly work. Often the research is newer or answering questions that are more recent, and can help push scholarship in new directions. 

Search for dissertations and theses

Locating dissertations and theses.

The Proquest Dissertations and Theses Global database includes doctoral dissertations and selected masters theses from major universities worldwide.

• Searchable by subject, author, advisor, title, school, date, etc.
• More information about full text access and requesting through Interlibrary Loan

NDLTD – Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations provides free online access to a over a million theses and dissertations from all over the world.

WorldCat Dissertations and Theses searches library catalogs from across the U.S. and worldwide.

Locating University of Minnesota Dissertations and Theses

Use  Libraries search  and search by title or author and add the word "thesis" in the search box. Write down the library and call number and find it on the shelf. They can be checked out.

Check the  University Digital Conservancy  for online access to dissertations and theses from 2007 to present as well as historic, scanned theses from 1887-1923.

Other Sources for Dissertations and Theses

• Center for Research Libraries
• DART-Europe E-Thesis Portal
• Theses Canada
• Ethos (Great Britain)
• Australasian Digital Theses in Trove
• DiVA (Sweden)
• E-Thesis at the University of Helsinki
• DissOnline (Germany)
• List of libraries worldwide - to search for a thesis when you know the institution and cannot find in the larger collections

University of Minnesota Dissertations and Theses FAQs

What dissertations and theses are available.

With minor exceptions, all doctoral dissertations and all "Plan A" master's theses accepted by the University of Minnesota are available in the University Libraries system. In some cases (see below) only a non-circulating copy in University Archives exists, but for doctoral dissertations from 1940 to date, and for master's theses from 1925 to date, a circulating copy should almost always be available.

"Plan B" papers, accepted in the place of a thesis in many master's degree programs, are not received by the University Libraries and are generally not available. (The only real exceptions are a number of old library school Plan B papers on publishing history, which have been separately cataloged.) In a few cases individual departments may have maintained files of such papers.

In what libraries are U of M dissertations and theses located?

Circulating copies of doctoral dissertations:.

• Use Libraries Search to look for the author or title of the work desired to determine location and call number of a specific dissertation. Circulating copies of U of M doctoral dissertations can be in one of several locations in the library system, depending upon the date and the department for which the dissertation was done. The following are the general rules:
• Dissertations prior to 1940 Circulating copies of U of M dissertations prior to 1940 do not exist (with rare exceptions): for these, only the archival copy (see below) is available. Also, most dissertations prior to 1940 are not cataloged in MNCAT and can only be identified by the departmental listings described below.  
• Dissertations from 1940-1979 Circulating copies of U of M dissertations from 1940 to 1979 will in most cases be held within the Elmer L. Andersen Library, with three major classes of exceptions: dissertations accepted by biological, medical, and related departments are housed in the Health Science Library; science/engineering dissertations from 1970 to date will be located in the Science and Engineering Library (in Walter); and dissertations accepted by agricultural and related departments are available at the Magrath Library or one of the other libraries on the St. Paul campus (the Magrath Library maintains records of locations for such dissertations).  
• Dissertations from 1980-date Circulating copies of U of M dissertations from 1980 to date at present may be located either in Wilson Library (see below) or in storage; consult Libraries Search for location of specific items. Again, exceptions noted above apply here also; dissertations in their respective departments will instead be in Health Science Library or in one of the St. Paul campus libraries.

Circulating copies of master's theses:

• Theses prior to 1925 Circulating copies of U of M master's theses prior to 1925 do not exist (with rare exceptions); for these, only the archival copy (see below) is available.  
• Theses from 1925-1996 Circulating copies of U of M master's theses from 1925 to 1996 may be held in storage; consult Libraries search in specific instances. Once again, there are exceptions and theses in their respective departments will be housed in the Health Science Library or in one of the St. Paul campus libraries.  
• Theses from 1997-date Circulating copies of U of M master's theses from 1997 to date will be located in Wilson Library (see below), except for the same exceptions for Health Science  and St. Paul theses. There is also an exception to the exception: MHA (Masters in Health Administration) theses through 1998 are in the Health Science Library, but those from 1999 on are in Wilson Library.

Archival copies (non-circulating)

Archival (non-circulating) copies of virtually all U of M doctoral dissertations from 1888-1952, and of U of M master's theses from all years up to the present, are maintained by University Archives (located in the Elmer L. Andersen Library). These copies must be consulted on the premises, and it is highly recommended for the present that users make an appointment in advance to ensure that the desired works can be retrieved for them from storage. For dissertations accepted prior to 1940 and for master's theses accepted prior to 1925, University Archives is generally the only option (e.g., there usually will be no circulating copy). Archival copies of U of M doctoral dissertations from 1953 to the present are maintained by Bell and Howell Corporation (formerly University Microfilms Inc.), which produces print or filmed copies from our originals upon request. (There are a very few post-1952 U of M dissertations not available from Bell and Howell; these include such things as music manuscripts and works with color illustrations or extremely large pages that will not photocopy well; in these few cases, our archival copy is retained in University Archives.)

Where is a specific dissertation of thesis located?

To locate a specific dissertation or thesis it is necessary to have its call number. Use Libraries Search for the author or title of the item, just as you would for any other book. Depending on date of acceptance and cataloging, a typical call number for such materials should look something like one of the following:

Dissertations: Plan"A" Theses MnU-D or 378.7M66 MnU-M or 378.7M66 78-342 ODR7617 83-67 OL6156 Libraries Search will also tell the library location (MLAC, Health Science Library, Magrath or another St. Paul campus library, Science and Engineering, Business Reference, Wilson Annex or Wilson Library). Those doctoral dissertations still in Wilson Library (which in all cases should be 1980 or later and will have "MnU-D" numbers) are located in the central section of the third floor. Those master's theses in Wilson (which in all cases will be 1997 or later and will have "MnU-M" numbers) are also located in the central section of the third floor. Both dissertations and theses circulate and can be checked out, like any other books, at the Wilson Circulation desk on the first floor.

How can dissertations and theses accepted by a specific department be located?

Wilson Library contains a series of bound and loose-leaf notebooks, arranged by department and within each department by date, listing dissertations and theses. Information given for each entry includes name of author, title, and date (but not call number, which must be looked up individually). These notebooks are no longer current, but they do cover listings by department from the nineteenth century up to approximately 1992. Many pre-1940 U of M dissertations and pre-1925 U of M master's theses are not cataloged (and exist only as archival copies). Such dissertations can be identified only with these volumes. The books and notebooks are shelved in the general collection under these call numbers: Wilson Ref LD3337 .A5 and Wilson Ref quarto LD3337 .U9x. Major departments of individual degree candidates are also listed under their names in the GRADUATE SCHOOL COMMENCEMENT programs of the U of M, available in University Archives and (for recent years) also in Wilson stacks (LD3361 .U55x).

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• Thesis and Dissertation Resources
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• Thesis Writing Guides
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Why search this literature?

It is crucial for graduate students to search the thesis and dissertation literature to make sure that an idea or hypothesis has not already been tested, explored, and published.  An additional reason to search this literature is that it is rich with ideas and information not found elsewhere.  If graduate students do not continue on as academics or if students that came after them in their programs did not continue their research, this literature may be the end of the line for scholarship on a topic.

ProQuest has published dissertation e-learning modules covering the usefulness of using dissertations as a research source.  See link below:

• Dissertation eLearning resources from ProQuest Uncover the value of dissertations.

Library Databases

All graduate students should, at minimum, search the ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global database (PQDT) to see if the research they are proposing to do has already been done by a student at another institution/university.  RIT dissertations and theses have been included in PQDT since approximately 2006.

• Proquest Dissertations & Theses Global This link opens in a new window Identifies Ph.D. dissertations from U.S. & Canadian universities since 1861. Abstracts from 1980. Master's theses from 1988. Many with full-text.

RIT Digital Institutional Repository

• Digital Institutional Repository The digital institutional repository for the Rochester Institute of Technology, managed by RIT Libraries.
• ProQuest - Most Accessed Dissertations/Theses

Each month ProQuest updates this list of the top 25 Most-Accessed Dissertations and Theses across all subjects, based upon total PDF downloads. Find out what is trending.

The web sites below should also be consulted as appropriate to perform a full and thorough review of the dissertation and thesis literature beyond your introductory search of ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global.  Consider whether a particular country or part of the world would have an interest in your potential research topic.

Only large-scale repositories of dissertations and theses are included here. You may also need to search individual university repositories directly.

• Ebsco Open Dissertations Search thousands of open dissertations and theses from over 50 participating libraries.
• EThOS (from the British Library) EThOS offers a 'single point of access' where researchers the world over can access ALL theses produced by UK Higher Education.
• Indian Institute of Science Dissertations and theses from the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India.
• Indian Theses and Dissertations (Shodhganga) Over 130 participating Indian universities and over 8800 ETD documents.
• National ETD Portal (South Africa) South African theses and dissertations.
• Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations The Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations (NDLTD), is an international organization dedicated to promoting the adoption, creation, use, dissemination, and preservation of electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs). The NDLTD Union Catalog contains more than one million records of electronic theses and dissertations. Search the Union Catalog from here: http://thumper.vtls.com:6090/?theme=NDLTD
• OhioLINK ETD Center Electronic theses and dissertations from colleges and universities in the state of Ohio.
• Open Access Theses and Dissertations OATD aims to be the best possible resource for finding open access graduate theses and dissertations published around the world. Metadata (information about the theses) comes from over 600 colleges, universities, and research institutions. OATD currently indexes over 1.5 million theses and dissertations. RIT is included.
• Theses Canada Canadian universities voluntarily participate by submitting approved theses and dissertation to Theses Canada. Click on "Search Theses Canada" under the Introduction on the left hand side of the page to begin your search.
• TROVE From the National Library of Australia - Search Trove to explore amazing collections from Australian libraries, universities, museums, galleries and archives.
• Next: Thesis Writing Guides >>

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How to Find Sources | Scholarly Articles, Books, Etc.

Published on 4 September 2022 by Eoghan Ryan .

It’s important to know how to find relevant sources when writing a  paper , literature review , or systematic review .

The types of sources you need will depend on the stage you are at in the research process , but all sources that you use should be credible , up to date, and relevant to your research topic.

There are three main places to look for sources to use in your research:

Research databases

• Your institution’s library
• Other online resources

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Table of contents

Library resources, other online sources, frequently asked questions about finding sources.

You can search for scholarly sources online using databases and search engines like Google Scholar . These provide a range of search functions that can help you to find the most relevant sources.

If you are searching for a specific article or book, include the title or the author’s name. Alternatively, if you’re just looking for sources related to your research problem, you can search using keywords. In this case, it’s important to have a clear understanding of the scope of your project and of the most relevant keywords.

Databases can be general (interdisciplinary) or subject-specific.

• You can use subject-specific databases to ensure that the results are relevant to your field.
• When using a general database or search engine, you can still filter results by selecting specific subjects or disciplines.

Example: JSTOR discipline search filter

Check the table below to find a database that’s relevant to your research.

Google Scholar

To get started, you might also try Google Scholar , an academic search engine that can help you find relevant books and articles. Its “Cited by” function lets you see the number of times a source has been cited. This can tell you something about a source’s credibility and importance to the field.

Example: Google Scholar “Cited by” function

Boolean operators

Boolean operators can also help to narrow or expand your search.

Boolean operators are words and symbols like AND , OR , and NOT that you can use to include or exclude keywords to refine your results. For example, a search for “Nietzsche NOT nihilism” will provide results that include the word “Nietzsche” but exclude results that contain the word “nihilism.”

Many databases and search engines have an advanced search function that allows you to refine results in a similar way without typing the Boolean operators manually.

Example: Project Muse advanced search

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You can find helpful print sources in your institution’s library. These include:

• Journal articles
• Encyclopaedias
• Newspapers and magazines

Make sure that the sources you consult are appropriate to your research.

You can find these sources using your institution’s library database. This will allow you to explore the library’s catalog and to search relevant keywords. You can refine your results using Boolean operators .

Once you have found a relevant print source in the library:

• Consider what books are beside it. This can be a great way to find related sources.
• Consult the index and bibliography to find the bibliographic information of other relevant sources.

You can consult popular online sources to learn more about your topic. These include:

• Crowdsourced encyclopaedias like Wikipedia

You can find these sources using search engines. To refine your search, use Boolean operators in combination with relevant keywords.

However, exercise caution when using online sources. Consider what kinds of sources are appropriate for your research and make sure the sites are credible .

Look for sites with trusted domain extensions:

• URLs that end with .edu are educational resources.
• URLs that end with .gov are government-related resources.

Other sites can still be used, but you should evaluate them carefully and consider alternatives.

You can find sources online using databases and search engines like Google Scholar . Use Boolean operators or advanced search functions to narrow or expand your search.

For print sources, you can use your institution’s library database. This will allow you to explore the library’s catalog and to search relevant keywords.

It is important to find credible sources and use those that you can be sure are sufficiently scholarly .

• Consult your institute’s library to find out what books, journals, research databases, and other types of sources they provide access to.
• Look for books published by respected academic publishing houses and university presses, as these are typically considered trustworthy sources.
• Look for journals that use a peer review process. This means that experts in the field assess the quality and credibility of an article before it is published.

When searching for sources in databases, think of specific keywords that are relevant to your topic , and consider variations on them or synonyms that might be relevant.

Once you have a clear idea of your research parameters and key terms, choose a database that is relevant to your research (e.g., Medline, JSTOR, Project MUSE).

Find out if the database has a “subject search” option. This can help to refine your search. Use Boolean operators to combine your keywords, exclude specific search terms, and search exact phrases to find the most relevant sources.

There are many types of sources commonly used in research. These include:

• Encyclopedias

You’ll likely use a variety of these sources throughout the research process , and the kinds of sources you use will depend on your research topic and goals.

Scholarly sources are written by experts in their field and are typically subjected to peer review . They are intended for a scholarly audience, include a full bibliography, and use scholarly or technical language. For these reasons, they are typically considered credible sources .

Popular sources like magazines and news articles are typically written by journalists. These types of sources usually don’t include a bibliography and are written for a popular, rather than academic, audience. They are not always reliable and may be written from a biased or uninformed perspective, but they can still be cited in some contexts.

Cite this Scribbr article

If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the ‘Cite this Scribbr article’ button to automatically add the citation to our free Reference Generator.

Ryan, E. (2022, September 04). How to Find Sources | Scholarly Articles, Books, Etc.. Scribbr. Retrieved 21 May 2024, from https://www.scribbr.co.uk/working-sources/how-to-find-sources/

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Dissertations and Theses

• Finding dissertations and theses
• Resources for writing & submitting a thesis or dissertation

Dissertations and theses as a research tool

Obtaining theses & dissertations written at other institutions, citing dissertations and theses, databases focused on dissertations and theses, sources indexing dissertations and theses, print dissertation indexes and bibliographies.

Theses and dissertations can be a valuable source of information for research.  They can offer the following benefits:

• Just like journal articles, conference proceedings, and other forms of literature, they present original research. Recently completed theses can provide "sneak previews" of ideas and findings that have yet to reach the public via other publication formats.
• They may be the only publicly-available work by authors who do not otherwise publish for general audiences or through commercial publishers.
• They contain extensive bibliographies.
• They provide inspiration for the formatting and presentation of ideas, graphs, charts, and other components of a document.
• They provide insight into the early work of a particular person and have value for historical and biographical purposes.

Want to borrow a thesis or dissertation written at another institution that isn't available in  full text online ? Request it via  ILLIAD , Tufts' interlibrary loan service. Choose the "Thesis" request form and provide as much descriptive information as you can. Not all theses or dissertations are available or loanable, but we'll try to find you a copy!

Some other ways you might be able to find a copy of an older dissertation:

If you can identify the author's institutional affiliation, visit that institution's webpage to see if they catalog or archive students' dissertations. 

Contact the author.  Some authors will post all or some of their dissertation on their website or have journal articles or other publications which draw heavily on this work.

Search the author's name and/or thesis title in full-text journal databases which include article references. These citations may provide clues as to how to locate the document.

Contact your  subject librarian  for assistance.

As with journal articles, books, and other sources, theses and dissertations must be properly cited in any document that references them.  Most citation styles, including APA, Chicago, and MLA, provide specific instructions for formatting these citations.  Citation Management tools, such as EndNote and Zotero, automatically format references for these sources in your selected citation style.  More information is in the Citing Sources guide.

Although requirements for citing dissertations vary according by style, they generally seek to convey the following information:  that the item is a dissertation (rather than an article or a book); the type of degree it resulted in (master's, PhD, etc); whether it was published; and which institution granted the degree.  An example of a citation for a dissertation is presented here in four major citation styles:

• APA:   Miaoulis, I. N. (1987). Experimental investigation of turbulence spectra of charge density fluctuations in the equilibrium range. Unpublished Ph.D., Tufts University, United States -- Massachusetts.
• Chicago:   Miaoulis, Ioannis Nikolaos. "Experimental Investigation of Turbulence Spectra of Charge Density Fluctuations in the Equilibrium Range." Ph.D., Tufts University, 1987.
• IEEE:   [1]    I. N. Miaoulis, "Experimental investigation of turbulence spectra of charge density fluctuations in the equilibrium range,"  United States -- Massachusetts: Tufts University, 1987, p. 98.
• MLA:   Miaoulis, Ioannis Nikolaos. "Experimental Investigation of Turbulence Spectra of Charge Density Fluctuations in the Equilibrium Range." Ph.D. Tufts University, 1987.

The following sources focus primarily or exclusively on theses and dissertations; some provide direct access to full-text.

• DART-Europe E-theses Portal "A partnership of research libraries and library consortia who are working together to improve global access to European research theses."
• Dissertations & Theses: Full Text Comprehensive collection of dissertations and theses worldwide. Of the over 2 million titles in the database, more than 930,000 are available in PDF format for free download. Those that aren't freely available can be ordered from within the database.
• DSpace@MIT Over 25,000 theses and dissertations from all MIT departments completed as far back as the mid 1800's. Note that this is NOT a complete collection of MIT theses.
• Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations (NDLTD) Search engine for graduate papers completed at universities both in America and abroad.
• Open Access Theses and Dissertations (OATD) Open access (OA) theses and dissertations from institutions worldwide.
• Ethos Service from the British Library for reading and ordering theses produced by students in the United Kingdom.
• Theses Canada Theses from over 60 Canadian universities, going back to 1965.
• Shodhganga@INFLIBNET Centre Digital repository of theses and dissertations from universities in India.

In the following subject-specific databases, the Advance Search option enables filtering by dissertation as the document type.

• American Bibliography of Slavic and East European Studies Sources on East-Central Europe and the former Soviet Union.
• ARTbibliographies Modern Sources on all forms of modern and contemporary art.
• EconLit Economic literature.
• Engineering Village For literature on all engineering disciplines.
• PsycInfo Sources on psychology and related disciplines.
• Sociological Abstracts For the literature on sociology.
• SPORTDiscus with Full Text Sources on sport, physical fitness, and physical education.
• World Shakespeare Bibliography Sources on materials published since 1971 related to Shakespeare.

A number of indexes and bibliographies of dissertations have been published, primarily in print format.  These often focus on specific historical eras, geographic regions, or topics.

• Dissertation Indexes in the Tufts Catalog
• Dissertation Indexes in WorldCat
• Dissertation Indexes in Google Books
• << Previous: Resources for writing & submitting a thesis or dissertation
• Last Updated: Apr 11, 2024 2:23 PM
• URL: https://researchguides.library.tufts.edu/theses

Reference management. Clean and simple.

The top list of academic search engines

1. Google Scholar

4. science.gov, 5. semantic scholar, 6. baidu scholar, get the most out of academic search engines, frequently asked questions about academic search engines, related articles.

Academic search engines have become the number one resource to turn to in order to find research papers and other scholarly sources. While classic academic databases like Web of Science and Scopus are locked behind paywalls, Google Scholar and others can be accessed free of charge. In order to help you get your research done fast, we have compiled the top list of free academic search engines.

Google Scholar is the clear number one when it comes to academic search engines. It's the power of Google searches applied to research papers and patents. It not only lets you find research papers for all academic disciplines for free but also often provides links to full-text PDF files.

• Coverage: approx. 200 million articles
• Abstracts: only a snippet of the abstract is available
• Related articles: ✔
• References: ✔
• Cited by: ✔
• Links to full text: ✔
• Export formats: APA, MLA, Chicago, Harvard, Vancouver, RIS, BibTeX

BASE is hosted at Bielefeld University in Germany. That is also where its name stems from (Bielefeld Academic Search Engine).

• Coverage: approx. 136 million articles (contains duplicates)
• Abstracts: ✔
• Related articles: ✘
• References: ✘
• Cited by: ✘
• Export formats: RIS, BibTeX

CORE is an academic search engine dedicated to open-access research papers. For each search result, a link to the full-text PDF or full-text web page is provided.

• Coverage: approx. 136 million articles
• Links to full text: ✔ (all articles in CORE are open access)
• Export formats: BibTeX

Science.gov is a fantastic resource as it bundles and offers free access to search results from more than 15 U.S. federal agencies. There is no need anymore to query all those resources separately!

• Coverage: approx. 200 million articles and reports
• Links to full text: ✔ (available for some databases)
• Export formats: APA, MLA, RIS, BibTeX (available for some databases)

Semantic Scholar is the new kid on the block. Its mission is to provide more relevant and impactful search results using AI-powered algorithms that find hidden connections and links between research topics.

• Coverage: approx. 40 million articles
• Export formats: APA, MLA, Chicago, BibTeX

Although Baidu Scholar's interface is in Chinese, its index contains research papers in English as well as Chinese.

• Coverage: no detailed statistics available, approx. 100 million articles
• Abstracts: only snippets of the abstract are available
• Export formats: APA, MLA, RIS, BibTeX

RefSeek searches more than one billion documents from academic and organizational websites. Its clean interface makes it especially easy to use for students and new researchers.

• Coverage: no detailed statistics available, approx. 1 billion documents
• Abstracts: only snippets of the article are available
• Export formats: not available

Consider using a reference manager like Paperpile to save, organize, and cite your references. Paperpile integrates with Google Scholar and many popular databases, so you can save references and PDFs directly to your library using the Paperpile buttons:

Google Scholar is an academic search engine, and it is the clear number one when it comes to academic search engines. It's the power of Google searches applied to research papers and patents. It not only let's you find research papers for all academic disciplines for free, but also often provides links to full text PDF file.

Semantic Scholar is a free, AI-powered research tool for scientific literature developed at the Allen Institute for AI. Sematic Scholar was publicly released in 2015 and uses advances in natural language processing to provide summaries for scholarly papers.

BASE , as its name suggest is an academic search engine. It is hosted at Bielefeld University in Germany and that's where it name stems from (Bielefeld Academic Search Engine).

CORE is an academic search engine dedicated to open access research papers. For each search result a link to the full text PDF or full text web page is provided.

Science.gov is a fantastic resource as it bundles and offers free access to search results from more than 15 U.S. federal agencies. There is no need any more to query all those resources separately!

Resources for Dissertation Writing

• Getting Started
• Proposals and Prospectuses
• Literature Reviews
• Humanities and the Arts Resources
• Social/Behavioural Sciences Resources
• Sciences Resources
• Business Resources
• Formatting and Submitting Your Dissertation
• Tips: Making Progress, Staying Well, and More!

UBC Library Research Commons

Getting Started on the Thesis/Dissertation Writing Process

The thesis or dissertation* is the final product of your Master's or PhD research work. It's intended to be a piece of scholarly work that demonstrates your ability to participate in the academic research world: that is, to conduct research based on a particular question, critically analyze the existing literature, present your methodology and results accurately and in detail, link your findings to the broader field, and effectively communicate your research to others (see UBC's Handbook of Graduate Supervision ). A PhD dissertation makes an original contribution to the field in which the research is being conducted; a Master's thesis can make such a contribution, in addition to demonstrating the writer's ability to conduct research, but doesn't have to.

Writing a thesis or dissertation takes time, planning, and a lot of hard work. The resources collected in this guide are intended to make it a little easier to finish!

*Note: thesis tends to be used for Master's degrees, dissertation for PhD degrees. On this site, we may switch back and forth between 'thesis' and 'dissertation'; unless otherwise noted, both types of writing are included.

As of June 30, 2021, UBC Library will no longer offer Thesis Formatting workshops or support. Students are encouraged to explore the many online resources that provide guidance on Thesis Formatting. For templates and FAQs, please visit the Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies website .

G+PS Information

The Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies ( G+PS ) has regulations and guidelines about many aspects of the thesis and dissertation preparation process.

• General requirements for Thesis and Dissertation preparation
• Scope of a Doctoral Dissertation . Includes information on what the purpose of a dissertation is, what skills and knowledge on the part of the student it should demonstrate, and roughly how long it should be.
• Structure of Theses and Dissertations . Includes information on all the sections that are required in a UBC thesis or dissertation.

Note that G+PS regulations for theses and dissertations sometimes change; make sure you're following the most current regulations!

Online Writing Resources

There are many thesis and dissertation writing resources online; find the ones that speak most to you!

• UBC's Graduate Pathways to Success program has a useful guide to "Getting Started with your Thesis or Dissertation" .
• The Thesis Whisperer blog , by Dr. Inger Mewburn at Australian National University. Resources for many areas of the thesis and dissertation writing process. In particular, visit the "On Writing" section of the blog.
• The GradHacker blog , hosted by Inside Higher Education. Resources for many areas of your grad school life, including writing.
• University of North Carolina Writing Center's "Tips and Tools" for writing dissertations. In particular, visit the "Getting Down to Business: Tips for Writing Consistently" section.
• Cornell University's Writing from A to B: A Guide to Completing the Dissertation Phase of Doctoral Studies . While some material is specific to Cornell, a lot of it will apply to any dissertation writer.
• Doctoral Writing SIG . While it's primarily aimed at those who are supporting doctoral researchers, there are lots of insights and tips that can help you as a doctoral researcher yourself.
• The Explorations of Style blog . While this is about academic writing generally, there's a lot of content about graduate writing and about thesis/dissertation writing.
• Writing or Presenting Your Thesis or Dissertation . In particular, tips 17-29.

Books and E-Books in UBC Library to Get You Started

These are a few of the books available in UBC Library to help you with your dissertation writing process. For a wider range of books, please visit our Books on Dissertation Writing pages.

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• Last Updated: Jun 23, 2021 9:58 AM
• URL: https://guides.library.ubc.ca/dissertation

Open Access Theses and Dissertations

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About OATD.org

OATD.org aims to be the best possible resource for finding open access graduate theses and dissertations published around the world. Metadata (information about the theses) comes from over 1100 colleges, universities, and research institutions . OATD currently indexes 7,253,551 theses and dissertations.

About OATD (our FAQ) .

Visual OATD.org

We’re happy to present several data visualizations to give an overall sense of the OATD.org collection by county of publication, language, and field of study.

You may also want to consult these sites to search for other theses:

• Google Scholar
• NDLTD , the Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations. NDLTD provides information and a search engine for electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs), whether they are open access or not.
• Proquest Theses and Dissertations (PQDT), a database of dissertations and theses, whether they were published electronically or in print, and mostly available for purchase. Access to PQDT may be limited; consult your local library for access information.

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Research Process

• Brainstorming
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• Narrowing a Topic
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• Literature Gap and Future Research
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• Finding Seminal Works
• Exhausting the Literature
• Finding Dissertations
• Researching Theoretical Frameworks
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• Organizing Research & Citations This link opens in a new window
• Scholarly Publication
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Library Basic Training: Resources for Doctoral Success

• Library Basic Training: Resources for Doctoral Success Reviews the most important resources for your dissertation research. Learn how to search for scholarly articles and dissertations, place Interlibrary Loan requests, find information about research methodology and design, use Google Scholar, and more.

NU Dissertation Center

If you are looking for a document in the Dissertation Center or Applied Doctoral Center and can't find it please contact your Chair or The Center for Teaching and Learning at [email protected]

• NCU Dissertation Center Find valuable resources and support materials to help you through your doctoral journey.
• Applied Doctoral Center Collection of resources to support students in completing their project/dissertation-in-practice as part of the Applied Doctoral Experience (ADE).

Dissertation Research

Dissertation topics are a special subset of research topics. All of the previously mentioned techniques can, and should, be utilized to locate potential dissertation topics, but there are also some special considerations to keep in mind when choosing a dissertation topic.

Dissertation topics should interesting, feasible, relevant, and worthy. The criterion of feasibility is especially important when choosing a dissertation topic. You don’t want to settle on a topic and then find out that the study you were imagining can’t be done, or the survey or assessment instrument you need can’t be used. You also want to make sure that you select a topic that will allow you to be an objective researcher. If you select a topic that you have worked closely on for many years, make sure you are still open to new information, even if that information runs counter what you believe to be true about the topic. To learn more about feasibility, see the Center for Teaching & Learning's Feasibility Checklist .

It is very important to think about these considerations beforehand so that you don’t get stuck during the dissertation process. Here are some considerations to keep in mind when choosing a dissertation topic:

• Access to the primary literature relating to your topic
• Access to grey literature relating to your topic
• Access to the surveys and assessment instruments that you will need
• Access to the study group to conduct your study
• IRB approval for your study
• Access to equipment for your study, if needed

Note that published surveys and assessment instruments are generally NOT free. Due to copyright laws you will more than likely need to purchase the survey from the publisher in order to gain permissions to use in your own study. Unpublished surveys and assessments (usually found in the appendices of articles) may be freely available, but you will need to contact the author(s) to gain permission to use the survey in your research.

Looking at previously published dissertations is a great way to gauge the level of research and involvement that is generally expected at the dissertation level. Previously published dissertations can also be good sources of inspiration for your own dissertation study. Similar to scholarly articles, many dissertations will suggest areas of future research. Paying attention to those suggestions can provide valuable ideas and clues for your own dissertation topic. Note that dissertations are not considered to be peer-reviewed documents, so carefully review and evaluate the information presented in them.

The literature review section in a dissertation contains a wealth of information. Not only can the literature review provide topic ideas by showing some of the major research that has been done on a topic, but it can also help you evaluate any topics that you are tentatively considering. From your examination of literature reviews can you determine if your research idea has already been completed? Has the theory that validates your study been disproved by new dissertation research? Is your research idea still relevant to the current state of the discipline? Literature reviews can help you answer these questions by providing a compact and summative description of a particular research area.

You may find it difficult to find scholarly articles, and books in which your hypothesis is directly addressed. If so, then expand your search to theories and variables that are related, but not directly so. No matter how specific or elusive your topic is, there is research out there that is relevant, so keep looking. Look for resources that address one or two of the variables in your study, theories that are either directly or indirectly related, as well as research that relates specifically to the population of interest. By focusing on resources that address different parts of your research topic, you can combine this information in a way that is directly applicable.

The sub-pages in this section provide resources for your Dissertation Research.

Dissertation Research FAQs

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EBSCO Open Dissertations

EBSCO Open Dissertations makes electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs) more accessible to researchers worldwide. The free portal is designed to benefit universities and their students and make ETDs more discoverable. 

Increasing Discovery & Usage of ETD Research

EBSCO Open Dissertations is a collaboration between EBSCO and BiblioLabs to increase traffic and discoverability of ETD research. You can join the movement and add your theses and dissertations to the database, making them freely available to researchers everywhere while increasing traffic to your institutional repository. 

EBSCO Open Dissertations extends the work started in 2014, when EBSCO and the H.W. Wilson Foundation created American Doctoral Dissertations which contained indexing from the H.W. Wilson print publication, Doctoral Dissertations Accepted by American Universities, 1933-1955. In 2015, the H.W. Wilson Foundation agreed to support the expansion of the scope of the American Doctoral Dissertations database to include records for dissertations and theses from 1955 to the present.

How Does EBSCO Open Dissertations Work?

Your ETD metadata is harvested via OAI and integrated into EBSCO’s platform, where pointers send traffic to your IR.

EBSCO integrates this data into their current subscriber environments and makes the data available on the open web via opendissertations.org .

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Dissertation Strategies

What this handout is about.

This handout suggests strategies for developing healthy writing habits during your dissertation journey. These habits can help you maintain your writing momentum, overcome anxiety and procrastination, and foster wellbeing during one of the most challenging times in graduate school.

Tackling a giant project

Because dissertations are, of course, big projects, it’s no surprise that planning, writing, and revising one can pose some challenges! It can help to think of your dissertation as an expanded version of a long essay: at the end of the day, it is simply another piece of writing. You’ve written your way this far into your degree, so you’ve got the skills! You’ll develop a great deal of expertise on your topic, but you may still be a novice with this genre and writing at this length. Remember to give yourself some grace throughout the project. As you begin, it’s helpful to consider two overarching strategies throughout the process.

First, take stock of how you learn and your own writing processes. What strategies have worked and have not worked for you? Why? What kind of learner and writer are you? Capitalize on what’s working and experiment with new strategies when something’s not working. Keep in mind that trying out new strategies can take some trial-and-error, and it’s okay if a new strategy that you try doesn’t work for you. Consider why it may not have been the best for you, and use that reflection to consider other strategies that might be helpful to you.

Second, break the project into manageable chunks. At every stage of the process, try to identify specific tasks, set small, feasible goals, and have clear, concrete strategies for achieving each goal. Small victories can help you establish and maintain the momentum you need to keep yourself going.

Below, we discuss some possible strategies to keep you moving forward in the dissertation process.

Pre-dissertation planning strategies

Get familiar with the Graduate School’s Thesis and Dissertation Resources .

Create a template that’s properly formatted. The Grad School offers workshops on formatting in Word for PC and formatting in Word for Mac . There are online templates for LaTeX users, but if you use a template, save your work where you can recover it if the template has corrruption issues.

Learn how to use a citation-manager and a synthesis matrix to keep track of all of your source information.

Skim other dissertations from your department, program, and advisor. Enlist the help of a librarian or ask your advisor for a list of recent graduates whose work you can look up. Seeing what other people have done to earn their PhD can make the project much less abstract and daunting. A concrete sense of expectations will help you envision and plan. When you know what you’ll be doing, try to find a dissertation from your department that is similar enough that you can use it as a reference model when you run into concerns about formatting, structure, level of detail, etc.

Think carefully about your committee . Ideally, you’ll be able to select a group of people who work well with you and with each other. Consult with your advisor about who might be good collaborators for your project and who might not be the best fit. Consider what classes you’ve taken and how you “vibe” with those professors or those you’ve met outside of class. Try to learn what you can about how they’ve worked with other students. Ask about feedback style, turnaround time, level of involvement, etc., and imagine how that would work for you.

Sketch out a sensible drafting order for your project. Be open to writing chapters in “the wrong order” if it makes sense to start somewhere other than the beginning. You could begin with the section that seems easiest for you to write to gain momentum.

Design a productivity alliance with your advisor . Talk with them about potential projects and a reasonable timeline. Discuss how you’ll work together to keep your work moving forward. You might discuss having a standing meeting to discuss ideas or drafts or issues (bi-weekly? monthly?), your advisor’s preferences for drafts (rough? polished?), your preferences for what you’d like feedback on (early or late drafts?), reasonable turnaround time for feedback (a week? two?), and anything else you can think of to enter the collaboration mindfully.

Design a productivity alliance with your colleagues . Dissertation writing can be lonely, but writing with friends, meeting for updates over your beverage of choice, and scheduling non-working social times can help you maintain healthy energy. See our tips on accountability strategies for ideas to support each other.

Productivity strategies

Write when you’re most productive. When do you have the most energy? Focus? Creativity? When are you most able to concentrate, either because of your body rhythms or because there are fewer demands on your time? Once you determine the hours that are most productive for you (you may need to experiment at first), try to schedule those hours for dissertation work. See the collection of time management tools and planning calendars on the Learning Center’s Tips & Tools page to help you think through the possibilities. If at all possible, plan your work schedule, errands and chores so that you reserve your productive hours for the dissertation.

Put your writing time firmly on your calendar . Guard your writing time diligently. You’ll probably be invited to do other things during your productive writing times, but do your absolute best to say no and to offer alternatives. No one would hold it against you if you said no because you’re teaching a class at that time—and you wouldn’t feel guilty about saying no. Cultivating the same hard, guilt-free boundaries around your writing time will allow you preserve the time you need to get this thing done!

Develop habits that foster balance . You’ll have to work very hard to get this dissertation finished, but you can do that without sacrificing your physical, mental, and emotional wellbeing. Think about how you can structure your work hours most efficiently so that you have time for a healthy non-work life. It can be something as small as limiting the time you spend chatting with fellow students to a few minutes instead of treating the office or lab as a space for extensive socializing. Also see above for protecting your time.

Write in spaces where you can be productive. Figure out where you work well and plan to be there during your dissertation work hours. Do you get more done on campus or at home? Do you prefer quiet and solitude, like in a library carrel? Do you prefer the buzz of background noise, like in a coffee shop? Are you aware of the UNC Libraries’ list of places to study ? If you get “stuck,” don’t be afraid to try a change of scenery. The variety may be just enough to get your brain going again.

Work where you feel comfortable . Wherever you work, make sure you have whatever lighting, furniture, and accessories you need to keep your posture and health in good order. The University Health and Safety office offers guidelines for healthy computer work . You’re more likely to spend time working in a space that doesn’t physically hurt you. Also consider how you could make your work space as inviting as possible. Some people find that it helps to have pictures of family and friends on their desk—sort of a silent “cheering section.” Some people work well with neutral colors around them, and others prefer bright colors that perk up the space. Some people like to put inspirational quotations in their workspace or encouraging notes from friends and family. You might try reconfiguring your work space to find a décor that helps you be productive.

Elicit helpful feedback from various people at various stages . You might be tempted to keep your writing to yourself until you think it’s brilliant, but you can lower the stakes tremendously if you make eliciting feedback a regular part of your writing process. Your friends can feel like a safer audience for ideas or drafts in their early stages. Someone outside your department may provide interesting perspectives from their discipline that spark your own thinking. See this handout on getting feedback for productive moments for feedback, the value of different kinds of feedback providers, and strategies for eliciting what’s most helpful to you. Make this a recurring part of your writing process. Schedule it to help you hit deadlines.

Change the writing task . When you don’t feel like writing, you can do something different or you can do something differently. Make a list of all the little things you need to do for a given section of the dissertation, no matter how small. Choose a task based on your energy level. Work on Grad School requirements: reformat margins, work on bibliography, and all that. Work on your acknowledgements. Remember all the people who have helped you and the great ideas they’ve helped you develop. You may feel more like working afterward. Write a part of your dissertation as a letter or email to a good friend who would care. Sometimes setting aside the academic prose and just writing it to a buddy can be liberating and help you get the ideas out there. You can make it sound smart later. Free-write about why you’re stuck, and perhaps even about how sick and tired you are of your dissertation/advisor/committee/etc. Venting can sometimes get you past the emotions of writer’s block and move you toward creative solutions. Open a separate document and write your thoughts on various things you’ve read. These may or may note be coherent, connected ideas, and they may or may not make it into your dissertation. They’re just notes that allow you to think things through and/or note what you want to revisit later, so it’s perfectly fine to have mistakes, weird organization, etc. Just let your mind wander on paper.

Develop habits that foster productivity and may help you develop a productive writing model for post-dissertation writing . Since dissertations are very long projects, cultivating habits that will help support your work is important. You might check out Helen Sword’s work on behavioral, artisanal, social, and emotional habits to help you get a sense of where you are in your current habits. You might try developing “rituals” of work that could help you get more done. Lighting incense, brewing a pot of a particular kind of tea, pulling out a favorite pen, and other ritualistic behaviors can signal your brain that “it is time to get down to business.” You can critically think about your work methods—not only about what you like to do, but also what actually helps you be productive. You may LOVE to listen to your favorite band while you write, for example, but if you wind up playing air guitar half the time instead of writing, it isn’t a habit worth keeping.

The point is, figure out what works for you and try to do it consistently. Your productive habits will reinforce themselves over time. If you find yourself in a situation, however, that doesn’t match your preferences, don’t let it stop you from working on your dissertation. Try to be flexible and open to experimenting. You might find some new favorites!

Motivational strategies

Schedule a regular activity with other people that involves your dissertation. Set up a coworking date with your accountability buddies so you can sit and write together. Organize a chapter swap. Make regular appointments with your advisor. Whatever you do, make sure it’s something that you’ll feel good about showing up for–and will make you feel good about showing up for others.

Try writing in sprints . Many writers have discovered that the “Pomodoro technique” (writing for 25 minutes and taking a 5 minute break) boosts their productivity by helping them set small writing goals, focus intently for short periods, and give their brains frequent rests. See how one dissertation writer describes it in this blog post on the Pomodoro technique .

Quit while you’re ahead . Sometimes it helps to stop for the day when you’re on a roll. If you’ve got a great idea that you’re developing and you know where you want to go next, write “Next, I want to introduce x, y, and z and explain how they’re related—they all have the same characteristics of 1 and 2, and that clinches my theory of Q.” Then save the file and turn off the computer, or put down the notepad. When you come back tomorrow, you will already know what to say next–and all that will be left is to say it. Hopefully, the momentum will carry you forward.

Write your dissertation in single-space . When you need a boost, double space it and be impressed with how many pages you’ve written.

Set feasible goals–and celebrate the achievements! Setting and achieving smaller, more reasonable goals ( SMART goals ) gives you success, and that success can motivate you to focus on the next small step…and the next one.

Give yourself rewards along the way . When you meet a writing goal, reward yourself with something you normally wouldn’t have or do–this can be anything that will make you feel good about your accomplishment.

Make the act of writing be its own reward . For example, if you love a particular coffee drink from your favorite shop, save it as a special drink to enjoy during your writing time.

Try giving yourself “pre-wards” —positive experiences that help you feel refreshed and recharged for the next time you write. You don’t have to “earn” these with prior work, but you do have to commit to doing the work afterward.

Commit to doing something you don’t want to do if you don’t achieve your goal. Some people find themselves motivated to work harder when there’s a negative incentive. What would you most like to avoid? Watching a movie you hate? Donating to a cause you don’t support? Whatever it is, how can you ensure enforcement? Who can help you stay accountable?

Affective strategies

Build your confidence . It is not uncommon to feel “imposter phenomenon” during the course of writing your dissertation. If you start to feel this way, it can help to take a few minutes to remember every success you’ve had along the way. You’ve earned your place, and people have confidence in you for good reasons. It’s also helpful to remember that every one of the brilliant people around you is experiencing the same lack of confidence because you’re all in a new context with new tasks and new expectations. You’re not supposed to have it all figured out. You’re supposed to have uncertainties and questions and things to learn. Remember that they wouldn’t have accepted you to the program if they weren’t confident that you’d succeed. See our self-scripting handout for strategies to turn these affirmations into a self-script that you repeat whenever you’re experiencing doubts or other negative thoughts. You can do it!

Appreciate your successes . Not meeting a goal isn’t a failure–and it certainly doesn’t make you a failure. It’s an opportunity to figure out why you didn’t meet the goal. It might simply be that the goal wasn’t achievable in the first place. See the SMART goal handout and think through what you can adjust. Even if you meant to write 1500 words, focus on the success of writing 250 or 500 words that you didn’t have before.

Remember your “why.” There are a whole host of reasons why someone might decide to pursue a PhD, both personally and professionally. Reflecting on what is motivating to you can rekindle your sense of purpose and direction.

Get outside support . Sometimes it can be really helpful to get an outside perspective on your work and anxieties as a way of grounding yourself. Participating in groups like the Dissertation Support group through CAPS and the Dissertation Boot Camp can help you see that you’re not alone in the challenges. You might also choose to form your own writing support group with colleagues inside or outside your department.

Understand and manage your procrastination . When you’re writing a long dissertation, it can be easy to procrastinate! For instance, you might put off writing because the house “isn’t clean enough” or because you’re not in the right “space” (mentally or physically) to write, so you put off writing until the house is cleaned and everything is in its right place. You may have other ways of procrastinating. It can be helpful to be self-aware of when you’re procrastinating and to consider why you are procrastinating. It may be that you’re anxious about writing the perfect draft, for example, in which case you might consider: how can I focus on writing something that just makes progress as opposed to being “perfect”? There are lots of different ways of managing procrastination; one way is to make a schedule of all the things you already have to do (when you absolutely can’t write) to help you visualize those chunks of time when you can. See this handout on procrastination for more strategies and tools for managing procrastination.

Your topic, your advisor, and your committee: Making them work for you

By the time you’ve reached this stage, you have probably already defended a dissertation proposal, chosen an advisor, and begun working with a committee. Sometimes, however, those three elements can prove to be major external sources of frustration. So how can you manage them to help yourself be as productive as possible?

Managing your topic

Remember that your topic is not carved in stone . The research and writing plan suggested in your dissertation proposal was your best vision of the project at that time, but topics evolve as the research and writing progress. You might need to tweak your research question a bit to reduce or adjust the scope, you might pare down certain parts of the project or add others. You can discuss your thoughts on these adjustments with your advisor at your check ins.

Think about variables that could be cut down and how changes would affect the length, depth, breadth, and scholarly value of your study. Could you cut one or two experiments, case studies, regions, years, theorists, or chapters and still make a valuable contribution or, even more simply, just finish?

Talk to your advisor about any changes you might make . They may be quite sympathetic to your desire to shorten an unwieldy project and may offer suggestions.

Look at other dissertations from your department to get a sense of what the chapters should look like. Reverse-outline a few chapters so you can see if there’s a pattern of typical components and how information is sequenced. These can serve as models for your own dissertation. See this video on reverse outlining to see the technique.

Managing your advisor

Embrace your evolving status . At this stage in your graduate career, you should expect to assume some independence. By the time you finish your project, you will know more about your subject than your committee does. The student/teacher relationship you have with your advisor will necessarily change as you take this big step toward becoming their colleague.

Revisit the alliance . If the interaction with your advisor isn’t matching the original agreement or the original plan isn’t working as well as it could, schedule a conversation to revisit and redesign your working relationship in a way that could work for both of you.

Be specific in your feedback requests . Tell your advisor what kind of feedback would be most helpful to you. Sometimes an advisor can be giving unhelpful or discouraging feedback without realizing it. They might make extensive sentence-level edits when you really need conceptual feedback, or vice-versa, if you only ask generally for feedback. Letting your advisor know, very specifically, what kinds of responses will be helpful to you at different stages of the writing process can help your advisor know how to help you.

Don’t hide . Advisors can be most helpful if they know what you are working on, what problems you are experiencing, and what progress you have made. If you haven’t made the progress you were hoping for, it only makes it worse if you avoid talking to them. You rob yourself of their expertise and support, and you might start a spiral of guilt, shame, and avoidance. Even if it’s difficult, it may be better to be candid about your struggles.

Talk to other students who have the same advisor . You may find that they have developed strategies for working with your advisor that could help you communicate more effectively with them.

If you have recurring problems communicating with your advisor , you can make a change. You could change advisors completely, but a less dramatic option might be to find another committee member who might be willing to serve as a “secondary advisor” and give you the kinds of feedback and support that you may need.

Managing your committee

Design the alliance . Talk with your committee members about how much they’d like to be involved in your writing process, whether they’d like to see chapter drafts or the complete draft, how frequently they’d like to meet (or not), etc. Your advisor can guide you on how committees usually work, but think carefully about how you’d like the relationship to function too.

Keep in regular contact with your committee , even if they don’t want to see your work until it has been approved by your advisor. Let them know about fellowships you receive, fruitful research excursions, the directions your thinking is taking, and the plans you have for completion. In short, keep them aware that you are working hard and making progress. Also, look for other ways to get facetime with your committee even if it’s not a one-on-one meeting. Things like speaking with them at department events, going to colloquiums or other events they organize and/or attend regularly can help you develop a relationship that could lead to other introductions and collaborations as your career progresses.

Share your struggles . Too often, we only talk to our professors when we’re making progress and hide from them the rest of the time. If you share your frustrations or setbacks with a knowledgeable committee member, they might offer some very helpful suggestions for overcoming the obstacles you face—after all, your committee members have all written major research projects before, and they have probably solved similar problems in their own work.

Stay true to yourself . Sometimes, you just don’t entirely gel with your committee, but that’s okay. It’s important not to get too hung up on how your committee does (or doesn’t) relate to you. Keep your eye on the finish line and keep moving forward.

Helpful websites:

Graduate School Diversity Initiatives : Groups and events to support the success of students identifying with an affinity group.

Graduate School Career Well : Extensive professional development resources related to writing, research, networking, job search, etc.

CAPS Therapy Groups : CAPS offers a variety of support groups, including a dissertation support group.

Advice on Research and Writing : Lots of links on writing, public speaking, dissertation management, burnout, and more.

How to be a Good Graduate Student: Marie DesJardins’ essay talks about several phases of the graduate experience, including the dissertation. She discusses some helpful hints for staying motivated and doing consistent work.

Preparing Future Faculty : This page, a joint project of the American Association of Colleges and Universities, the Council of Graduate Schools, and the Pew Charitable Trusts, explains the Preparing Future Faculty Programs and includes links and suggestions that may help graduate students and their advisors think constructively about the process of graduate education as a step toward faculty responsibilities.

Dissertation Tips : Kjell Erik Rudestam, Ph.D. and Rae Newton, Ph.D., authors of Surviving Your Dissertation: A Comprehensive Guide to Content and Process.

The ABD Survival Guide Newsletter : Information about the ABD Survival Guide newsletter (which is free) and other services from E-Coach (many of which are not free).

You may reproduce it for non-commercial use if you use the entire handout and attribute the source: The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

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• UCL Special Collections UCL Library Special Collections is one of the foremost university collections of manuscripts, archives and rare books in the UK. There are also archives located at several of our specialist libraries, while documents concerning UCL’s history are also held by the Records Office.
• Special Collections Primary Sources Our Special Collections team have compiled an online reading list of Special Collections Primary Sources to support dissertations and research projects.

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May 15, 2024

Tips and Resources for a Successful Summer of Dissertation Writing

By Yana Zlochistaya

Summer can be a strange time for graduate students. Gone are the seminars and workshops, the student clubs, and the working group, that structured the semester and provided us with a sense of community. Instead, we’re faced with a three-month expanse of time that can feel equal parts liberating and intimidating. This double-edged freedom is only exacerbated for those of us in the writing stage of our dissertation, when isolation and a lack of discipline can have a particularly big impact. For those hoping not to enter another summer with lofty plans, only to blink and find ourselves in August disappointed with our progress, we’ve compiled some tips and resources that can help.

According to Graduate Writing Center Director Sabrina Soracco, the most important thing you can do to set yourself up for writing success is to clarify your goals. She recommends starting this process by looking at departmental requirements for a completed dissertation. Consider when you would like to file and work backwards from that point, determining what you have to get done in order to hit that target. Next, check in with your dissertation committee members to set up an accountability structure. Would they prefer an end-of-summer update to the whole committee? A monthly check-in with your chair or one of your readers? Setting up explicit expectations that work for you and your committee can cut through the aimlessness that comes with a major writing project.

For those early on in their dissertation-writing process, a committee meeting is also a valuable opportunity to set parameters. “One of the problems with the excitement for the discipline that happens post-quals is that it results in too many ideas,” says Director Soracco. Your committee members should give you input on productive research directions so that you can begin to hone in on your project. It is also important to remember that your dissertation does not have to be the end-all-and-be-all of your academic research. Ideas that do not fit into its scope can end up becoming conference papers or even book chapters.

Once you have a clear goal that you have discussed with your committee, the hard part begins: you have to actually write. The Graduate Writing Center offers several resources to make that process easier:

• The Graduate Writing Community. This is a totally remote, two-month program that is based on a model of “gentle accountability.” When you sign up, you are added to a bCourses site moderated by a Graduate Writing Consultant. At the beginning of the week, everyone sets their goals in a discussion post, and by the end of the week, everyone checks in with progress updates. During the week, the writing consultants offer nine hours of remote synchronous writing sessions. As a writing community member, you can attend whichever sessions work best for your schedule. All that’s required is that you show up, set a goal for that hour, and work towards that goal for the length of two 25-minute Pomodoro sessions . This year’s summer writing community will begin in June. Keep your eye on your email for the registration link!
• Writing Consultations : As a graduate student, you can sign up for an individual meeting with a Graduate Writing Consultant. They can give you feedback on your work, help you figure out the structure of a chapter, or just talk through how to get started on a writing project. 
• Independent Writing Groups: If you would prefer to write with specific friends or colleagues, you can contact Graduate Writing Center Director Sabrina Soracco at [email protected] so that she can help you set up your own writing group. The structure and length of these groups can differ; often, members will send each other one to five pages of writing weekly and meet the next day for two hours to provide feedback and get advice. Sometimes, groups will meet up not only to share writing, but to work in a common space before coming together to debrief. Regardless of what the groups look like, the important thing is to create a guilt-free space. Some weeks, you might submit an outline; other weeks, it might be the roughest of rough drafts; sometimes, you might come to a session without having submitted anything. As long as we continue to make progress (and show up even when we don’t), we’re doing what we need to. As Director Soracco puts it, “it often takes slogging through a lot of stuff to get to that great epiphany.”

Yana Zlochistaya is a fifth-year graduate student in the Department of Comparative Literature and a Professional Development Liaison with the Graduate Division. She previously served as a co-director for Beyond Academia.

UT Electronic Theses and Dissertations

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This collection contains University of Texas at Austin electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs). The collection includes ETDs primarily from 2001 to the present. Some pre-2001 theses and dissertations have been digitized and added to this collection, but those are uncommon. The library catalog is the most comprehensive list of UT Austin theses and dissertations.

Since 2010, the Office of Graduate Studies at UT Austin has required all theses and dissertations to be made publicly available in Texas ScholarWorks; however, authors are able to request an embargo of up to seven years. Embargoed ETDs will not show up in this collection. Most of the ETDs in this collection are freely accessible to all users, but some pre-2010 works require a current UT EID at point of use. Please see the FAQs for more information. If you have a question about the availability of a specific ETD, please contact [email protected].

Some items in this collection may contain offensive images or text. The University of Texas Libraries is committed to maintaining an accurate and authentic scholarly and historic record. An authentic record is essential for understanding our past and informing the present. In order to preserve the authenticity of the historical record we will not honor requests to redact content, correct errors, or otherwise remove content, except in cases where there are legal concerns (e.g. potential copyright infringement, inclusion of HIPAA/FERPA protected information or Social Security Numbers) or evidence of a clear and imminent threat to personal safety or well-being.

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Teen walks at graduation after completing doctoral degree at 17

Dorothy Jean Tillman II was 10 when she entered college as a freshman.

A teenager from Chicago walked in her graduation ceremony this month after earning her doctoral degree at 17.

Dorothy Jean Tillman II told " Good Morning America " that she was homeschooled in her early years before entering college at age 10.

In 2020, she said she earned a Master of Science degree, and then, one year later, at age 15, was accepted into the Doctorate of Behavioral Health Management program at Arizona State University.

In December 2023, at 17, Tillman successfully defended her dissertation to earn her doctoral degree in integrated behavioral health from ASU's College of Health Solutions.

On May 6, she walked at ASU's spring commencement ceremony.

Tillman told "GMA" she has always held education in such high regard in part due to her family's background.

"People in my life like my grandmother, who was part of the Civil Rights movement, she of course harped on the importance of education and consistently learning something always," Tillman said. "But the way I always held education so high on my own, aside from being raised that way, was finding different things to be educated about."

She continued, "I feel like that urge to learn something new just never didn't exist for me."

Teen who battled leukemia and homelessness as a child graduates college at 18

Dr. Lesley Manson, a clinical associate professor at ASU, told "GMA" that Tillman is the youngest person in school history to earn a doctoral degree in integrated behavioral health.

Manson said she oversaw Tillman's dissertation for the doctoral program offered through ASU Online.

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During her studies, Tillman wrote a journal article of her dissertation and completed an internship at a university student health center, according to Manson.

"She really led change and worked on different forms of management to really reduce healthcare stigma and improve that student population there to be able to enter and accept student health services," she said of Tillman. "It was wonderful to see her and help her navigate some of those personal and professional interactions and grow through those experiences."

Manson described Tillman as an "inquisitive" and "innovative" student, and emphasized just how rare it is to accomplish what she has so far.

"It's a wonderful celebration ... but this is still something so rare and unique," she said. "She has innovative ideas and motivation, which is wonderful, and truly, I think what is inspiring is that she embodies that meaning of being a true leader."

Manson said she hopes Tillman continues to inspire people with her love of learning, saying, "That curiosity is always there, and I think all learners come with that, but it's great to be able to see it in someone so young as well."

Her inspiration and how she gives back to community

Tillman said her own journey wouldn't be possible without the support of her mom, who she said is one of her biggest motivators.

"Seeing my mother consistently work so hard to continuously uphold our family's legacy, and be that person that everyone was able to go to, if they needed anything ... always seeing [her] like [a] 'wonder woman' definitely made me want to grow up [into] an accomplished person," she said.

An advocate for education, Tillman is also the founder and CEO of a leadership institute that emphasizes the arts and STEM.

"I feel like adding art and putting a focus on it throughout science, technology, engineering and math makes the kids excited to learn all those things," she said. "And it opens them up to all of the possibilities and all the knowledge provided in that area of just STEM."

'Super dad' graduates with master's while working 3 jobs

As for her plans after graduation, Tillman said she is "just like any other teenager, still figuring out what my specific dreams and goals are."

"I'm really just grateful that the world is my oyster, and that I've done so much so young," she said. "And I have time to kind of think that through."

Tillman added that she hopes young people will take away from her story that it's OK to continually figure out what you want to do in life.

"Always remember that everyone has points in their life where they feel like they're figuring it out," she said. "And so figuring things out, not knowing what you want isn't a bad thing. But making the choice not to sit down and try to figure it out is."

Editor's note: This story has been updated with additional quotes from Tillman since its original publish date of May 13, 2024.

How to escape from a car sinking in water

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There are many options for what to drink , but water is the best choice for most people who have access to safe drinking water. It is calorie-free and as easy to find as the nearest tap.

Water helps to restore fluids lost through metabolism, breathing, sweating, and the removal of waste. It helps to keep you from overheating, lubricates the joints and tissues, maintains healthy skin, and is necessary for proper digestion. It’s the perfect zero-calorie beverage for quenching thirst and rehydrating your body.

How Much Water Do I Need?

Water is an essential nutrient at every age, so optimal hydration is a key component for good health. Water accounts for about 60% of an adult’s body weight. We drink fluids when we feel thirst, the major signal alerting us when our body runs low on water. We also customarily drink beverages with meals to help with digestion. But sometimes we drink not based on these factors but on how much we think we should be drinking. One of the most familiar sayings is to aim for “8 glasses a day,” but this may not be appropriate for every person.

General recommendations

• The National Academy of Medicine suggests an adequate intake of daily fluids of about 13 cups and 9 cups for healthy men and women, respectively, with 1 cup equaling 8 ounces. [1] Higher amounts may be needed for those who are physically active or exposed to very warm climates. Lower amounts may be needed for those with smaller body sizes. It’s important to note that this amount is not a daily target, but a general guide. In the average person, drinking less will not necessarily compromise one’s health as each person’s exact fluid needs vary, even day-to-day.
• Fever, exercise, exposure to extreme temperature climates (very hot or cold), and excessive loss of body fluids (such as with vomiting or diarrhea) will increase fluid needs.
• The amount and color of urine can provide a rough estimate of adequate hydration. Generally the color of urine darkens the more concentrated it is (meaning that it contains less water). However, foods, medications, and vitamin supplements can also change urine color. [1] Smaller volumes of urine may indicate dehydration, especially if also darker in color.
• Alcohol can suppress anti-diuretic hormone, a fluid-regulating hormone that signals the kidneys to reduce urination and reabsorb water back into the body. Without it, the body flushes out water more easily. Enjoying more than a couple of drinks within a short time can increase the risk of dehydration, especially if taken on an empty stomach. To prevent this, take alcohol with food and sips of water.
• Although caffeine has long been thought to have a diuretic effect, potentially leading to dehydration, research does not fully support this. The data suggest that more than 180 mg of caffeine daily (about two cups of brewed coffee) may increase urination in the short-term in some people, but will not necessarily lead to dehydration. Therefore, caffeinated beverages including coffee and tea can contribute to total daily water intake. [1]

Keep in mind that about 20% of our total water intake comes not from beverages but from water-rich foods like lettuce, leafy greens, cucumbers, bell peppers, summer squash, celery, berries, and melons.

Aside from including water-rich foods, the following chart is a guide for daily water intake based on age group from the National Academy of Medicine:

Preventing Dehydration: Is Thirst Enough?

As we age, however, the body’s regulation of fluid intake and thirst decline. Research has shown that both of these factors are impaired in the elderly. A Cochrane review found that commonly used indicators of dehydration in older adults (e.g., urine color and volume, feeling thirsty) are not effective and should not be solely used. [3] Certain conditions that impair mental ability and cognition, such as a stroke or dementia, can also impair thirst. People may also voluntarily limit drinking due to incontinence or difficulty getting to a bathroom. In addition to these situations, research has found that athletes, people who are ill, and infants may not have an adequate sense of thirst to replete their fluid needs. [2] Even mild dehydration may produce negative symptoms, so people who cannot rely on thirst or other usual measures may wish to use other strategies. For example, aim to fill a 20-ounce water bottle four times daily and sip throughout the day, or drink a large glass of water with each meal and snack.

Symptoms of dehydration that may occur with as little as a 2% water deficit:

• Confusion or short-term memory loss
• Mood changes like increased irritability or depression

Dehydration can increase the risk of certain medical conditions:

• Urinary tract infections
• Kidney stones
• Constipation  

Like most trends of the moment, alkaline water has become popular through celebrity backing with claims ranging from weight loss to curing cancer. The theory behind alkaline water is the same as that touting the benefits of eating alkaline foods, which purportedly counterbalances the health detriments caused by eating acid-producing foods like meat, sugar, and some grains.

From a scale of 0-14, a higher pH number is alkaline; a lower pH is acidic. The body tightly regulates blood pH levels to about 7.4 because veering away from this number to either extreme can cause negative side effects and even be life-threatening. However, diet alone cannot cause these extremes; they most commonly occur with conditions like uncontrolled diabetes, kidney disease, chronic lung disease, or alcohol abuse.

Alkaline water has a higher pH of about 8-9 than tap water of about 7, due to a higher mineral or salt content. Some water sources can be naturally alkaline if the water picks up minerals as it passes over rocks. However, most commercial brands of alkaline water have been manufactured using an ionizer that reportedly separates out the alkaline components and filters out the acid components, raising the pH. Some people add an alkaline substance like baking soda to regular water.

Scientific evidence is not conclusive on the acid-alkaline theory, also called the acid-ash theory, stating that eating a high amount of certain foods can slightly lower the pH of blood especially in the absence of eating foods supporting a higher alkaline blood pH like fruits, vegetables, and legumes. Controlled clinical trials have not shown that diet alone can significantly change the blood pH of healthy people. Moreover, a direct connection of blood pH in the low-normal range and chronic disease in humans has not been established.

BOTTOM LINE: If the idea of alkaline water encourages you to drink more, then go for it! But it’s likely that drinking plain regular water will provide similar health benefits from simply being well-hydrated—improved energy, mood, and digestive health

Is It Possible To Drink Too Much Water?

There is no Tolerable Upper Intake Level for water because the body can usually excrete extra water through urine or sweat. However, a condition called water toxicity is possible in rare cases, in which a large amount of fluids is taken in a short amount of time, which is faster than the kidney’s ability to excrete it. This leads to a dangerous condition called hyponatremia in which blood levels of sodium fall too low as too much water is taken. The excess total body water dilutes blood sodium levels, which can cause symptoms like confusion, nausea, seizures, and muscle spasms. Hyponatremia is usually only seen in ill people whose kidneys are not functioning properly or under conditions of extreme heat stress or prolonged strenuous exercise where the body cannot excrete the extra water. Very physically active people such as triathletes and marathon runners are at risk for this condition as they tend to drink large amounts of water, while simultaneously losing sodium through their sweat. Women and children are also more susceptible to hyponatremia because of their smaller body size.

Fun Flavors For Water  

Infused water

Instead of purchasing expensive flavored waters in the grocery store, you can easily make your own at home. Try adding any of the following to a cold glass or pitcher of water:

• Sliced citrus fruits or zest (lemon, lime, orange, grapefruit)
• Crushed fresh mint
• Peeled, sliced fresh ginger or sliced cucumber
• Crushed berries

Sparkling water with a splash of juice

Sparkling juices may have as many calories as sugary soda. Instead, make your own sparkling juice at home with 12 ounces of sparkling water and just an ounce or two of juice. For additional flavor, add sliced citrus or fresh herbs like mint.

TIP: To reduce waste, reconsider relying on single-use plastic water bottles and purchase a colorful 20-32 ounce refillable water thermos that is easy to wash and tote with you during the day. 

Are seltzers and other fizzy waters safe and healthy to drink?

BOTTOM LINE: Carbonated waters, if unsweetened, are safe to drink and a good beverage choice. They are not associated with health problems that are linked with sweetened, carbonated beverages like soda.

• Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health is a member of the Nutrition and Obesity Policy Research and Evaluation Network’s (NOPREN) Drinking Water Working Group. A collaborative network of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the NOPREN Drinking Water Working Group focuses on policies and economic issues regarding free and safe drinking water access in various settings by conducting research and evaluation to help identify, develop and implement drinking-water-related policies, programs, and practices. Visit the network’s website to access recent water research and evidence-based resources.
• The Harvard Prevention Research Center on Nutrition and Physical Activity provides tools and resources for making clean, cold, free water more accessible in environments like schools and afterschool programs, as well as tips for making water more tasty and fun for kids.
• The National Academy of Sciences. Dietary References Intakes for Water, Potassium, Sodium, Chloride, and Sulfate. https://www.nap.edu/read/10925/chapter/6#102 Accessed 8/5/2019.
• Millard-Stafford M, Wendland DM, O’Dea NK, Norman TL. Thirst and hydration status in everyday life. Nutr Rev . 2012 Nov;70 Suppl 2:S147-51.
• Hooper L, Abdelhamid A, Attreed NJ, Campbell WW, Channell AM, et al. Clinical symptoms, signs and tests for identification of impending and current water-loss dehydration in older people. Cochrane Database Syst Rev . 2015 Apr 30;(4):CD009647.

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May 21, 2024

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New thesis shows Lynch syndrome should be seen as a common condition

by Karolinska Institutet

Sophie Walton Bernstedt from the Gastroenterology and Rheumatology Unit at the Department of Medicine, Huddinge (MedH), is defending her thesis "Risk factors for colorectal cancer and the impact on life in Lynch syndrome," on 24 May, 2024. The main supervisor is Ann-Sofie Backman (MedH).

"We have investigated various risk factors associated with the development of colorectal cancer in Lynch syndrome and what it is like for these patients to live with a greatly increased cancer risk," says Walton Bernstedt.

"There is likely still a large number of patients yet to be identified with Lynch syndrome. It is necessary to identify these patients in time in order to prevent and detect early stage cancer by preventive procedures.

"By implementing routines in follow-up services for this group of patients it is possible to create optimal conditions for early detection. These routines include bowel preparation , but also the quality of the procedure, adaptation to genetic risk but also accommodating psychosocial needs among patients.

"Lynch syndrome no longer should be considered a rare condition. By increasing the knowledge of hereditary cancer in the public we hope to increase the efficiency of cancer preventive measures ."

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Professorship for Open-Source Software

Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nürnberg

Final Thesis: Integrating Open Data License Information into Data Pipelines

Abstract: Today a lot of open data is available on the internet. To utilize this information to its full potential, it is often necessary to combine multiple datasets into new datasets. An important part of this is understanding and following the requirements of the licenses attached to them. This thesis presents a solution that can be used to integrate open data license information into a data pipeline. Following design science, we construct a framework, that can be used to model and compare open data licenses. To achieve this, existing frameworks and solutions are compared and analyzed to find a solution fitting to open data licenses. The framework includes the functionality to check two licenses for compatibility, aggregate them into a composite license and give recommendations in case the composite license matches an existing license. The thesis also includes an implementation of the framework in the form of an extensible library and a demonstration, based on a website-prototype, on how the framework can be utilized to generate reports about different data-licenses. The framework is evaluated by comparing the results against existing frameworks from literature and testing if other licenses could be included in it as well.

Keywords: Open Data, Open Data Licenses, Data Engineering, JValue

PDF: Master Thesis

Reference: Philip Rebbe. Integrating Open Data License Information into Data Pipelines. Master Thesis. Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg: 2024.

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Category: 4 Theses , 4.3 Finished Theses keywords: Data Engineering , JValue , Open Data