Did you know that only 1.2% of the population has a PhD? If you’re studying for your doctorate, you’ll be joining an elite percentage of people.
Having a PhD not only looks great on your resume, but it also deepens your knowledge of your specialist subject.
Are you writing a PhD dissertation? Not sure where to start? Here are five expert tips for writing a PhD dissertation.
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1. Check Out the PhD Dissertation Requirements for Your University
One of the most important things for you to do is to check out the Ph.D. dissertation writing requirements for the university. You may have previously undergone undergraduate or postgraduate study elsewhere, and you may have some assumptions on academic style.
Pay close attention to how your institution wants your references to be formatted, the required length, whether the document needs to be double-spaced, and whether you should use US or UK spelling.
2. Plan Your Structure Carefully
Speak with your supervisor and find out whether you need to structure your thesis in any particular way. Your supervisor will be able to advise you on the best structure for your particular dissertation.
Once you have a structure, you can start your first draft. Don’t expect your first draft to be fantastic, great things take time.
3. Write About Something That Matters to You
Your Ph.D. might take several years to complete. During this time, you will fall in love and out of love with your topic often. It is important that you pick a topic that you really care about. If you don’t have a deep passion for what you’re writing about, you’ll quickly get bored.
Think long-and-hard about whether the topic is right for you before you commit.
4. Get Professional Help
There are lots of ways that you can get help and support while you’re writing your thesis. You may want to look at getting homework assignment help and have professional writers write-up elements of your thesis.
It can be very easy to miss glaring mistakes in your text when you’re spending a long time staring at a screen. Employ a proofreader to pinpoint any errors that you might have lurking in your dissertation.
5. Just Start!
One of the most common problems Ph.D. students face is getting started. Many students will wait for the muse to descend for too long or get sucked into procrastination. These are common writer’s traps, and they should be avoided at all costs.
The best thing you can do is to just start writing. It doesn’t matter if you start at the beginning, middle, or end. If you start, it will all come together eventually.
Don’t Give Up
While this only scratches the surface of how to write a PhD dissertation, we hope it will inspire you to get started on your thesis. Writing a thesis is long, grueling work. It can also be very rewarding, particularly when you make breakthroughs in your subject.
If you’ve enjoyed these expert writing tips, you may want to check out some of the other great content on this site.