What is a dissertation?

During the pandemic, I was working on a Centre for Online and Distance Education (CODE) project to develop training materials for Masters students embarking on a dissertation project. This was a really enjoyable project to work on. Working alongside three other CODE Fellows and a brilliant student Fellow (Tiffany Tupper), we carried out a small survey to gather insights, then developed a series of short online activities using H5P and Moodle, and sought feedback to improve these resources. We also created some teacher guidance notes and a PDF version of the training. These were published in 2020 and can currently be found on the PORT website (and are free to use and download).

Statistics seem to suggest that there has been interest in these resources, so we applied for additional funding from CODE to carry out a bigger survey and create a few more resources. We will be embarking on this new phase in October, so I’ll post more about that soon.

Today, I want to go back to basics, and ask the simple question (or perhaps not quite as simple as it might sound): What is a dissertation?

So, what is a dissertation?

The answer to the title of this essay would seem obvious. A dissertation is a long-form written document, containing academically credible content, including supporting materials such as a contents page, abstract, bibliography, and perhaps appendices. This, at least, is how I would understand a dissertation to be, in its outputted form. But that is a simplification.

Of course, a dissertation is not just its attributes. Its purpose is that of an assignment, to be marked by two or more examiners. It is a test of a student’s ability to research, analyse, and report back on a question or hypothesis in a specific discipline (sometimes cross-disciplinary). It, therefore, has a specific audience in mind and a sole reason to exist – to gain a grade as part of an undergraduate or postgraduate degree.

Again, this is a simplification.

White (2011) describes the dissertation as a manuscript typically composed of between 80,000 to 100,000 words. Others have described it as a manuscript of about 200 to 400 pages. As noted by Tim Anderson et al. (2020), there are no universal criteria or protocols for institutions, departments, or graduates to follow, as a means of standardising the dissertation assignment, but there is a consensus between examiners of what constitutes higher and lower quality dissertations and there are conventions and policies specific to individual institutions and disciplines.

The four types of Thesis

The general description of a dissertation project is that it is a single academically rigorous study which posits something original. Nonetheless, studies have identified certain general trends. For instance, based on previous studies, Paltridge and starfield (2020) have suggested four main types of Thesis writing based on the arguments made by Thompson (1999) and Dudley-Evans (1999). Dong (1998) similarly suggested the category of compilation. These are:

1. ‘simple traditional’ | Introduction – Methods – Results – Discussion (IMRD)
2. ‘complex traditional’ | reports on more than a single study (most common in STEM subjects)
3. Topic-based | Introduction – sub-topics – conclusion
4. Thesis by publication (manuscript-style) | compilation of published or publishable research articles

In addition, there is a small, but substantial ‘hybrid’ form, sometimes merging published materials with non-published ‘traditional’ research and a growing move to present some or most of the research not in a traditional written format but in others such as comic books, videos, manuals, and non-academic policy papers.

Dissertations, as with other research projects, also rely on one of the usual method types:

1. Qualitative
2. Quantitative
3. Mixed-methods

There are also some dissertations that follow no prescribed design at all. Various studies have shown that qualitative studies are generally less popular than quantitative and mixed, however, Anderson et al.’s study (2020) found that 66% of education Canadian PhD theses that they examined were qualitative, possibly indicating a recent shift (their study focused on doctoral dissertations produced between 2008 and 2017) or representing something specific to the Canadian system (or at least to the institutions or discipline that formed part of the study). Indeed, Anderson et. al., found that IMRD (simple-traditional) dissertation structures are disproportionately represented in guidebooks for dissertation writing and that most dissertations that they studied follow this approach. Of these, qualitative approaches were the most common.

So, where does all of this leave us? A dissertation might not be a simple text document, but it might contain other elements or take a different format. A dissertation might be part or wholly published, changing drastically the intended audience from a few examiners, to a wider academic peerage. The only thing that is demonstrably the same across all dissertations is that its main purpose is to receive a grade, as a means of showing that the candidate has successfully reached a standard.

Thesis or Dissertation – a matter of definition?

There is something to say here about the Thesis. There is something interesting in the different definitions here. In the US, the thesis is usually an assignment for undergraduate or Masters students, and the expectation is that it is based on existing research. The dissertation is based on conducting your own research and analysis, and is therefore confined to PhD level. The reverse is true in the UK. The dissertation is used to describe a piece of work based on existing research, and the thesis is reserved for original ideas and analysis. Who is right?

The Oxford English Dictionary suggests that in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the word ‘thesis’ was used to describe the act of stating a proposition and proving it, thus:

A dissertation to maintain and prove a thesis, epsecailly written or delivered by a candidate for a University degree.

A dissertation meanwhile is described as either a spoken or written discourse on a subject ‘which is discussed at length’. The evidence here would point towards the US being correct. A dissertation is the discourse, the thesis is the idea and proof that forms part of that discourse. Of course, this is more about the meanings of the words, rather than how they have been institutionalised and formalised as the title of an assignment.  

It’s difficult to find any studies about this, but it would seem likely that the UK was using these terms before the US, and therefore, historically, dissertation (undergraduate and Masters) and thesis (PhD) were used that way round, before the US swapped the terms over. 

I hope to find more on this subject as I look more into the literature. Right now, and as I previously mentioned, I am again working on a small project with colleagues to provide online support modules for Masters students undertaking a dissertation project. These modules are intended to supply skills training, but to do so in a meaningful and practical way, by guiding students through processes such as narrowing down a research question, or compiling a list of sources, whilst actually doing the module itself.

The project is funded by the Centre for Online and Distance Education (CODE) at the University of London, and the outputs of the first version (published in 2020) can be found on the PORT website.