Research Student Seminar - Workshop on 'Analysing a thesis' - Dr Anna Robinson-Pant

This week's seminar was focused on analysing a doctoral thesis. I had
compiled a list of recently completed theses (see attached), with the aim of
reflecting the very different ways in which students had chosen to present
their research. I suggested that the theses on this list could be viewed as
a continuum, from 'conventional' to 'non-conventional': Redwood's Ethics in
qualitative research or the terrible process of undecidability could be seen
as on the far extreme in terms of challenging the conventional form of a
thesis (for instance, through presenting two different but linked narratives
on the top and bottom of each page). Members of our seminar group presented
on the thesis that they had read and analysed (see attachments for some of
their notes too):


Al-Yousef, H. (2006) Exploring young women's higher educational choices:
insights from UK and Saudi Arabia

Dadds, M. (1991) Validity and award-bearing teacher action research

Lo, B.Y.M. (2007) Who's supporting who? Learning to become curriculum
leaders together in the context of curriculum support services in Hong Kong

Mohamed, A.H. (2006) The impact of the Malaysian Smart schools training
programme (SSTP): teachers' perspectives

Ng, H.S. (2007) Creating an art education web site through collaborative
action research



As the seminar progressed, we began to identify many issues emerging in
relation to the construction of a thesis, the examination process and how
this shapes decisions (and outcomes) and the influence of the writer's
professional/personal agenda for doing a PhD. In particular, the following
points were noted in individual accounts and our discussion:


- The difficulty of understanding (and for the writer of explaining)
professional terminology that had evolved in a specific cultural context
(e.g. 'Smart learning skills' in Malaysia). It was also a problem for the
reader to remember acronyms - and one thesis had addressed this through
providing a list of the necessary terms at the start of each chapter.



- The decision about whether to report on a pilot study and main
study together or separately. Whereas one thesis had reported findings and
methods according to the chronological stages, another had combined all the
findings and analysis in the empirical chapters under thematic discussion.


- Notions of audience: a final chapter of policy recommendations
(written in a directive style - 'the government should....') made us realise
that some people were not just writing for their examiner/supervisor, but
also keen to address a wider audience and to influence policy in their
chosen area. I suggested that some students are also supported to undertake
doctoral research for a specific purpose and so their thesis should meet the
requirements of that audience too (e.g. employer or sponsor).



- What should the conclusion consist of? The concluding sections of
the theses we reviewed offered a range of alternatives: from discussion of
the theoretical and methodological contribution (e.g. through the
exploration of 'conversational enquiry' in Lo), to policy recommendations
for the improvement of a specific programme or educational approach, to
reflections on the writers' personal research journey.


- What does the writer mean by 'case study'? We found the term was
used in different ways - referring, for instance, to an evaluation of an
innovatory programme (which was seen as the 'case') as compared to
individual case studies of teachers.


- The theses differed in the extent to which they were personalised
or that the writer brought themselves into the text. All the theses reviewed
here included an autobiographical section (for instance, outlining the
author's previous professional interest in the area of study and how their
experience had shaped the research questions), and discussed possible 'bias'
in terms of the author being an insider. Some theses however were written as
a much more personalised account: for instance, Lo continually brought
herself into the thesis, describing her emotional responses, such as the
frustration she had felt as a teacher working within the tight constraints
of the previous Hong Kong national curriculum. #


- All these theses were written in the first person, though we
discussed how in some disciplines and departments, this would not be
acceptable. Al-Yousef had described her own difficulties in learning to
write in the first person - as this was a great shift from the more formal
English writing she had undertaken in Saudi Arabia. Although she wanted to
create a text that was more personalised, she explained that she had
'accidentally' written occasionally in the formal style that she had been
used to.



- What does the title tell us? The title 'Who's supporting who?'
immediately told us something about the tensions and reflective approach
taken in the study (but you only really understood the title by the end of
the thesis). Other titles (eg 'The impact of the Malaysian Smart schools
training programme: teachers' perspective') gave a strong indication of the
kind of audience anticipated (policy-focused account in this case).


- What is the role of the supervisor in making decisions about how
the thesis is constructed? A visiting fellow explained that she was
surprised that the UEA thesis cover page did not include the supervisor's
name as this is a requirement in Spain. We discussed how far this was about
ownership and responsibility - that the supervisor is considered to be a
close partner in the decisions about the research, including the form and
content of the thesis.


- Should you include long quotes from the literature (and your own
raw data)? One thesis had a lot of long extracts from the literature which
seemed to disrupt the text. We discussed alternatives, such as paraphrasing
the ideas and the difficulty this posed for some students working in English
as a second language.


- PhD as a process or a product? The theses varied in how far they
tried to capture the process of learning that the writer had gone through,
as compared to focusing mainly on the findings that had emerged in relation
to a particular project.



- Whose narrative is it? Several writers reflected on the
difficulties of presenting their informants' stories and how far they would
see the text as their own story (as opposed to the PhD student's account of
their story).


- Structure: most of the theses had followed a similar structure
with early chapters on introduction, methodology and literature review, then
empirical findings, discussion and conclusion. By contrast, Dadds began with
the case study, presented as far as possible in the form of the biography of
the teacher - the literature review and methodology came last in the thesis.
We discussed the risks she had taken in this respect - in expecting the
reader to embrace the story without knowing how it had been shaped by the
researcher's interpretation, literature findings and methods. We wondered
how far the conventional form of the thesis (methodology, literature review)
is effective or whether it was more about establishing the researchers'
credentials first!


In conclusion, we reflected on the decisions that you have to take in
relation to a PhD study. There seemed to be two big decisions: which
research approach to adopt and then secondly, how to write it up. The latter
decision was perhaps not given as much importance in students' minds at
first - partly because of assumptions shaped by the conventional form of a
thesis. But also, writing the thesis needed to be seen in the wider social
context - who the audience would be (including the likely examiners) and how
they might read the text.


Thanks to everyone who read and presented on a thesis this week - there was
much rich material for the basis of our discussion. Next week, Waheed Hammad
will be taking time off from writing his thesis to share his experiences of
moving from the doing of field work to the analysis/writing stage. He will
also be presenting a paper based on his research: 'School culture: a
barrier to teacher participation in decision making in Egyptian secondary
schools'.
Research Student Seminar - Workshop on 'Analysing a thesis' - Dr Anna Robinson-Pant)