Conclusions

[altariel]

So writing a conclusion to a PhD thesis is a lot harder than I would have imagined. I would greatly appreciate any thoughts that any of you might have.

At the moment I am leaning to the kind of advice given here (scroll down), that it is a purely instrumental section saying, "This is what I've done, this is how it's great, this is what I'd do next if you gave me the cash." Or something on those lines.

I know some of you have already passed through this elusive initiation rite. Any advice?

Comments

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

this is what I'd do next if you gave me the cash

Write more Garak novels?

[altariel.livejournal.com]

I'm keeping that in the subtext.

[epsilon-delta.livejournal.com]

Hee! That conclusion sounds suspiciously like the conclusions to our design reports. "This is what our team has done. Against all odds, it managed to work. This is how it's great. You already gave us your money to design this, so nyah nyah nyah."

[altariel.livejournal.com]

This is a tricky thing for me, actually, because the work I did was a practical project (built a website), and disentangling writing that kind of report from writing up a thesis has been one of the big stumbling blocks. So I don't want to fall too much back into doing a 'report' style conclusion.

[epsilon-delta.livejournal.com]

Well, I have all the English education of a high school student, so I'm not too clear on the difference between a thesis and a report. But now that you mention it, you might check out some theses by engineers? I know that all masters & PhD engineers tend to research some very practical stuff, but they still end up writing theses, so... might be helpful?

Although judging from the *ahem* writing skills of some of my fellow students, I'd say ignore the grammar/style and look for the content. *g*

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Good suggestions, thank you.

Giving the engineers I teach the confidence to write continuous prose (in essay format) is one of the big mental blocks I try to break through with them. I have a nice flowchart which shows how essays work.

[eldritchhobbit.livejournal.com]

Wow, I feel your pain. Hang in there! Seriously, the best piece of advice I ever received was the tried and true "The best dissertation is a completed dissertation" cliche. It's trite, but it's true: I saw several people stall in the eleventh hour trying to, as Scotty would say, "overthink the plumbing" on their conclusion. It makes sense, doesn't it? After years on a project, the wrap-up should be one serious climax! But at some point, it just has to be done, and the mind-game pressure of the conclusion can be an annoying obstacle to that.

That was no help at all, was it? ;) My experience is a bit different, since I was doing intellectual history (different methodology, etc.), but I bookended my whole work with a contemporary case study begun in the introduction and revisited and ended in the conclusion. The reason I did it that way was to say 1) See how relevant I am?, 2) Have you heard other people talking about this? No, I didn't think so. See how I'm filling a hole in the current scholarship?, 3) See? I have been paying attention to what's been going on while I wrote this monstrous tome, and not living under a rock, and 4) See what a cool project this could be on its own, if you'd just pass my defense and let me get on with it? And all that is to say, in response to the current advice you're leaning toward, yes. :)

Sorry for the ramble. I have good thoughts aimed in your direction, not that you need them! :) Go you!

[altariel.livejournal.com]

The ramble is wonderful and gives me a lot more confidence in my plans.


I saw several people stall in the eleventh hour trying to, as Scotty would say, "overthink the plumbing" on their conclusion.

This is getting closer to the twenty-third hour: this is a resubmitted thesis (long story). I've tried several approaches now, and I think 'overthinking the plumbing' has been the problem throughout. I'm going to try to take it a little easier, maybe try the 'bullet-point' approach were I put down sequential points and then turn them into sequential prose.

Thank you for taking the time to answer, and so thoughtfully and so encouragingly. This process has been a particularly tough ride.

[eldritchhobbit.livejournal.com]

Hey, no problem. I am sending lots of good thoughts and best wishes your way. It can be a pretty dysfunctional process, so Whatever Gets You Through is a Good Thing. Hang in there!

[kendokamel.livejournal.com]

I always have trouble with my conclusions.

Good luck, though! (;

/notreallyanyhelpbuthadtocommentanyway

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Thank you! :-)

[cathexys.livejournal.com]

since we're in different fields this might not be useful, but i always strive for the summary plus approach..not necessarily bringing up a *new* subject, but widening the scope so to speak.

in my diss, forexample, i examioned a text not quite within the scope of my field whose reception in particular exemplified and illuminated all the issues i had argued throughout. i this had a convenient way to bring them all in and show that the issues were larger than i had 'prioven'...not sure this makes *any* sense without specifics :-)

as a reader i like case studies/examples/personalization bioth in intro and conclusion and i think looking toward limits of your research/new venues that it has opened up it always neat.

good luck!!!!

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Thank you! :-) I was struggling with a sense of form rather than content, so this was all really helpful regardless of discipline.

It exists now, god knows if it's any good, but that's a massive improvement on where I was at the start of the week!

[iainjcoleman.livejournal.com]

I've just looked at my thesis for the first time and years, and am surprised to discover that I didn't really bother with much of a conclusions chapter. I have a couple of short concluding paragraphs at the end of the last substantial chapter (basically, "in conclusion, this method works"). Then there's a two-page "Future Prospects" chapter, which is about how the work could be extended (though not necessarily by me). This chapter also serves to embed the work in the context of other current research ("This thesis used simplified model A in order to gain theoretical insight: those clever chaps over there have done a lot of work on complicated model B, and if you applied my technique with that model, you might get some interesting results").

My main advice would be "don't sweat it". A brief summary of what youve done in the thesis, and what you see as potential routes for future work based on your results, is all you need. I don't think you need to be terribly self-promoting in this section. Picture your reader as the poor 1st year postgrad who gets handed your thesis next year and told to continue the work.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Thank you - this is useful in terms of giving me a sense of what a reasonable length to a conclusion might be, and also "don't sweat it" is good advice. Better written in some form than not written at all.

[forodwaith.livejournal.com]

No advice, but much sympathy.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Thank you :-)

[mevennen.livejournal.com]

I also had to re-submit the doctorate and as far as I can recall, I did much the same as you're planning to do: a summation of the evidence and (as far as this is possible in the philosophy of science) a snappy punchline.

I turned to Garak fanfic with mighty relief, believe me.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Thank you for this, it's good to know I'm on the right lines. Snappy punchlines might be beyond my abilities by the end of this week, but I'm working on it!

I can't wait till January, when I intend to have a fanfic frenzy.

[edge-of-ruin.livejournal.com]

I can only suggest piling up your notes on the floor and shuffling ;-)

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Shuffling my notes or my feet?

[edge-of-ruin.livejournal.com]

Whichever works best for you, I guess.

[trixieleitz]

Shuffle your notes with your feet. I don't think the alternative would work very well.

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

A conclusion in the kind of papers I write tends to run pretty much along the lines of the quotation you gave.

Re-state the key results from the study and the extent to which they met the study's aims/objectives. Review how your results fit into the existing body of literature. Expand on their applications (what?, to whom?). Discuss any limitations of your data. Indicate avenues for future study.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

This really helped - cut and pasted it at the top of the chapter. Thank you.

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

Glad it was of use! I think it's easy to over-engineer these things.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Thank you :-)

On a slightly more serious note...

[trixieleitz]

The conclusion I wrote for my MSc was pretty much what you say above. But then we're in somewhat different fields, and maybe the expectations are different.

Research-wise, my project was a disaster, but I got a good degree on the strength of the approach and quality of the write-up. Essentially, I referred back to the Aims chapter, and stated how I'd attempted to achieve each aim, speculated about why it hadn't worked, and suggested how one could approach the problem in a why that might give a meaningful result.

I don't know if that helps, but there you go :)

Re: On a slightly more serious note...

[altariel.livejournal.com]

I'm starting to feel this whole project was a disaster (not the work itself, but as a piece of research), so I think just giving a fair stab at a conclusion will be my best thing. Thanks, Trixie.

[pretty-poodle.livejournal.com]

Can't offer any advice, but I have lots of four leaf clovers and hugs.

*hands you a clover and huggles you*

Maybe not the best of advice, but you know I'm cheering for you. :)

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Oh, thank you

*takes clover and huggles you back*

I really appreciate it :-)

[hardrada.livejournal.com]

Buggered if I can remember very well, to be quite honest. And my Mum and Dad have got the only extant copies of my thesis, other than the one in the Uni library.

I do remember the first sentence of my conclusion. I copied a line from Norman Davies (and gave myself an extra reference, to boot): "In the beginning there was no [thesis]. Now the last words are flowing onto the last pages."

This was a maths PhD, as you know!

[altariel.livejournal.com]

I am being strongly encouraged to remove anything that smacks of such originality.

[iainjcoleman.livejournal.com]

That's the humanities for you.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Soon I'll be free.

[aervir.livejournal.com]

No advice from me either (because I can't even wrap up a six-page essay or a 25-page term paper properly *g*), but much belated sympathy... Good luck with your conclusion! So when are we supposed to address you as Dr.Altariel? :)

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the moral support :-)

Who knows when you'll get to call me Dr Altariel? To be honest, I'm not really holding my breath.

[dawtheminstrel.livejournal.com]

Altariel--

I hope you don't mind my horning in here, but I actually wrote a diss in English lit, although that was a long time ago. Since then, I've wandered a bit and now teach and do research on writing in "non-academic" settings (to use a highly ethnocentric word), particularly that of engineers, so I feel your pain.

I know the "funnel" and "reverse funnel" are rather cliched but they do work. In your intro, you start broad and narrow to your specific topic, and in the conclusion, you do the opposite. Oddly enough, one of the hardest things for my doctoral students is to have a conclusion that matches their introduction. They create this intro with a good question but the question they answer turns out to be different.

In a book called "Genre Analysis," John Swales lays out the typical structure of a research article in detail. His findings are based on linguistic analysis of lots of articles. I think what he says is helpful for any piece of research, including dissertations. And if you don't use it now, you'll probably have loads of use for it when you publish all your insights. :-)

You probably had this all worked out by now, so you might want to take all this as just making sympathetic noises on my part.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Hi Daw! I don't mind you chiming in at all - I'm very grateful, for advice and sympathetic noises both! :-)

I eventually intuited towards the reverse funnel, and I've got what I think is a pretty solid conclusion now (it had better be, I'm submitting it later today!). The book on "Genre Analysis" sounds fascinating; right up my street.

Interesting to read that your research is with engineers; I teach organizational sociology to undergraduate engineers and find them very challenging and rewarding students.

Thank you again!