C. Worrell (Eds.), (pp. 345–359). American Psychological Association.
Parenthetical citation: (Aron et al., 2019)
Narrative citation: Aron et al. (2019)
Merriam-Webster. (n.d.). Culture. In . Retrieved September 9, 2019, from |
Parenthetical citation: (Merriam-Webster, n.d.)
Narrative citation: Merriam-Webster (n.d.)
National Cancer Institute. (2019). (NIH Publication No. 18-2059). U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health. |
Parenthetical citation: (National Cancer Institute, 2019)
Narrative citation: National Cancer Institute (2019)
The specific agency responsible for the report appears as the author. The names of parent agencies not present in the group author name appear in the source element as the publisher. This creates concise in-text citations and complete reference list entries.
Harvard University. (2019, August 28). [Video]. YouTube. |
Parenthetical citation: (Harvard University, 2019)
Narrative citation: Harvard University (2019)
APA Databases [@APA_Databases]. (2019, September 5). [Tweet]. Twitter. Gates, B. [@BillGates]. (2019, September 7). [Thumbnail with link attached] [Tweet]. Twitter. |
Parenthetical citations: (APA Databases, 2019; Gates, 2019)
Narrative citations: APA Databases (2019) and Gates (2019)
News From Science. (2019, June 21). [Image attached] [Status update]. Facebook. |
Parenthetical citation: (News From Science, 2019)
Narrative citation: News From Science (2019)
Fagan, J. (2019, March 25). . OER Commons. Retrieved September 17, 2019, from National Institute of Mental Health. (2018, July). . U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health. Woodyatt, A. (2019, September 10). . CNN. World Health Organization. (2018, May 24). . |
Parenthetical citations: (Fagan, 2019; National Institute of Mental Health, 2018; Woodyatt, 2019; World Health Organization, 2018)
Narrative citations: Fagan (2019), National Institute of Mental Health (2018), Woodyatt (2019), and World Health Organization (2018)
The following supplemental example references are mention in the Publication Manual:
Archival document and collections are not presented in the APA Publication Manual, Seventh Edition . This content is available only on the APA Style website . This guidance has been expanded from the 6th edition.
Archival sources include letters, unpublished manuscripts, limited-circulation brochures and pamphlets, in-house institutional and corporate documents, clippings, and other documents, as well as such nontextual materials as photographs and apparatus, that are in the personal possession of an author, form part of an institutional collection, or are stored in an archive such as the Archives of the History of American Psychology at the University of Akron or the APA Archives. For any documents like these that are available on the open web or via a database (subscription or nonsubscription), follow the reference templates shown in Chapter 10 of the Publication Manual.
The general format for the reference for an archival work includes the author, date, title, and source. The reference examples shown on this page may be modified for collections requiring more or less specific information to locate materials, for different types of collections, or for additional descriptive information (e.g., a translation of a letter). Authors may choose to list correspondence from their own personal collections, but correspondence from other private collections should be listed only with the permission of the collector.
Keep in mind the following principles when creating references to archival documents and collections:
Frank, L. K. (1935, February 4). [Letter to Robert M. Ogden]. Rockefeller Archive Center (GEB Series 1.3, Box 371, Folder 3877), Tarrytown, NY, United States.
Zacharius, G. P. (1953, August 15). [Letter to William Rickel (W. Rickel, Trans.)]. Copy in possession of Hendrika Vande Kemp.
Allport, G. W. (1930–1967). Correspondence. Gordon W. Allport Papers (HUG 4118.10), Harvard University Archives, Cambridge, MA, United States.
To cite specific letters in the text, provide the author and range of years as shown in the reference list entry, plus details about who wrote the specific letter to whom and when the specific letter was written.
Berliner, A. (1959). Notes for a lecture on reminiscences of Wundt and Leipzig. Anna Berliner Memoirs (Box M50), Archives of the History of American Psychology, University of Akron, Akron, OH, United States.
Allport, A. (presumed). (ca. 1937). Marion Taylor today—by the biographer [Unpublished manuscript]. Marion Taylor Papers, Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe College, Cambridge, MA, United States.
Subcommittee on Mental Hygiene Personnel in School Programs. (1949, November 5–6). Meeting of Subcommittee on Mental Hygiene Personnel in School Programs. David Shakow Papers (M1360), Archives of the History of American Psychology, University of Akron, Akron, OH, United States.
Smith, M. B. (1989, August 12). Interview by C. A. Kiesler [Tape recording]. President’s Oral History Project, American Psychological Association, APA Archives, Washington, DC, United States.
Sparkman, C. F. (1973). An oral history with Dr. Colley F. Sparkman/Interviewer: Orley B. Caudill. Mississippi Oral History Program (Vol. 289), University of Southern Mississippi, Hattiesburg, MS, United States.
Psychoanalysis institute to open. (1948, September 18). [Clipping from an unidentified Dayton, OH, United States, newspaper]. Copy in possession of author.
Sci-Art Publishers. (1935). Sci-Art publications [Brochure]. Roback Papers (HUGFP 104.50, Box 2, Folder “Miscellaneous Psychological Materials”), Harvard University Archives, Cambridge, MA, United States.
[Photographs of Robert M. Yerkes]. (ca. 1917–1954). Robert Mearns Yerkes Papers (Box 137, Folder 2292), Manuscripts and Archives, Yale University Library, New Haven, CT, United States.
U.S. Census Bureau. (1880). 1880 U.S. census: Defective, dependent, and delinquent classes schedule: Virginia [Microfilm]. NARA Microfilm Publication T1132 (Rolls 33–34), National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, DC, United States.
Read the full APA guidelines on citing ChatGPT
OpenAI. (2023). ChatGPT (Mar 14 version) [Large language model]. https://chat.openai.com/chat
Author: The author of the model is OpenAI.
Date: The date is the year of the version you used. Following the template in Section 10.10, you need to include only the year, not the exact date. The version number provides the specific date information a reader might need.
Title: The name of the model is “ChatGPT,” so that serves as the title and is italicized in your reference, as shown in the template. Although OpenAI labels unique iterations (i.e., ChatGPT-3, ChatGPT-4), they are using “ChatGPT” as the general name of the model, with updates identified with version numbers.
The version number is included after the title in parentheses. The format for the version number in ChatGPT references includes the date because that is how OpenAI is labeling the versions. Different large language models or software might use different version numbering; use the version number in the format the author or publisher provides, which may be a numbering system (e.g., Version 2.0) or other methods.
Bracketed text is used in references for additional descriptions when they are needed to help a reader understand what’s being cited. References for a number of common sources, such as journal articles and books, do not include bracketed descriptions, but things outside of the typical peer-reviewed system often do. In the case of a reference for ChatGPT, provide the descriptor “Large language model” in square brackets. OpenAI describes ChatGPT-4 as a “large multimodal model,” so that description may be provided instead if you are using ChatGPT-4. Later versions and software or models from other companies may need different descriptions, based on how the publishers describe the model. The goal of the bracketed text is to briefly describe the kind of model to your reader.
Source: When the publisher name and the author name are the same, do not repeat the publisher name in the source element of the reference, and move directly to the URL. This is the case for ChatGPT. The URL for ChatGPT is https://chat.openai.com/chat . For other models or products for which you may create a reference, use the URL that links as directly as possible to the source (i.e., the page where you can access the model, not the publisher’s homepage).
The DOI or URL is the final component of a reference list entry. Because so much scholarship is available and/or retrieved online, most reference list entries end with either a DOI or a URL.
Follow these guidelines for including DOIs and URLs in references:
Follow these guidelines to format DOIs and URLs:
https://doi.org/ xxxxx
When a DOI or URL is long or complex, you may use shortDOIs or shortened URLs if desired.
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Surprisingly, I have not found a similar question to mine - all I found was a question about the maximum number of citations per sentence.
However, I am more interested in the total number of citations that is considered normal for a paper (to be more specific, a Master Thesis, which in my case will be around 60 pages of content.)
I heard that about 1 - 1.5 multiplied with page count would be a good number of sources cited.
I am asking because I am a little worried that I might have cited too many sources.
There is no definite answer. It really depends on how much previous literature exists, how much of it you have reviewed and cited appropriately, and (loosely) what the word count of the document is. Page count can misleading, as some theses have many more figures and tables than others.
No one is going to skip to the bibliography, think negative thoughts, and say "you have too many references!" without reading the document. If no individual part of the thesis could be considered as having too many citations, then the thesis as a whole has an appropriate number of citations.
These related questions have answers as to how you can decide if a particular part of the thesis has too many citations.
In addition to the other answer, this question is based on some slightly questionable premises, as seen in the sentence "the total number of citations that is considered normal for a paper (to be more specific, a Master Thesis, which in my case will be around 60 pages of content.)":
I just completed an M.A. thesis in English literature, and I mean just. I tend to be light on the number of sources I use and I like to have favored sources and work it to exhaustion.
My thesis is about 30,000 words, about 50 percent more than the minimum at my institution. I have 27 secondary sources and six primary sources. The institution requires 20 sources, I don't if that's 20 secondary or 20 total, but what I did will give you and idea what you need to do.
I'm not just out college. In fact, I am senior citizen age. My writing ability is equal to that the people who write the journal article and equal to that of a professional historian too. Reading the journal articles I have had to read to do my seminar papers and my thesis, I have seen many that are excessively heavy on sources. Some are light on sources but seem nevertheless to be good articles.
How you primary sources you cite might depend on your topic. It could be only one. Conceivably, it could be none. For a master's thesis in literature, the minimum might be one secondary source for each thousand word. In imagine, in that case, that it might be double than many for a doctoral disseration. In that case, the number secondary sources for doctoral thesis would have to be around 150.
How many source might depend on the individual and how that persons works their sources. But I would still say, expect to be required to have 150 sources or close to it.
My thesis was low on sources in part because I first outlined a theory and then applied that theory to the characters of four novels without much reference to outside sources.
The number should be N, where N is the exact number of papers that you have really read, understood and (mostly) relevant to your thesis.
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In academic writing at all levels, referencing is crucial. Knowing how to reference your dissertation correctly will not only give your work the academic finish it needs to pass, but will also support your ideas and arguments so that the person marking it has a clear understanding of your level of knowledge and research on the topic.
In this article, we’ll occasionally use the term ‘scholarly referencing’ – which quite simply means the style of referencing used in the world of academia (as opposed to the references you may include at the end of your CV, for example).
Scholarly referencing refers to a series of conventions used to point readers towards sources that you have cited, quoted, or otherwise borrowed from in your work.
There are many different referencing styles (and the three main categories are discussed below), but they all provide the same fundamental pieces of information to enable a reader to go and find a source you've cited in your work and look at it for themselves:
Avoiding plagiarism.
The first reason most universities will give for why accurate citation is crucial is that it protects you from accusations of plagiarism . You need to provide a reference to any work done by others that you've incorporated into your own work. This does not just refer to direct quotations but also to paraphrases, data, and even broad "schools of thought", or ways of thinking about a topic.
Plagiarism is not always dishonest – you may not be intentionally passing off someone else's work as your own – but if you don't cite any source that may have influenced your thinking you're open to plagiarism accusations.
If you're in any doubt about whether a source has influenced an assertion you're making, cite it!
Beyond covering yourself, though, there are a couple of other reasons why you should practise good citation habits. Specifically, these have to do with your development as a scholar and your participation in the collective creation of knowledge:
In short, you may not have much of a choice. If you're lucky your university will let you choose between their preferred styles of parenthetical referencing and footnote referencing (for Arts or Humanities subjects) or their preferred parenthetical and numerical styles (for Sciences or Social Sciences).
If you do get a choice, read the “usage” sections for each referencing type below, and ask yourself the following questions:
If you're fortunate enough to have a choice in your referencing system, these questions should help you decide between the alternatives before you.
Be systematic.
If you're referencing a dissertation, you're likely to have many tens if not hundreds of sources. If you think of your bibliography as something separate from the process of researching and writing and plan to leave it till the end, remembering every single source you cited and finding all its bibliographic details is going to be a daunting task, to say the least. You need to develop a systematic way of tracking and organising works you've read and cited, both for your own retrieval later and for use in in-text citations and your bibliography.
There are various ways to do this: you might prefer to set up a spreadsheet or just keep thorough notes as you research. But by far the most efficient way to store, retrieve, and cite the sources you find – especially if you're working with lots of recent, online sources – is to use reference management software . Universities often have subscriptions to commercial packages like RefWorks and EndNote, but you can still save a lot of time with a freeware package like Zotero (though it has far less sophisticated bibliography-generating tools, and with far fewer citation formats, than the commercial tools).
Reference management software packages typically contain some or all of the following features:
These software packages can be hugely efficient time savers, allowing you to easily catalogue, retrieve and annotate sources as you research, and generating citations and even a complete bibliography for your project.
Do be aware, though, that auto-generated bibliographies won't always be 100% accurate. You might, for example, have to fill in missing pieces of information like place of publication for certain records, or reformat bibliographies to match your department's requirements.
Parenthetical referencing styles are the most common scholarly styles in use, and are employed across a wide range of academic disciplines, with different formats dominant in different fields.
MLA and Chicago tend to dominate in Arts and Humanities disciplines (especially in North America); APA is very common in the Social Sciences, while one of the many variants of the Harvard system can turn up in any discipline anywhere in the world!
Parenthetical styles generally work on the basis of economy. They allow the reader to quickly and easily locate a source in the reference list at the end of a work (in most parenthetical referencing formats this is labelled "References" or "Works Cited" and includes only sources directly cited in the written work), with a minimal disruption of the flow of the writing in which they appear. Because of their emphasis on economy, parenthetical styles generally mandate that you include the author's name in the parenthetical reference only if it's not clear from the context. So, if you introduce a quote with "Smith says that…" you wouldn't normally repeat Smith's name a few words later in parentheses.
Most parenthetical referencing systems use an "author-date" format. The parenthetical reference includes the author's surname and the year of publication (or just the year of publication if the author's name is clear from the context). So you might see, for example;
Scholars often complain that there are "far too many referencing styles for the young scholar to keep track of" (Smith 2012, p. 6)
Smith argues that "There are far too many referencing styles for the young scholar to keep track of" (2012, p. 6).
The year is always the first piece of information after the author's name in the reference list to allow you to quickly and easily match up a parenthetical reference with a bibliographic entry. Author-date entries must always form a unique identifier for a particular source – if a scholar has been exceptionally busy in a given year and produced multiple papers that are being cited in the present written work, the convention is to refer to them, both in-text and in the reference list, using the convention 2012a, 2012b, etc.
Page referencing conventions can vary considerably from format to format, depending on the discipline in which a referencing style is generally used. APA, for example, is designed for use in Social Sciences contexts and doesn't have a straightforward built-in mechanism for specifying page numbers, since it is expected that the vast majority of the time it will be used to reference paraphrases and summaries rather than direct quotations. When using APA to provide direct page number references it is recommended that the author and date be included when introducing the citation and the page reference be provided in a separate parenthetical note at the end of the citation;
Smith (2012) argues that "There are far too many referencing styles for the young scholar to keep track of" (p. 6).
Harvard deserves a special mention among author-date systems: while it's very likely that your university uses Harvard for referencing in at least some disciplines, it's also equally likely that your university's idea of what Harvard referencing looks like is slightly different from any of its neighbouring universities. Whereas referencing styles like Chicago and MLA form part of detailed style guides that provide explicit rules on many aspects of scholarly writing (not just referencing), Harvard simply defines the types of information that should be included in a reference and some broad principles about formatting.
There are almost as many variations of the Harvard system as there are institutions and publications that use it, and though the variations are generally pretty minor they include things like the following:
Confusingly, you very often won't find universities acknowledging these differences; go to almost any university library's guide to referencing and it will claim to be offering an authoritative guide to the Harvard System, not one variation among many – it's up to you to identify where other referencing guides or software don't agree.
You need to pay particularly close attention to this if you're using reference management software to keep track of your sources and generate your bibliography. If you set it to output a reference list in "Harvard" you can be almost certain that your list won't quite match the format your university expects and you'll have to do some manual formatting to get it right. Some reference managers include several variants of Harvard; you should experiment with these and pick the one that gets as close as possible to your format, but again you'll be lucky to find a 100% match.
MLA is something of a special case among parenthetical referencing systems as it doesn't use dates to identify works. It aims to be even more economical than author-date systems by identifying sources by author's name only and using minimal punctuation in the parenthetical reference, for example Scholars often complain that there are "far too many referencing styles for the young scholar to keep track of" (Smith 6). In the event that a written work contains more than one work by a single author, that work is identified by the shortest possible reference to its title, for example;
Scholars often complain that there are "far too many referencing styles for the young scholar to keep track of" (Smith, Scholar's 6).
Note: the examples of sources used here and throughout this post are fictitious.
Scholars often complain that there are "far too many referencing styles for the young scholar to keep track of" (Smith 2012, 6).
In the References list:
Smith, Arnold. 2012. The Scholar's Complete Guide to Referencing. London: Scholar's Press.
Footnote referencing styles are most common in Arts and Humanities subjects (especially in the UK and Commonwealth countries), where direct quotation of sources – often at length – is commonplace and footnoting is also frequently used as a means of adding additional quotations, context, or clarifying comments. Footnote referencing styles almost always include page numbers when available (the exception being "classic" literary texts that exist in a multitude of editions and are more usually referenced by chapter, line, scene, or stanza number as appropriate). This referencing style works on the assumption that readers may want to go and find the source of specific quotations as they read, possibly to establish the context or to better understand the theory or argument behind the quotation. It's not uncommon in a heavily referenced book or journal article to see footnotes containing bibliographic references and other material take up half a page or more!
A number in superscript font (or, more rarely, parentheses, especially for work published online) at the end of a quotation or assertion indicates that the text is supplemented by a note. In most footnoting styles the note will be at the bottom of the page on which its corresponding number appears, or on an adjacent page if the word processing software's text formatting rules dictate that the page footer has become too large. The footer section is usually separated by a horizontal rule to separate it from the body of the page, and the note is found next to its corresponding number. Less common endnote referencing styles – and variations of footnote styles used by certain university departments or publications – collect all notes at the end of the chapter or work.
The level of detail given in the footnote may depend on whether or not the referencing style also uses a bibliography. If a bibliography is used, the footnote may contain only sufficient detail to find the source in the bibliography – for example the work's author and title – and a page reference for the citation. Unlike other referencing formats, footnote referencing styles generally don't restrict bibliographies to containing only sources directly cited in the work; you are free to include all sources you consulted in writing your work, irrespective of whether you cited them or not.
Some footnote referencing styles don't use a separate bibliography at the end of the written work, which means that the entire bibliographic details for the article must be contained in the footnote. However, two of the most common footnote referencing styles, Oxford and MHRA, generally require that the full bibliographic details be given in the footnote and in an alphabetised bibliography (although publications using MHRA in particular may choose to omit the bibliography, universities tend to require it). Generally a shortened note form (author, title, page reference) is permissible for subsequent footnotes after the one in which the source is first introduced.
Smith argues that "There are far too many referencing styles for the young scholar to keep track of".1
In the footer:
1 Arnold Smith, The Scholar's Complete Guide to Referencing (London: Scholar's Press, 2012), p. 6.
In the bibliography:
Smith, Arnold, The Scholar's Complete Guide to Referencing (London: Scholar's Press, 2012).
Numbered referencing styles are usually restricted to the sciences. They cater for contexts in which very large numbers of sources are likely to be referenced in brief or in paraphrase, with as many as 5-10 sources used to support a single assertion or argument, but where direct quotation is rarely if even used. The use of numbers as shorthand to refer to bibliographic records is an ideal solution for situations in which sources are referenced in such high volumes that even the briefest parenthetical citation style would still lead to unacceptably long interruptions in the flow of the text.
Each source is assigned a unique number, depending on when it first appears in the text. The number is inserted in parentheses in the text (not normally in superscript format, unlike with footnotes) and the same number is used for every subsequent reference to that source. References are listed at the end of the document in numerical (not alphabetical) format for easy retrieval. Numerical references are very well-suited to publications whose sole or primary medium is electronic, as the numerical references to sources can be hyperlinked very unobtrusively to their corresponding entries in the reference list.
Scholars often complain about the high number of different referencing systems a university student might have to learn during the course of his or her studies (1-4).
In the references list: 1. Smith A. The Scholar's Complete Guide to Referencing. London: Scholar's Press; 2012.
By far the most common standardised numerical referencing style is Vancouver. However, many universities just refer in generic terms to "the numeric style" without specifically identifying it as Vancouver style. As with Harvard referencing, the detailed implementation of these styles varies somewhat from university to university and publication to publication, but they are typically close variants of the Vancouver system, and setting your referencing software to output a Vancouver-style bibliography should get you fairly close to the style your department is looking for.
A Digital Object Identifier , or DOI, is an ISO standardised and increasingly commonplace way of referencing online sources. It works like a cross between an ISBN and a URL. Like an ISBN, it's a unique, stable identifier for a particular digital source that allows you to look it up in a database; like a URL it also functions as a type of “address”, helping you identify not only what the object is but where it is.
The overwhelming majority of new articles published in online journals are now assigned a DOI, and the information about that DOI (including the article’s author, title, and publication date, and the name, volume and issue of the journal in which it was published) is stored in a centralised database as metadata.
This is great news if you're using reference management software: simply input an article’s DOI and the software will download the associated metadata and create a full bibliographic record from it!
But best of all, one of the metadata properties that is stored and regularly updated for the DOI is the URL of the article. Enter any object’s DOI into a web browser preceded by http://dx.doi.org/ and it should resolve to the best current place to access the text of the article. If the article is open-access this will generally be a page on which the article’s full text is published; otherwise it's likely to be a login page from which you can gain access via either an institutional or personal account.
To an extent, referencing systems are still playing catchup with DOIs, although the most recent editions of APA and MLA both contain full guidance on citing online sources using DOIs (which are now explicitly preferred to URLs where they're available) and even allow you to omit some other key details about the source if you do provide a DOI.
Dissertation writing: publishing a dissertation, 11 quick fixes to get your thesis back on track.
Cryptocurrency payments.
By: Derek Jansen (MBA) Reviewed By: David Phair (PhD) | July 2019
So, you’ve got a decent understanding of what a dissertation is , you’ve chosen your topic and hopefully you’ve received approval for your research proposal . Awesome! Now its time to start the actual dissertation or thesis writing journey.
To craft a high-quality document, the very first thing you need to understand is dissertation structure . In this post, we’ll walk you through the generic dissertation structure and layout, step by step. We’ll start with the big picture, and then zoom into each chapter to briefly discuss the core contents. If you’re just starting out on your research journey, you should start with this post, which covers the big-picture process of how to write a dissertation or thesis .
In this post, we’ll be discussing a traditional dissertation/thesis structure and layout, which is generally used for social science research across universities, whether in the US, UK, Europe or Australia. However, some universities may have small variations on this structure (extra chapters, merged chapters, slightly different ordering, etc).
So, always check with your university if they have a prescribed structure or layout that they expect you to work with. If not, it’s safe to assume the structure we’ll discuss here is suitable. And even if they do have a prescribed structure, you’ll still get value from this post as we’ll explain the core contents of each section.
As I mentioned, some universities will have slight variations on this structure. For example, they want an additional “personal reflection chapter”, or they might prefer the results and discussion chapter to be merged into one. Regardless, the overarching flow will always be the same, as this flow reflects the research process , which we discussed here – i.e.:
In other words, the dissertation structure and layout reflect the research process of asking a well-defined question(s), investigating, and then answering the question – see below.
To restate that – the structure and layout of a dissertation reflect the flow of the overall research process . This is essential to understand, as each chapter will make a lot more sense if you “get” this concept. If you’re not familiar with the research process, read this post before going further.
Right. Now that we’ve covered the big picture, let’s dive a little deeper into the details of each section and chapter. Oh and by the way, you can also grab our free dissertation/thesis template here to help speed things up.
The title page of your dissertation is the very first impression the marker will get of your work, so it pays to invest some time thinking about your title. But what makes for a good title? A strong title needs to be 3 things:
Typically, a good title includes mention of the following:
For example:
A quantitative investigation [research design] into the antecedents of organisational trust [broader area] in the UK retail forex trading market [specific context/area of focus].
Again, some universities may have specific requirements regarding the format and structure of the title, so it’s worth double-checking expectations with your institution (if there’s no mention in the brief or study material).
This page provides you with an opportunity to say thank you to those who helped you along your research journey. Generally, it’s optional (and won’t count towards your marks), but it is academic best practice to include this.
So, who do you say thanks to? Well, there’s no prescribed requirements, but it’s common to mention the following people:
There’s no need for lengthy rambling. Just state who you’re thankful to and for what (e.g. thank you to my supervisor, John Doe, for his endless patience and attentiveness) – be sincere. In terms of length, you should keep this to a page or less.
The dissertation abstract (or executive summary for some degrees) serves to provide the first-time reader (and marker or moderator) with a big-picture view of your research project. It should give them an understanding of the key insights and findings from the research, without them needing to read the rest of the report – in other words, it should be able to stand alone .
For it to stand alone, your abstract should cover the following key points (at a minimum):
So, in much the same way the dissertation structure mimics the research process, your abstract or executive summary should reflect the research process, from the initial stage of asking the original question to the final stage of answering that question.
In practical terms, it’s a good idea to write this section up last , once all your core chapters are complete. Otherwise, you’ll end up writing and rewriting this section multiple times (just wasting time). For a step by step guide on how to write a strong executive summary, check out this post .
This section is straightforward. You’ll typically present your table of contents (TOC) first, followed by the two lists – figures and tables. I recommend that you use Microsoft Word’s automatic table of contents generator to generate your TOC. If you’re not familiar with this functionality, the video below explains it simply:
If you find that your table of contents is overly lengthy, consider removing one level of depth. Oftentimes, this can be done without detracting from the usefulness of the TOC.
Right, now that the “admin” sections are out of the way, its time to move on to your core chapters. These chapters are the heart of your dissertation and are where you’ll earn the marks. The first chapter is the introduction chapter – as you would expect, this is the time to introduce your research…
It’s important to understand that even though you’ve provided an overview of your research in your abstract, your introduction needs to be written as if the reader has not read that (remember, the abstract is essentially a standalone document). So, your introduction chapter needs to start from the very beginning, and should address the following questions:
These are just the bare basic requirements for your intro chapter. Some universities will want additional bells and whistles in the intro chapter, so be sure to carefully read your brief or consult your research supervisor.
If done right, your introduction chapter will set a clear direction for the rest of your dissertation. Specifically, it will make it clear to the reader (and marker) exactly what you’ll be investigating, why that’s important, and how you’ll be going about the investigation. Conversely, if your introduction chapter leaves a first-time reader wondering what exactly you’ll be researching, you’ve still got some work to do.
Now that you’ve set a clear direction with your introduction chapter, the next step is the literature review . In this section, you will analyse the existing research (typically academic journal articles and high-quality industry publications), with a view to understanding the following questions:
Depending on the nature of your study, you may also present a conceptual framework towards the end of your literature review, which you will then test in your actual research.
Again, some universities will want you to focus on some of these areas more than others, some will have additional or fewer requirements, and so on. Therefore, as always, its important to review your brief and/or discuss with your supervisor, so that you know exactly what’s expected of your literature review chapter.
Now that you’ve investigated the current state of knowledge in your literature review chapter and are familiar with the existing key theories, models and frameworks, its time to design your own research. Enter the methodology chapter – the most “science-ey” of the chapters…
In this chapter, you need to address two critical questions:
Remember, the dissertation part of your degree is first and foremost about developing and demonstrating research skills . Therefore, the markers want to see that you know which methods to use, can clearly articulate why you’ve chosen then, and know how to deploy them effectively.
Importantly, this chapter requires detail – don’t hold back on the specifics. State exactly what you’ll be doing, with who, when, for how long, etc. Moreover, for every design choice you make, make sure you justify it.
In practice, you will likely end up coming back to this chapter once you’ve undertaken all your data collection and analysis, and revise it based on changes you made during the analysis phase. This is perfectly fine. Its natural for you to add an additional analysis technique, scrap an old one, etc based on where your data lead you. Of course, I’m talking about small changes here – not a fundamental switch from qualitative to quantitative, which will likely send your supervisor in a spin!
You’ve now collected your data and undertaken your analysis, whether qualitative, quantitative or mixed methods. In this chapter, you’ll present the raw results of your analysis . For example, in the case of a quant study, you’ll present the demographic data, descriptive statistics, inferential statistics , etc.
Typically, Chapter 4 is simply a presentation and description of the data, not a discussion of the meaning of the data. In other words, it’s descriptive, rather than analytical – the meaning is discussed in Chapter 5. However, some universities will want you to combine chapters 4 and 5, so that you both present and interpret the meaning of the data at the same time. Check with your institution what their preference is.
Now that you’ve presented the data analysis results, its time to interpret and analyse them. In other words, its time to discuss what they mean, especially in relation to your research question(s).
What you discuss here will depend largely on your chosen methodology. For example, if you’ve gone the quantitative route, you might discuss the relationships between variables . If you’ve gone the qualitative route, you might discuss key themes and the meanings thereof. It all depends on what your research design choices were.
Most importantly, you need to discuss your results in relation to your research questions and aims, as well as the existing literature. What do the results tell you about your research questions? Are they aligned with the existing research or at odds? If so, why might this be? Dig deep into your findings and explain what the findings suggest, in plain English.
The final chapter – you’ve made it! Now that you’ve discussed your interpretation of the results, its time to bring it back to the beginning with the conclusion chapter . In other words, its time to (attempt to) answer your original research question s (from way back in chapter 1). Clearly state what your conclusions are in terms of your research questions. This might feel a bit repetitive, as you would have touched on this in the previous chapter, but its important to bring the discussion full circle and explicitly state your answer(s) to the research question(s).
Next, you’ll typically discuss the implications of your findings . In other words, you’ve answered your research questions – but what does this mean for the real world (or even for academia)? What should now be done differently, given the new insight you’ve generated?
Lastly, you should discuss the limitations of your research, as well as what this means for future research in the area. No study is perfect, especially not a Masters-level. Discuss the shortcomings of your research. Perhaps your methodology was limited, perhaps your sample size was small or not representative, etc, etc. Don’t be afraid to critique your work – the markers want to see that you can identify the limitations of your work. This is a strength, not a weakness. Be brutal!
This marks the end of your core chapters – woohoo! From here on out, it’s pretty smooth sailing.
The reference list is straightforward. It should contain a list of all resources cited in your dissertation, in the required format, e.g. APA , Harvard, etc.
It’s essential that you use reference management software for your dissertation. Do NOT try handle your referencing manually – its far too error prone. On a reference list of multiple pages, you’re going to make mistake. To this end, I suggest considering either Mendeley or Zotero. Both are free and provide a very straightforward interface to ensure that your referencing is 100% on point. I’ve included a simple how-to video for the Mendeley software (my personal favourite) below:
Some universities may ask you to include a bibliography, as opposed to a reference list. These two things are not the same . A bibliography is similar to a reference list, except that it also includes resources which informed your thinking but were not directly cited in your dissertation. So, double-check your brief and make sure you use the right one.
The very last piece of the puzzle is the appendix or set of appendices. This is where you’ll include any supporting data and evidence. Importantly, supporting is the keyword here.
Your appendices should provide additional “nice to know”, depth-adding information, which is not critical to the core analysis. Appendices should not be used as a way to cut down word count (see this post which covers how to reduce word count ). In other words, don’t place content that is critical to the core analysis here, just to save word count. You will not earn marks on any content in the appendices, so don’t try to play the system!
And there you have it – the traditional dissertation structure and layout, from A-Z. To recap, the core structure for a dissertation or thesis is (typically) as follows:
Most importantly, the core chapters should reflect the research process (asking, investigating and answering your research question). Moreover, the research question(s) should form the golden thread throughout your dissertation structure. Everything should revolve around the research questions, and as you’ve seen, they should form both the start point (i.e. introduction chapter) and the endpoint (i.e. conclusion chapter).
I hope this post has provided you with clarity about the traditional dissertation/thesis structure and layout. If you have any questions or comments, please leave a comment below, or feel free to get in touch with us. Also, be sure to check out the rest of the Grad Coach Blog .
This post was based on one of our popular Research Bootcamps . If you're working on a research project, you'll definitely want to check this out ...
many thanks i found it very useful
Glad to hear that, Arun. Good luck writing your dissertation.
Such clear practical logical advice. I very much needed to read this to keep me focused in stead of fretting.. Perfect now ready to start my research!
what about scientific fields like computer or engineering thesis what is the difference in the structure? thank you very much
Thanks so much this helped me a lot!
Very helpful and accessible. What I like most is how practical the advice is along with helpful tools/ links.
Thanks Ade!
Thank you so much sir.. It was really helpful..
You’re welcome!
Hi! How many words maximum should contain the abstract?
Thank you so much 😊 Find this at the right moment
You’re most welcome. Good luck with your dissertation.
best ever benefit i got on right time thank you
Many times Clarity and vision of destination of dissertation is what makes the difference between good ,average and great researchers the same way a great automobile driver is fast with clarity of address and Clear weather conditions .
I guess Great researcher = great ideas + knowledge + great and fast data collection and modeling + great writing + high clarity on all these
You have given immense clarity from start to end.
Morning. Where will I write the definitions of what I’m referring to in my report?
Thank you so much Derek, I was almost lost! Thanks a tonnnn! Have a great day!
Thanks ! so concise and valuable
This was very helpful. Clear and concise. I know exactly what to do now.
Thank you for allowing me to go through briefly. I hope to find time to continue.
Really useful to me. Thanks a thousand times
Very interesting! It will definitely set me and many more for success. highly recommended.
Thank you soo much sir, for the opportunity to express my skills
Usefull, thanks a lot. Really clear
Very nice and easy to understand. Thank you .
That was incredibly useful. Thanks Grad Coach Crew!
My stress level just dropped at least 15 points after watching this. Just starting my thesis for my grad program and I feel a lot more capable now! Thanks for such a clear and helpful video, Emma and the GradCoach team!
Do we need to mention the number of words the dissertation contains in the main document?
It depends on your university’s requirements, so it would be best to check with them 🙂
Such a helpful post to help me get started with structuring my masters dissertation, thank you!
Great video; I appreciate that helpful information
It is so necessary or avital course
This blog is very informative for my research. Thank you
Doctoral students are required to fill out the National Research Council’s Survey of Earned Doctorates
wow this is an amazing gain in my life
This is so good
How can i arrange my specific objectives in my dissertation?
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Graduate School
Learn about overall organization of your thesis or dissertation. Then, find details for formatting your preliminaries, text, and supplementaries.
A typical thesis consists of three main parts – preliminaries, text, and supplementaries. Each part is to be organized as explained below and in the order indicated below:
1. Preliminaries:
3. Supplementaries:
These are the general requirements for all preliminary pages.
A sample Thesis title page pdf is available here , and a sample of a Dissertation title page pdf is available here.
Refer to the sample page as you read through the format requirements for the title page.
The heading “ Thesis ” or “ Dissertation ” is in all capital letters, centered one inch from the top of the page.
Divide this section exactly as shown on the sample page. One blank line must separate each line of text.
If your department name begins with “School of”, list as:
If you have questions about the correct name of your department or degree, consult your department. Areas of Study or specializations within a program are not listed on the Title Page.
The text of a thesis features an introduction and several chapters, sections and subsections. Text may also include parenthetical references, footnotes, or references to the bibliography or endnotes.
Any references to journal publications, authors, contributions, etc. on your chapter pages or major heading pages should be listed as a footnote .
Do not insert a running head.
When dividing paragraphs, at least two lines of text should appear at the bottom of the page and at least two lines of text on the next page.
The last word on a page may not be divided. No more than three lines in succession may end with hyphens. Divide words as indicated in a standard dictionary.
Poems should be double-spaced with triple-spacing between stanzas. Stanzas may be centered if lines are short.
These are the general requirements for all supplementary pages.
Occasionally, theses are written in languages other than English. In such cases, an English translation of the title and abstract must be included in the document.
In some departments, a student may do research on two or more generally related areas which would be difficult to combine into a single well-organized thesis. The solution is the multi-part thesis.
Library Services
To be made up of:
In-text citation:
(Smith, 2019)
Reference List:
Smith, E. R. C. (2019). Conduits of invasive species into the UK: the angling route? Ph. D. Thesis. University College London. Available at: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10072700 (Accessed: 20 May 2021).
The purpose of these Formatting Guidelines is to make all dissertations and theses legible, accessible, preservable, and uniform in presentation. The steps you take now to format your dissertation and thesis will improve the file for future readers.
See The Mardigian Library’s Formatting Your Thesis or Dissertation with Microsoft Word for video tutorials designed to help you get most of the formatting of your thesis correct the first time. It is recommended that you use the dissertation/thesis template available in this guide which has most of the guidelines already incorporated.
For questions about formatting beyond what is covered in these resources, please check with your dissertation or thesis advisor.
Techniques for creating accessible documents, including adding alternative text for images, can be found on this website.
Set Document Title: Set the document title (note: this is a document property, not the filename) as your dissertation or thesis title.
Set Document Language
Set the Language of Parts (Quotations, Sections) That Are Different from the Main Language (required if applicable)
Use Correct Headings: Use appropriate heading levels for section and subsection titles. Use “Heading 1” for main section titles (e.g. a Chapter), “Heading 2” for subsection titles (e.g. a Chapter section), and so on.
Create Lists, Columns, and Other Structures by Using the Appropriate Structural Element. Do not use space bar, tab, or enter to arrange text in apparent tables, lists, or columns.
Text, Fonts, Color, Spacing
Numbering and Page Numbering
Include the following components, in the following order. All required components must be included.
Use the page numbering conventions given below. Every section below starts on a new page with 2-inch top margin.
Title Page (required)
No page number. No page count.
Frontispiece (Illustration or Epigraph) (optional)
Identifier/Copyright Page (required)
Dedication (optional)
Page numbers required. Lowercase Roman numerals.
Preface (optional)
Table of Contents (required)
List of Tables, List of Figures, etc. (required if applicable)
List of Illustrations/Photos (required if applicable)
List of Appendices (required if applicable)
List of Abbreviations, List of Acronyms, List of Symbols (optional)
Abstract (required)
Dissertation or Thesis Text (required)
Bibliography or Reference section(s). (required)
Page numbers required. Arabic numerals. Insert at the end of each chapter, or the end of the dissertation/thesis, in the format preferred by the discipline.
Title Page Components
Include the following components on the title page, in the following order. Begin each item on a new line.
A dissertation (thesis) submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Name of Degree (Name of Program) in The University of Michigan-Dearborn YEAR
Identifier/Copyright Page Components
Include the following components on the identifier/copyright page, in the following order. Begin each item on a new line, centered.
ORCID iD is a unique digital identifier that you control and that distinguishes you from other researchers.
Copyright notice notifies readers that you hold the copyright to this work and when it was established.
Use the following format: © Full Name YEAR
Before submission, double-check the following:
The thesis or dissertation is submitted as public evidence of your scholarly research and accomplishment. A thesis or dissertation and abstract is normally made publicly available upon degree conferral when it is deposited electronically in Deep Blue. If a student wishes to postpone public release of the final product, also called an embargo, the student should discuss this option with his or her faculty advisor. It has always been the university's expectation that every dissertation and abstract will be released upon conferral of the degree. Only in specific circumstances may release of a thesis or dissertation be deferred, and then only for a limited period of time. The student is responsible for requesting an embargo.
Embargo forms can be found at: "Thesis and Dissertation Release and Embargo Options”
Required for doctoral dissertations and highly recommended for Master’s Thesis. The final pdf document of your dissertation or thesis must be submitted electronically to the Mardigian Library. This digital PDF will be the copy of record and will be archived in Deep Blue . Deep Blue is a digital repository that is part of the University of Michigan Library.
To submit your document, you need to provide:
To maintain the usability and appearance of your document, please review the Best Practices for Producing High Quality PDF Files , available on Deep Blue.
If you have supplemental materials (such as data) that should also be made publicly available and associated with your dissertation or thesis, consider reaching out to [email protected] for help determining whether these should be deposited into one of the Deep Blue repositories.
Once your document is submitted to Deep Blue by the library, you will receive an email containing the DOI and a URL to access the document. It will also be added to the Mardigian Library catalog and made available on Google Scholar. If no embargo is requested, it may take three to four weeks for your document to become available.
More support.
Contact your subject librarian for assistance on a wide range of topics including literature searching, citation management, and much more.
Office of graduate studies.
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Title: a double tracking method for optimization with decentralized generalized orthogonality constraints.
Abstract: In this paper, we consider the decentralized optimization problems with generalized orthogonality constraints, where both the objective function and the constraint exhibit a distributed structure. Such optimization problems, albeit ubiquitous in practical applications, remain unsolvable by existing algorithms in the presence of distributed constraints. To address this issue, we convert the original problem into an unconstrained penalty model by resorting to the recently proposed constraint-dissolving operator. However, this transformation compromises the essential property of separability in the resulting penalty function, rendering it impossible to employ existing algorithms to solve. We overcome this difficulty by introducing a novel algorithm that tracks the gradient of the objective function and the Jacobian of the constraint mapping simultaneously. The global convergence guarantee is rigorously established with an iteration complexity. To substantiate the effectiveness and efficiency of our proposed algorithm, we present numerical results on both synthetic and real-world datasets.
Subjects: | Optimization and Control (math.OC); Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing (cs.DC); Machine Learning (stat.ML) |
Cite as: | [math.OC] |
(or [math.OC] for this version) | |
Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite |
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To cite an unpublished dissertation (one you got directly from the author or university in print form), add "Unpublished" to the bracketed description, and list the university at the end of the reference, outside the square brackets. APA format. Author last name, Initials. (Year).
Published Dissertation or Thesis References. This page contains reference examples for published dissertations or theses. Kabir, J. M. (2016). Factors influencing customer satisfaction at a fast food hamburger chain: The relationship between customer satisfaction and customer loyalty (Publication No. 10169573) [Doctoral dissertation, Wilmington ...
Citing a published dissertation or thesis from a database. If a thesis or dissertation has been published and is found on a database, then follow the structure below. It's similar to the format for an unpublished dissertation/thesis, but with a few differences: Structure: Author's last name, F. M. (Year published).
How to Cite a Published Dissertation or Thesis in APA. To cite a published dissertation in APA 7th edition, you need to include: Author, A. A. (Year). Title of doctoral dissertation or master's thesis (Publication number, if available) [Doctoral dissertation or master's thesis, Institution]. Publisher.
Narrative citation: Harris (2014) When a dissertation or thesis is unpublished, include the description " [Unpublished doctoral dissertation]" or " [Unpublished master's thesis]" in square brackets after the dissertation or thesis title. In the source element of the reference, provide the name of the institution that awarded the degree.
Proper citation is indispensable for maintaining the integrity and credibility of your dissertation. By adhering to best practices such as choosing the right citation style, ensuring accurate referencing, and effectively quoting, paraphrasing, and summarizing sources, you contribute to a transparent and honest academic conversation.
Thesis, from a commercial database. Lope, M. D. (2014). Perceptions of global mindedness in the international baccalaureate middle years programme: The relationship to student academic performance and teacher characteristics (Order No. 3682837) [Doctoral dissertation, University of Maryland].ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global.
Unpublished Thesis or Dissertation. Last name, Initial (s). (Year). Title of Doctoral dissertation or Master's thesis [Unpublished Doctoral dissertation or Master's thesis). Name of Institution. Example. Pope, S. (2013). Parental participation in the child protection process [Unpublished Master's thesis]. Swansea University.
Theses are generally the culminating work for a master's or undergraduate degree and dissertations are often original research completed by doctoral students. Here are examples of a dissertation & a thesis, and how they would be formatted: Examples: Dissertation found in Proquest Dissertations and Theses Global: Reference: Banks, B. (2020).
In a thesis, however, if the reference is very important and the original is in some foreign language that cannot be retrieved easily, it is permissible to cite it. List such references with an asterisk and footnote: 'originals not seen'. Still, avoid using too many references, the originals of which have not been seen. ...
How to cite a dissertation in APA. Give the last name and initials (e. g. Watson, J. D.) of up to seven authors with the last name preceded by an ampersand (&). For eight or more authors include the first six names followed by an ellipsis (…) and add the last author's name. Give the full URL where the document can be retrieved from.
General Rule: Author, A. A. (year). Title of doctoral dissertation or master's thesis (Publication No. #) [Doctoral dissertation or master's thesis, Name of Institution Awarding the Degree].Name of Database. Example: Davis, P. M. (2010). Access, readership, citations: A randomized controlled trial of scientific journal publishing.
Include Recent Researches. As important as relevant studies are for your dissertation, including recent studies only is equally important. Using reference in a dissertation that belong to the past five to ten years are acceptable; however, using references of the 1980s or 1990s is not recommended. The main reason being changes in time, settings ...
References in research are a list of sources that a researcher has consulted or cited while conducting their study. They are an essential component of any academic work, including research papers, theses, dissertations, and other scholarly publications. Types of References. There are several types of references used in research, and the type of ...
A thesis is a long-term, large project that involves both research and writing; it is easy to lose focus, motivation, and momentum. Here are suggestions for achieving the result you want in the time you have. The dissertation is probably the largest project you have undertaken, and a lot of the work is self-directed.
Thesis Paper AI Proofreader Essay Checker PhD dissertation APA editing Academic editing College admissions essay Personal statement English proofreading Spanish, French, or German. ... Improve your in-text citations and references for errors and inconsistencies using Scribbr's AI technology or human experts. Run a free check.
Thesis and dissertation can mean different things depending on where the degree is awarded. Always check the title page, or subsequent pages, to determine exactly what the work is and use the information for your reference. Auckland University of Technology (and other NZ universities) Thesis is either for a doctoral or a master's degree.
Parenthetical citations: (Grady et al., 2019; Jerrentrup et al., 2018) Narrative citations: Grady et al. (2019) and Jerrentrup et al. (2018) If a journal article has a DOI, include the DOI in the reference. If the journal article does not have a DOI and is from an academic research database, end the reference after the page range (for an explanation of why, see the database information page).
The structure of a dissertation depends on your field, but it is usually divided into at least four or five chapters (including an introduction and conclusion chapter). The most common dissertation structure in the sciences and social sciences includes: An introduction to your topic. A literature review that surveys relevant sources.
For some Master Thesis tasks, there may be a number of default works that should always be listed in the initial exposition of the general topic, which in itself already fill a page of references, whereas other Master Thesis tasks might not have such a "default list"; the general exposition is done with very few or without any references.
Whether authors' names are capitalised in the references list. Whether "p." or just a number is used when referring to page numbers. Whether a comma separates the author and date in the parenthetical reference (Smith 2012 or Smith, 2012) The organisation and formatting of various bibliographic elements.
Time to recap…. And there you have it - the traditional dissertation structure and layout, from A-Z. To recap, the core structure for a dissertation or thesis is (typically) as follows: Title page. Acknowledgments page. Abstract (or executive summary) Table of contents, list of figures and tables.
The text of a thesis features an introduction and several chapters, sections and subsections. Text may also include parenthetical references, footnotes, or references to the bibliography or endnotes. Any references to journal publications, authors, contributions, etc. on your chapter pages or major heading pages should be listed as a footnote.
Thesis or dissertation. To be made up of: Author. Year of submission (in round brackets). Title of thesis (in italics). Degree statement. Degree-awarding body. Available at: URL. (Accessed: date).
All entries in the table of contents and lists match contents as titled/ordered in the dissertation text. References/Bibliography entries are complete and match the formatting preference of your discipline. Thesis or Dissertation Embargo. The thesis or dissertation is submitted as public evidence of your scholarly research and accomplishment.
View PDF HTML (experimental) Abstract: In this paper, we consider the decentralized optimization problems with generalized orthogonality constraints, where both the objective function and the constraint exhibit a distributed structure. Such optimization problems, albeit ubiquitous in practical applications, remain unsolvable by existing algorithms in the presence of distributed constraints.