|
The easy answer is 'yes and no'.
There are certain conventions specific to certain disciplines.
However, these structures are not imposed on a piece of work.
There are logical reasons why there is a conventional way of
structuring the thesis, which is after all the account of what
you've achieved through your research. Research is of course
not conducted in the step-by-step way this structure suggests,
but it gives the reader the most accessible way of seeing why
this research was done, how it was done and, most importantly,
what has been achieved. If you put side by side all the questions
you had to answer to finish your research and what is often proposed
as a typical structure of a thesis, then you see the logic of
the arrangement. That does not mean, however, that you have to
name your chapters in this way. In some disciplines, it very
often is like this; in others, this structure is implied. For
example, in many science theses, the following basically is the
structure; in many humanities theses, the final structure looks
very different, although all of these questions are answered one
way or another.
| Why am I doing it? |
Introduction
Significance
|
What is known?
What is unknown? |
Review of research
Identifying gaps
|
| What do I hope to discover? |
Aims
|
| How am I going to discover it? |
Methodology
|
| What have I found? |
Results
|
| What does it mean? |
Discussion
|
So what? What are the possible applications or recommendations?
What contribution does it make to knowledge? What next? |
Conclusions
|
Occasionally a thesis is written which does not in any way comply
with this structure. Generally the reasons you want to have a
recognised, transparent structure are that, to some extent, it
is expected and the conventional structure allows readers ready
access to the information. If, however, you want to publish a
book based on the thesis, it is likely the structure would need
to be altered for the different genre and audience.
|
