How to start PhD research

PhD is the abbreviation of Doctor of Philosophy it is the at most high level of education that you can study. If you are passionate about research works and willing to contribute in academic field you can opt to undertake a PhD study. Most of the career opportunities related to academics in universities and research institutes, expects their employees to have a PhD degree.

Now we can elaborately discuss about PhD proposal and process involved in to apply for it.

How to start a PhD proposal

            When you want to apply for PhD, the first stage of it is to know about the PhD proposal. If you want to do a research degree from any university then your application should also incorporate the PhD proposal. Each university out there will have different kind of application process. A PhD proposal should contain around 2000 to 3000 words. The PhD proposal is a part of your application process.

            Some important key points that should be addressed in your proposal are the main, the area in which you want to do a study, the problem you want to address and aim of your PhD proposal. It should also explain about the methodology you choose for your study, the research problem and your expected output. The proposal examines why the chosen field of you should be investigated, why you are more inclined to the topic and the reason behind choosing the particular mentor.

Some of the tips are mentioned below you can use them for writing your proposal:

1. Include a title page:

            While choosing a title for your study, make it interesting and catchy as possible. The title should attract the attention of reader’s. Your working title can be with ten words and should define about your study. You can also add your contact details to the title page.

2. Write an introduction

            The introduction of your PhD proposal should be constructed deliberately, by framing sentences properly to address the exact problem you want to work in. your proposal should signify how your research can contribute to the society. At this stage of your research proposal you need not mention more details; you can just talk about how you will overcome the limitations of already existing literature.

3. Do a literature review

            In this part of the research you have to go through the literatures available on the topic related to your research to know more about the field and to fill the existing gaps. The main motive of this section is to make you more familiar with the topic of your research and help you understand the topic more deeply. In this phase you have to be very clear about the main theme about the topic and how can you help with the betterment of it. You should clearly demonstrate the content of your topic and why you choose this domain through your PhD proposal.

            The admission officer from a particular university or research institute should able to find out about your knowledge of the topic and reason behind your choice of instructor after knowing their hypotheses and concepts.

4. Determine your methodology

            You can mention about the methodology you opt to choose for your research plan, and why you choose that in particular. You can give a brief definition regarding the overall focus for the research that you are going to do. This can include your research methodology like whether it is an empirical research or a primary research.

            The admission officer will find your proposal more interesting when you present the information in a more attractive way. To mention about the person with whom you want to speak or about the questions to ask in interview is not compulsory at this stage. Moreover you can come out with a general description of things with sections of interviewees like medical staff, engineers and politicians.

5. Construct a thesis statement:

            In the PhD proposal thesis statement section contains more responsibility to deliver the main ideology of your project to the readers. In this you should not explain about your expected result rather you should address the problem you are going to work on.

6. Write your conclusion:

            The conclusion of your proposal should give importance to state that your research is more valid and it should also bring all the previous phases together. It can also add all the chapters of topic you want to discuss about. You can write about the pros and cons of tour research topic.

7. Create a timeline for your work

            By creating a timetable for your project you can schedule your individual objectives of the goal which shows you are more familiar regarding the process and planned your whole research. You can frame each section of your project using a timeline and could know what you can achieve in a year or in a month.

8. Proofread for errors

            You should do proofread your PhD proposal before submitting it for the application of PhD study. It is more important to check the format of the paper in terms of clear outline, number of pages and relative headings according to the style preferred by particular university. To do this you may seek help from someone who is more familiar to proofread your proposal.

Guidance for how to write a successful PhD proposal

Go through the below information and follow it accordingly to get more chances of getting a chance to do PhD:

·       Communicate clearly:

Explain about your idea in a clear and concise way to express all your ideas related to the project. May be the ideology of your project is complex but explain it in a simpler way which can be understood by all common people. Try to avoid the usage of more complex or technical terms to make it more straightforward.

·       Analyze your subject:

For doing a PhD research capability of thinking analytically is very much needed. Analytical thinking includes marking limitations from already existing studies or research papers, looking a problem from every different way to solve it by keenly observing the topic. There could be difference between your expectation of result and outcome of your study.

·       Introduce details gradually:

You can add about your research problem, the main objectives of it and the goal of your project to the proposal at this stage. Avoid too much information add on to your proposal at the early stage. In addition to it you can add information regarding your methodology or about the expected outcome of your research. On the further improvement of your project you can follow up with extra details.

·       Demonstrate your understanding of the subject:

Explain everything you know about the project clearly and the plan you made for study it will express your project in a more reasonable way. Shortening the information might portray you in such a way that you haven’t done enough of the literature survey.

·       Create different proposals for each university:

If you are applying for different universities then use different proposal for each one of them rather than sending the same. Not required to re write every portion. You can explain about how your research helps several departments and your interest to work with the instructor.