You will also need an appropriate 'letter' to go with your questionnaire, and may need some kind of tickbox to show they agree to your work. some researchers also suggest that the participants should download the questionnaire and post it, but that defeats the object really. Not running stuff by the ethics board is risky.

I would read the articles if I were you, just so you can say you have read up on the ethics, you might find it difficult to get past your ethics board otherwise. The use of the internet is growing and there are issues now being considered such as what they call 'lurking' and the fact that you should inform anyone that they will be part of your research just as if they were filling in a paper questionnaire. The group that I am using have individual e-mails that I can use to contact them directly if I want to quote either from the questionnaire or from comments made to the site(this is because the sites are closed to the general public), but with other more general sites you may have problems in preserving anonymity.

I'm also doing an online survey, and it does work well for me, as I can target the right people. However have you read the recent articles that are appearing concerning the ethics issue? Particularly Madge, E. and O'Connor H. (2002) On-line with e-mums: exploring the Internet as a medium for research in Arena 34,1 pp92-102, Hewson, C. Conducting research on the internet in The Psychologist, vol 16 no. 6 and Brownlow, C. and O'Dell, L. (2002) Ethical Issues in for Qualitative Research in On-line Communities in Disability & Society Vol 17, No 6, 685-694? Sorry can do the proper ref, machine won't let me do anything but this text. My participants are keen to get involved, and I am a member of the group and have been for a number of years, so the situation might not be quite the same as yours, but I quoted from these papers when doing my ethics bit.

Just one small thought cakeman, Have you tried the experiment that you know works? If it does then you know you have the method as stated right, if not, try to get in touch with those who did it for advice. (If this is a rubbish suggestion, just put it down to me not knowing anything much about your work )

Got a message today saying the meeting will have to be at 2.30. I will see the secretary to ask what the deadline is, (really nice person, and I'm going to a meeting there at 5.30, so may have an hour or two) but fear it won't make it

Hope you don't end up in the same situation as my daughter, who has always used Harvard (so have I)and had two essays back this week, both with footnotes,from the same university one said the essay they marked was the best essay they had read this year, no comment about footnotes. The other said the uni style does not allow footnotes, added the footnote words into the word count of the essay, said it was too long and took off 10% of the marks.

It isn't really a prob as I can overshoot this deadline and submit in September, but I want to get going on the next bit and feel I need to get the plans validated before continuing. I don't know why they have involved this person as he seems to think I am researching a different area, or wants me to research a different area, one that has been well trodden and I really don't want to go down that path. I have sent my first supervisor a suitable reply, but I really want to say I think this minion is rubbish

I've been preparing to submit work for my next hurdle. - don't you just love all these things that you have to do which have very little bearing on your work - and I have been telling them that I want to get things in in time for the last submission date for this academic year for at least a month. I got an e-mail today saying the planned meeting for tomorrow is off, as main super is still waiting to hear from the second super and we can't get further until he does. I am really cross about this because I hate leaving things till the last minute and when we meet I will have just the rest of the day, until about 4.30 to get it finished.

When I presented my chapter plan sans lit review I was told there had to be one, so I've put one in, but am not sure what is going to go in it yet!

I'm wondering about this too, most of my material will come from books, jourmals, gov webistes etc. and there is going to be a lot of analysis of same so my problem is where does the lit review end and the rest of the thing begin . I have one samll bit of research which will invole questionnaires, simply because there is a need to prove my initial scene setting is justified, before I launch into the rest. The problem is there has been very little research done in my area, and what is more some of the stuff that has been done has major flaws that are only obvious if viewed alongside the points I will be making later. (for example one report suggests that most people in the area are ex military - the sample was very small and the sampling was unconventional - whereas I never had anyone from any of my various sources over the years from this background) so there isn't much literature to review and if I review it here, what goes in the other chapters?

I started out in mad lab science, and have ended up in education. Did MA in education and was encouraged by them to carry on. So if you do well in the MA I can't see a problem.

This is one of those difficult situations. The computer problem might be solved by speaking to your IT department maybe, but it isn't unique, my supervisor has a computer that also has the same problem. It is odd that the department, that is supposedly full of intellectually able people should adopt such tactics, but you shouldn't let it get to you. If you want to do the work with the other person, just say so, and do it. Sometimes it is more difficult being part time because you aren't around so much so miss out on bits and pieces. The e-mail thing is odd, becuase at my place its just a list that is generated for departments, and I think is ultimately controlled by IT (may be wrong there, but they do seem to control a lot of things!. BH - have you read 'the rise of the meritocracy' -quite an interesting book which I am using as part of my section on labour power

I expect your supervisor does know something about your subject. People don't get to be supervisors without having a wide knowledge of areas that relate to their own particular area. A lot of research work has to be self motivated (I suppose lab work is a bit different if it is a joint project) read the handbook to find out what you should be doing, go to the supervisor with some kind of overall plan, ask for advice about the first area you want to tackle and take it from there. You must not underestimate their knowledge, you should ultimately become an expert in your own particular bit, and then you can explain that to them, but I expect that on the way you will uncover bits of info, or some comment by someone else that you think they won't know about, but will find they know more than you do . Also, if you think they know nothing about the area - perhaps you haven't explained it very well to them?

My uni doesn't allow hot food in the library, although looking at some of the books it looks like several people have bought in coffe and the like and spilt it. However we too have the soft chair areas, it must be a growing trend I suppose. It doesn't help much when you want to work though

i had a similar experience right at the beginning of the process because someone in the dept didn't think the work was valid - I had to put in a load more detail to prove that it was, and my lovely supervisor helped me rephrase the title so that it was succinct but a little bit obscure (it could end up as quite a political piece in the end) so it wouldn't look like it was going to do any boat rocking. I'm at the same stage again now with the next hurdle and have had to cut down the explanation, so I'm hoping they won't want more info AGAIN . First they want just an outline, or so they say, then they decide the want more detail which turns it from the supposed 1000 or so words to getting on for 7000, I which they would decide what they do want sometimes.