my sup always gets me an xmas present, and I always just look embarrassed and say thanks lol. I've never got her anything!

I think she'd like a book or tickets to see some arty rubbish which would be dull IMO, but she'd find it really interesting haha! Or wine.

Just make sure you have your 'story' properly sorted. Make sure you know the aims and the outcomes of each chapter and how these feed into the story. I wish I'd done this as an overall plan - it would have saved lots of re-writes!

You really do have to combine, becuase at some point you need to send it to the printers, and I wouldn't trust any printers to get it all in the right order - even if you numbered it etc. they're bound (pardon the pun) to get it all messed up

my advice - write each chapter in a different word doc. only combine at the last possible minute. Then all you have to do is hit the 'refresh' button on mendeley and it should do all the sorting out automatically. Although I'm finding when you edit a reference, for example if I want to put e.g.

(e.g. Smith, 2010), rather than (Smith, 2010), it won't update the citation on any edits. So if it was (Smith, Jones & Wilson, 2002) and I changed it to (e.g. Smith, Jones & Wilson, 2002) - it will never go to (e.g. Smith et al 2002), because I've edited it, if that makes sense, whereas endnote did do that.

yes, use a reference manager! I have 35 pages of references for my thesis! and if your sup gets you to edit a paragraph, then you may need to take references in/out. Plus it can be difficult to track whether it should be 'et al' or not over all your chapters etc.

I use mendeley. TBH I preferred endnote, but that was expensive, and mendeley is free. I find it has a few bugs which are annoying, but it also has some great features - particularly the ability to read pdfs and highlight/write comments on them.

I have this problem. I can only suggest telling your mum what your thsis is about and recording the conversation!

WOOOOOOOO!

Congratulations :-)

I don't think it really matters, in one way its good, because they won't pick you up on specifics. But I'd look at what kind of methodologies they use etc. My sup appointed examiners because she wanted thme to know who she was - she didn't even know my internal and then said he might play an ego game in the viva and fight with the other bloke to be alpha male at the expense of my PhD! - thanks!

Walminski helped me with this. He read my methods chapter and suggested it was also a bit 'textbook' his comments were basically don't describe the epistemology etc, just summarise, but focus on *why* you have chosen it. So I stripped mine back and just left a table in that explains the different epistemology, and then focused on why I chose what I did in relation to my specific field.

I know some people liek to make it all 'personal' like a research journey or something - that's a bit touchy feely for me. I basically went with "it was the best thing for the job" lol.

ooh I got mine today. Eeek! I haven't even submitted yet!

1) google 'imposter syndrome'

2) don't believe the hype - you don't *have* to love your subject. I hate mine. Like you, I like the general area/discipline, but the topic has no real interest for me at all. I just treat it like something that has to be done.

I guess it depends what you want to do long term and what the options are in your field.

yeah, that's a mixed ANOVA with one independent factor which has 2 levels (system A or B) and then a second factor, which is repeated measures, which has four levels (time 1, time 2, time 3, time 4).

When books talk about unequal sample sizes, then the difference between 21 and 24 is fine, its when the difference is like 21 and 60 then its an issue - especially if all your assumption tests are ok (i.e Levene's test).

Not normal I think but I would much prefer this. I have that horrible thing of everyone gawking out of their offices (which are glass) as you do 'the walk of shame' back/to the viva so everyone knows exactly what is going on and rumours go like wildfire around the building about how its gone so far, etc etc.

So I'd much rather do it where all the nosy people in the department don't know!

I'm also a bit of an introvert, so I'd hate the bubbly thing - would rather go home and collapse in front of an x factor repeat with a nice mug of tea as I know I'll be exhausted and won't fancy putting on a 'face' for hours in the pub afterwards!

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yep, I supervised about 15 this summer (similar to health psych type of projects).

a) I think we were told to devote about 10 hours of contact time per student, but probably more about 20 overall in terms of emails etc. Some are more demanding than others and some need more support!
b) I was paid per student
c) I had group meeting to begin with, but tried to meet once a month for the first few months and then more frequently if they needed specific help e.g. with analysis
d) no didn't have any anyway
e) yes, I'm in academia, but it has given me confidence in my own knowledge - i.e. i was suprised at how much I knew compared to them! Also, I can say that I have managed people and deadlines etc etc

All the viva's I've seen (i.e. watched people do them in my department) - you tend to have the viva, then you go out for 30 mins or so and then you get called back where they tell you what the result is. Of the 10 people I've known to have a viva, about 8 of them had to ask for clarification about what the result actually was, as they were completely unclear as to whether they had passed or failed because the examiners aren't often very straight talking I guess.

I suppose you do have the opporutnity to argue, but I'd imagine, they've already made up their mind before they even come to the viva. I suppose if you get asked for a major amendment and you think its completely stupid, then you can tell them why and they may re-consult eachother?