Hi,

Im about to do a part-time PhD and a friend of mine (who is currently doing a funded PhD) told me of a girl who do a part-time PhD in Archeology at UCL. Her thesis did not involve any experimental work and was mostly literature reviews. Anyway, cut a long story short, after 6 years she submitted and after her viva they told her her thesis was not good enough for a PhD and awarded her a masters. The women tried to sue the university but her case was thrown out.

This story scares the hell out of me because, wait for it, my part-time PhD will be non experimental and mostly a literature review. It will be a joint colab. between the Dept of Life Science and Archaeology at the University of Reading.

My friend could be BS but has anyone else heard of such things happening? Surely, if her thesis was not PhD worthy they would have spotted it at some point during the 5/6 years she was working on it. Should they not have spotted it after her 2 year MPhill stage? It looks as if her supervisor just used her to do his research for him and screwed her out of her money under the false pretense that her work was PhD worthy. This is unethical in my eyes. I hope its not true since it puts me off because you will never know the true intentions of your supervisor until its too late.

Even with a good supervisor a thesis can fail. This happened to a superb student in my department, who had just about the best supervisor. She wasn't even offered a Masters at her viva, but failed outright. This sent shockwaves through my department.

However a PhD has to make an adequate contribution to knowledge. I'd be very sceptical that something based purely on a literature review could do that. Or at the very least there's more of a chance that that might not be deemed acceptable.

I started a full-time science PhD over a decade ago. Recently I completed a part-time (6 year) history PhD. So I've been through the process twice. My second PhD was in humanities, but involved a substantial amount of new research. The literature review was a teeny weeny bit, maybe no more than 10% in total, probably not even that.

If you have faith in your supervisor, you should be fine. Perhaps that person submitted against the advice of their supervisor?? While it is not the supervisor who awards you the PhD, it is they who tell you when your PhD is good to go, ie ready for submission. Why not register (if you haven't already) with the British library thesis online service and have a look at other theses - either in your field or do a title search for those with literature review in the thesis title - it might put your mind at rest. It's free :-) and available at:
http://ethos.bl.uk/Home.do

Thanks for the replies Bilbo and Ady.

Bilbo - what type of research did you do for your history/humanities PhD? I assume its very different to the life science style of experimental (i.e. lab based) research? Did you find the transition difficult, from life science research to a art based research? Im in a simmilar situation to what you were in, I have a life science research background but about to do a non experimental PhD. Im seeing the supervisor this Friday to discuss in detail but I have no clue what research I can do for my project.

I was a history student, so I did research in historical documents. For example I transcribed library borrowing records - thousands and thousands and thousands of borrowings - as well as trawling through diaries, letters, memoirs, autobiographies etc, looking for relevant references.

My previous go at a PhD wasn't life science, but computer science, so building software solutions. Very very different from humanities. But I've always been a historical researcher, since a very young age, so I took to the second go like a duck to a water. I also retrained from scratch: after I left my computer science PhD (left due to MS-like illness developing) I got a new BA in history, then a Masters. So I was fully retrained the second time around.

As an archaeology student wouldn't you be working with artefacts, either directly or second-hand, so writing about what has been found? Or archaeological surveys? You should be doing mre than just writing about what other people have done.

I think I will be doing something similar.

I will be visiting my potential supervisor this Friday to get confirmation of the thesis. It’s not a project I have come with, it all her idea which is unusual for a part-time PhD. She is a life science researcher in the departments of Genetics. Her key interests are Forensic Entomology and Forensic DNA analysis, which is also my interest. I initially approached her asking if she had any suitable non experimental (i.e. non lab) projects that I could do for a PhD. I had a published paper in Forensic Entomology and she had heard of me and my paper and was keen to speak to me and had a non experimental project that she believed I would find interesting. Im seeing her in person this Friday but she briefly mentioned that the project with be in collaboration with the department of archaeology and would involve looking into the history of forensic entomology. However, Im not sure what type of research this will involve since its completely new approach for me, - Im more used to the traditional life science approach to research via experiments so researching in history or art based subjects is completely new to me. I will have to learn as I go along.

I fear I may be out of my debt since I have been out of academic research for 8 years! Im 31 now.

A mere baby! Try returning after 20 years!!

Oh you're a young thing, you'll be fine :p When I was a full-time PhD student I was 21-23. There was a big gap before I had a second go (yes I was retraining with a BA and Masters, but they're very different from PhD-type research). Then I was 31-37 :-)

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Thanks to you and Ady!

Bilbo - do you have any thoughts on what I wrote in my previous post, the one before this, about my potential project. I will be looking into the history of forensic entomology so Im a little confused as to what type of research I can do. I will be discussing this on Friday anyway but it would be great to get some small hints and tips from a history student. I appreciate I have not given much info, if any, on the actual project, Im just curious as to what "research into history" involves.

I have a similar story, I submitted, my supervisor said it was 100% certain to pass, my viva was cancelled because my thesis was 'so unsatisfactory'. I took it though the complaints proceedure and the OIA and they uphelded the majority of my complaint. I then went back, re-wrote the whole thing and had a very sucessful viva and graduated last year. It can, and does, happen. I am surprised they did not cancel the viva, this at least give the candidate a second chance.

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Afraid I don't. I even had to look up "entomology" to see what it means :p It's very much outside my area. But your supervisor should be able to advise. Typically historical research involves using historical documents, like the kind I described in my previous post. But I would have thought something more archaeology based might be a little bit different. But, again, your supervisor should be able to clarify all this for you.

Good luck!

I don't think this is about being part-time, it can happen to a full-time PhD just as easily.

I think one way of avoiding 'being used' is by communicating a lot with other people, your colleague and other students/lecturers in your field once you start. That way, you will get a good understanding of what is expected of you as a PhD student, and what is not.