I've been looking at all the ethical matters concerned with my research and I think I'd like to write it as a chapter by itself because the matter is extremely wide-ranging as far as my research is concerned: vulnerable subjects, interviews, questionnaires - stuff like that. Do you think that could be a good idea, or is it not very conventional for a thesis?

I'll just add, I've already written something - and it just sits well by itself. I can't see how I could just tack it on as a paragraph in my methodology chapter.

Could do,

I can't help but wonder why you would if you already have a fairly substantial amount of thesis material and a deadline you are having to work stupidly hard to meet. Essentially, why make things any more difficult for yourself than it already is?

A PhD is a training exercise, not necessarily a masterpiece, and chances are if you are remaining within your field, you will do much better research after graduation, therefore, why bother?

I'd include it as it's own chapter for now. If you have ethical considerations, and ones that are higly specific to your research, then they need discussing. You don't want to get to the Viva stage and be asked why you didn't discuss the ethics in depth. Your supervisor will let you know as well if you've gone too far off piste with it as well. And if that's the case you can just cut it down and tag it on the end of the methodology.

All in all I'd go for it as it stands. I think it'd save time and tears later.

Hey Wal, my supervisor has mentioned that I might want to have a chapter regarding ethical issues, although we haven't really finalised this yet. But I think when you're working with vulnerable people, especially if you have had to go through NHS ethics, then it's a really good idea to outline these issues in the thesis, because it's a really big deal in this type of research. I'm not sure exactly what sort of population you're working with, but some of my participants are not judged to have the capacity to even consent to participate in the research themselves, which of course is a huge issue. If you have a lot to write about on the topic, then I don't see why you shouldn't make an extra chapter on it. Just my thoughts! Best, KB