Aww good luck to you Emmaki - sounds like you've got a lot on your plate there. Hope you feel better soon!

Hi - thanks for the great advice, I'll certainly sit down with my supervisors and go through all of the points raised above. The good thing is my supervisors seem very keen on supervision and I guess I'm lucky in the sense that both are really 'hands on' kind of guys as opposed to very distant academic figures!

Firstly I'll be producing a research proposal (the one submitted for funding was very loose and brief, and so I'll need a much tighter, comprehensive proposal for my thesis). As for what else the first year comprises, I'd guess a literature review would be one of the first points of call. Again I'll have to discuss all this with my supervisors.

I was really excited to get the scholarship, however am a bit nervous now as there seem to be lots of unhappy people on the forum!

H :-)

Hi everyone

I'm new to the forum - so hello! First I'd better give you a bit about me - I'm a psychology graduate from the UK and have come overseas to New Zealand in order to complete a PhD at Massey University, based in Auckland. I've seen a lot of negative posts on here, and I'm keen for some advice in starting my PhD, like what to expect, what are the challenges, things people have enjoyed or hated.... just a general feel for the PhD process I guess!

My PhD topic is in health psychology, so if anyone has completed/completing a PhD in psychology or social science I'd be really keen to hear form you! I suppose my initial worries are how to get started and what generally the first year of a PhD should entail, and what the workload expectations are.

I realise this is a bit of a vague post.

Looking forward to hearing from fellow PhD-ers! :-)