Also think about what you want to with the PhD and research on a long term basis. This is what impressed my supervisor who offered me a studentship. Also remember you will leanr most of what you need to know during your PhD, so just be and act confident and you will be fine!

I am just conducting my interviews and trying to transcribe which I am way behind on. My tutors recommended that I pay someone to do some of them for me. If I was on their salaries I could think about it, but paying around £80 for an hour of transcription is a killer, esp as I have around 50 hours to do! So, can anyone give me any tips, recommend any software, or anything that will help.

So far I have: a foot pedal, and am using ExpressScribe. I find that having something on in the background that doesnt need sound helps, e.g. a football match etc... but this is not always practical!

Please help!

Thanks.

S

Some very wise words here. Thanks very much everyone!

Thanks!

All you need to do is find a good mortgage broker. DO NOT GO DIRECTLY TO THE LENDERS. Trust me, if you find a good broker, he or she will be able to sort out what you need, as long as you have the necessary deposit (usually around 25% of the property value minimum).

I see my superevisors once a month which seems to work ok. As long as she is available by email you should be fine. I wouldn't worry about it.

Hi all,

I have a problem of sometimes falling asleep when reading either in the library or at home, which is quite embarrassing when I snore!

I was just wondering if anyone has any tips on staying awake, or any natural energy remedies? I really don't want to be drinking energy drinks everyday.

Please help!

S.

Critical in terms of writing means the same as it does in life. Without being critical for the sake of it, you need to read the literature and give your honest opinion about it. If you think it is crap, then say so, if you agree with something but think it needs to be tweaked, then say so. With a PhD, you need to excel yourself and value your own judgements. I am only learning this now after a year in!

But be careful! You need to have evidence, i.e. through other literature you agree with, or through primary research.

There is a great chapter in a Becker book which will help you.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Writing-Social-Scientists-Chicago-Publishing/dp/0226041301/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1233161591&sr=1-6

break the barrier and call him by hist first name. A PhD is different to a masters. You need to now consider yourself on slightly more of the same level as your professors, and they should treat you the same way. Also, as someone said the first few months are difficult. I am just coming up to a year now and am surprised I am not a mental wreck by now! Any concerns you have, just look for similar posts on here or post your own and people will reply. Everyone on here is really good, and always trying to help each other. Just remember, whatever difficulties you may encounter, someone else has probably had them too, it is just part of being a PhD student! Good luck and see you on the other side!

My dept (social sciences) say between 80-120k. But think my tutor would prefer the lower end. I think I will need the upper end!

I use a thing called Carbonite. It is the same company that gave us winzip so is very trusted. My bro in law is a programmer and swears by it. You pay around $40-50 a year (which is about £25-30, look out for deals on the web). The great thing about it is that it runs quietly in the background and when you ammend anything at all on your comp it automatically updates it on the server. Even if you change the directory of a file it will do this. Also just say you by mistake (and this happened to me, but thank God I had Carbonite by then) you copy over a file or save it with the wrong name and write over another word doc (as you can easily do when you have so many with similar names, eg. Methodology v1, v2 etc), it will give you the option of downloading recently backed up versions.

Basically it is great. If you don't mind spending the money I would get it. I wouldn't usually spen the cash, but I just thought, if I lose all of my hard work I will be royally screwed!

Oh and also it is unlimited! My bro in law has all of his songs and movies backed up, around 55GB!

Hi,

Thank you both for your replies. I found a couple of good books yesterday. I discovered that I am going to have a 'theoretical model' which is deductive in design. I will then incorporate a diagrammatic representation and also incorporate elements of heuristic research. I don't know if that even makes sense to me at the moment, but that's the plan!

Thanks again!

J.

Hello all,

Just a quick question. I am conducting my PhD within the Social Sciences. I have developed a model from reading other academics theories and will be using it to inform my analysis (which will be through semi-structured interviewing), and then revising the model afterwards if necessary. My tutor seems to think this will be call a heuristic model, but I am unsure as I can't find much to back this up. She also thinks it may be called a framework analysis. Does anyone have any ideas on this?

Thanks,

J.

W... no I mean Rank