For a student pursuing a doctoral degree, selecting a dissertation topic can cause an existential crisis. You spend your entire academic career learning more and more information. Then, you have to select one narrow topic to spend your life on for the next year or two. Additionally, one of the most common questions that you’ll get after graduation is, “What did you write your dissertation on?” — even years after completing your degree. Selecting a topic doesn’t have to be stress inducing. I want to share 5 easy steps for how to choose a dissertation topic.
Most students see a sea of options and have no idea how to select a great dissertation topic.
My advice will be most helpful for those in education (my field), but also should help those in the social sciences more generally. Humanities and science doctoral students may have to modify some of these, yet I hope you’ll still find them useful.
As with any dissertation advice, one of the most important factors is to check with your chair or potential chair. Each faculty member thinks about these issues slightly differently and their advice may differ from mine.
Step 1
Identify 10 potential topics. Try to have as much variety in the ten as possible. Write 1-3 sentences describing each topic, but don’t do any more at this stage. Ask your chair and mentors about their advice on the list. Typically, several topics won’t be doable for many different reasons so these can be eliminated.
Step 2
Select three or four of the topics and write 1-3 pages on each. You should review relevant literature and pressing questions in the field related to the topic. Additionally, you may present questions you find compelling or particular areas of the topic that are most appealing.
During the course of writing up the 1-3 pages, you may find yourself disinterested in a topic. This is excellent and tells you which topic you should immediately throw out.
Step 3
Schedule a meeting with faculty advisors and mentors to discuss the topics you selected. You may want to share your write ups of the topics before the meeting. Faculty will be able to help you refine your topic and suggest suitable chairs for such a study.
Step 4
If you already have a chair, congratulations. Skip to Step 5.
If you’re still seeking a chair, you should have met with several faculty about your potential topics. In these meetings, potential chairs may have been suggested or you may have identified someone who you would like to be your chair. Your goal is to find someone you can work well with, who knows your abilities and interests, and has expertise on your topic. By now, you hopefully have someone in mind and you can reach out to ask if they would be willing to chair your work.
Step 5
After getting approval from a faculty member to work with you as chair, you should write up an approximately 5 page description of your dissertation. This should include a description of the problem you’re studying, the relevant literature, a few ideas about methods, and a potential timeline for your study. Share this document with your chair and ask for a meeting to discuss. Allow about two weeks for your chair to review before the meeting. At the meeting, ask for guidance on each aspect of your study. Ask how your chair prefers to work with students (receive partial drafts, meet regularly or as needed, etc).
What’s next?
After meeting with your chair, you should now have a direction for your study and a timeline to work towards. There’s only one thing left… get to work!
