Authoring a PhD Thesis How to Plan, Draft, Write and Finish a Doctoral Dissertation by Patrick Dunleavy

the thesis as a whole. The whole effect may be that the thesis
ends ‘not with a bang, but a whimper’.^6

The opening out model

There are better ways of sequencing material in a long text. In
the physical sciences the normal approach is the ‘opening out’
model shown in Figure 3.3, which works in an almost reversed
manner. The first element in the sequence is a deliberately short
and terse specification of the research question. It focuses
tightly on the immediate issue to be tackled and gives only
a brief discussion of the most recent relevant literature, plus
a very compressed amount of essential set-up information. The
second element, beginning within (say) 30 pages of the start,
presents the author’s key research findings and results. This is
followed by a section of applied analysis, which tracks back and
forth across what has been found out, and connects it up in
detail with previous research and literature. Finally, once the
author has convincingly established their research credentials
the thesis ‘opens out’ into a discussion of the wider themes or
theoretical implications arising from the research and discusses
possible avenues for the next phase of work in the field.

PLANNING AN INTEGRATED THESIS◆ 59

Analysis and

close literature

Discussion and wider

literature implications

CORE

Brief

literature

and set-up

Sequence of chapters

Breadth of coverage

Figure 3.3 The opening out model