This guide will explain how to write a great undergraduate or master’s thesis (see our Essay Writing Guide for advice on shorter academic documents).
Use the list to the left to select an aspect of dissertation writing to learn about.
A thesis is a longer, in-depth paper written at the end of an undergraduate or master’s degree. It will be on a subject you choose yourself and involve self-directed research, although with some help from a tutor or advisor. The thesis may make a significant contribution towards your final grade, so it is very important. We will use the word “thesis” throughout this guide, but some also call this final project a “dissertation.”
The idea of an undergraduate thesis (also known as a “senior project” or “senior thesis”) is to demonstrate the skills and knowledge developed during your studies. Not every undergraduate will need to do a senior thesis, but they are common in some schools and may be required if you’re planning on enrolling for a postgraduate course.
A master’s thesis is the final project on a master’s degree. It will usually be longer and more detailed than an undergraduate thesis. You may also be required to make an original contribution (i.e., put forward a new argument) as well as demonstrating your knowledge.
Depending on your subject area, your thesis may be empirical or non-empirical:
In this guide, we will discuss both types of thesis, highlighting any differences as they become relevant. We will not look at how to write a doctoral dissertation, which is usually even longer and more complex, but many of the same skills apply.
KEY NOTE: Most colleges and universities have detailed guidelines for how students should write a thesis, including any stylistic or procedural requirements. The advice below will be designed to apply to any thesis-length project, but you still need to check what your institution requires if you are writing a thesis or dissertation.
The first step in writing a thesis is making a plan. This may include several steps.
Since a thesis is self-directed, you will need to decide what to research. This is an important decision, so don’t rush it! Tips for selecting a thesis topic include:
And once you’ve selected a topic, you’ll want to check what your school requires for a dissertation. Usually, you will need to submit a research proposal of some kind for approval. Minimally, though, you will need to decide on a research question.
The “research question” is the question you’ll seek to answer in your thesis. This should narrow the focus of your thesis down even more, giving you a distinct problem to address. To formulate a research question, try to come up with something that:
For instance, you may be interested in viral marketing techniques. However, since this would be a very broad topic for a thesis, you would then need to look for a specific question to answer, such as how do social media influencers affect a viral advertising campaign? You could even narrow this down further by framing a question around a specific case study.
We can see some examples of “good” and “bad” questions below.
In this case, the “bad” question is too broad. It would take several book-length essays to even start answering! The second question is much narrower, focusing on the effect of climate change on one species in one region, making it easier to answer.
In this case, the “bad” question is too narrow. It could be answered by searching on google and simply setting out the policies you find. The second question, meanwhile, is open to debate and does not have a simple answer, so there is scope for good research.
As with your thesis topic, once you have come up with a research question, speak to your advisor or tutor. They may have some guidance on how to refine it.
Some colleges will ask you to write a research proposal – i.e., a detailed description of your proposed research project – before they approve your thesis. And even if you don’t have to do this, writing a research proposal can be a useful way to organize your thoughts before you begin writing. This may include information on the following:
You won’t always need all the above. This will depend on your school’s requirements, your subject area, and the scope of your thesis project. In essence, though, you need to set out what you want to achieve, why you want to do this, and how you intend to accomplish it.
One thing to note here is that your plan may change later on. Research can be difficult to predict, so you may need to adapt your plan after you start work on your thesis. You might find, for example, that your research question was too broad. Or you might encounter an obstacle that forces you to adapt your plans. This is completely normal!
As such, don’t stress too much about making your research plan “perfect.” Your real aim is to prove that you’ve thought seriously about your thesis, that you’re capable of planning a research project, and that you’re committed to producing high quality work.
Once your school has approved your plan, you will be ready to begin work on your thesis.
Any thesis will require engaging with past research. This may be for a literature review before conducting your own experimental study. Or, in a more theoretical thesis (e.g., historical analysis or literary criticism), it may make up a large proportion of your work.
You will have done some research already as part of your proposal. But most of it will come after your thesis has been approved. Exactly what this will involve will depend on your subject area and research question, but we will look at a few common issues below.
Creating a plan will help you focus your research. To do this, break your thesis down into steps and set aside time for each task you need to complete. You’ll then know exactly how much you need to do and how long you will need to do it. This may include:
When creating this plan, be realistic about how long each stage will take. And make sure to leave time for writing and editing your thesis once you’ve finished the research!
Top Tip! You can actually start writing while you’re still doing research or gathering data. For example, if you’re working on your design study, you can start making notes for your methodology section. This will save time when you come to write your thesis, as you should have all the information you need in one place, ready to be written up.
Part of efficient research is selecting the best sources for your project, as reading every single book or article on a subject would take far too long. This may involve:
If you are doing research online, make sure you’re using reliable academic sources, too. For instance, a reputable journal or a university website should be trustworthy. But a blog post with no cited sources or author information will not be suitable for academic writing. Likewise, Wikipedia is not an academic source, though you can check the citations to find sources.
Top Tip! If you are writing a thesis in the humanities, the majority of your work may involve analyzing, criticizing, and comparing secondary sources or ideas from these sources. As such, it is vital to find and engage with the major thinkers in your subject area.
For instance, if you were writing about behavioral psychology, and your thesis did not acknowledge or engage with B. F. Skinner – a hugely influential figure in behaviorism – at any point, your marker may assume you haven’t done enough research or that you have missed something important. And this may affect how they assess the rest of your work.
Even if your thesis is mainly based on primary research, it is important to show that you’ve researched past work in your subject area. If you overlook a major thinker or some recent research relevant to your own study, it could end up losing you marks!
Writing a thesis will be much simpler if you have good notes to work from. So when you’re reading a paper or book relevant to your research, make sure to:
Other tips for efficient note taking include:
This should leave you with detailed, easy-to-use notes when you come to write your thesis.
If you are conducting empirical or experimental research, part of your research will involve data collection. This is where you gather your own information to help answer your research question. The three main styles of research include:
The same applies to data analysis methods, which can also be quantitative or qualitative. But the research approach you adopt will have a major influence on how you answer your research question, so you need to think about this carefully! Key factors may include:
You may have decided on much of this while writing your research proposal, but these are issues you should consider throughout the study design process. You may also want to work with your thesis advisor to finalize your plans before collecting data.
From a planning perspective, the key is giving yourself enough time to carry out each stage of the data collection and analysis. If you rush, things are more likely to go wrong!
The structure of your thesis will depend heavily on the subject area. As such, we will look at how to structure empirical and non-empirical theses separately. However, as elsewhere, make sure to check what your school suggests about structuring your thesis.
Most empirical theses have a structure along the following lines:
We will look at some of these sections in more detail below.
In the humanities and other non-experimental subject areas, your thesis may be structured more like a long essay, with each chapter/section adding to your argument. The structure will therefore depend on what you are arguing, but a common style is:
We will look at some of these sections in more detail below. For the main chapters of your thesis, though, you will have to break your argument down into a series of points. To do this, review your notes with your research question in mind, then:
It can help to treat each chapter in a humanities thesis like an essay of its own, with an introduction (i.e., what you will address in the chapter at hand), a series of sub-points with evidence, and a short conclusion that leads on to the next chapter.
Next, we’ll look in detail at some of the sections most theses will include. As elsewhere, though, don’t forget to check your school’s requirements for the structure and content of a thesis, as some elements will vary (e.g., the length of the abstract, or whether to include separate “Results” and “Discussion” sections). If you cannot find this information on your college’s website or in course materials, ask your tutor or advisor for guidance.
Your thesis title should give readers an immediate sense of what it is about. A good way to do this is to have a title and a subtitle based on topic and focus respectively:
For instance, the following could all work as dissertation titles:
Viral marketing and social media: A case study of the role of influencer culture in the success of Old Spice’s “The Man Your Man Could Smell Like” campaign
Environmental Effects of Climate Change: A Qualitative Study of the Factors Behind Changing Polar Bear Populations in Alaska
Food Safety in America: Are Federal Policies Promoting Public Health?
All these titles give a sense of the question the thesis will answer. The first two are quite long, which can reduce clarity in some cases, but they also include information about the type of research conducted. The key is striking a balance between detail and clarity.
You may also want to check your style guide (or ask your advisor) for advice on how to capitalize titles. You can find information on title case and sentence case capitalization here.
An abstract is like a preview, allowing readers to see what your thesis is about. As such, it should set out the key information about your study in a clear, concise manner.
The exact length and style of an abstract can vary, but typically it will be between 100 and 500 words long and primarily written in the past or present tense. It should include:
It often helps to leave writing the abstract until you’ve at least got a first draft of your full thesis, as by that point you’ll have a better sense of your research overall.
A good thesis introduction should set the scene for the reader, telling them everything they’ll need to know to follow the rest of your thesis. It should therefore:
It can help to have a strong opening line that will grab the reader’s attention, but this is not necessary. Try to avoid clichéd openings such as “Webster’s Dictionary defines [THESIS TOPIC] as…,” as these will rarely add anything useful to your paper.
One good tip is to write a rough introduction first, but to revisit it once you have a draft of your full thesis. This is because the introduction and conclusion should work like “bookends” to the rest of your thesis, so the introduction needs to reflect the content that follows.
The literature review provides the theoretical foundations for your thesis. The idea is not just to summarize key concepts and studies, but to set up your own work by showing how it follows from existing research to offer something new. To do this, you may need to:
You can use your research question to guide this review. But it’s also worth asking your advisor or tutor for advice on literature you should read.
When writing up your literature review, make sure it has a clear structure. This might be chronological (i.e., in order of when the studies you discuss were done), methodological (i.e., organized in terms of the research style or approach), or thematic (i.e., organized in terms of what studies focused on or discussed). But you need to give it a clear sense of development, which ultimately should lead back to your own research question.
The methodology chapter is where you explain, in detail, how you performed your research. This may be a relatively simple section of your thesis, but make sure to:
The appendices can be useful here, as you can use them for information that is relevant but not essential for explaining your methodology (e.g., survey templates, consent forms). If you do include anything like this in your appendices, though, make sure to reference it clearly in your methodology chapter (e.g., “For more information, see Appendix C…”).
This is where you set out the results of your research, including data, analysis, and findings.
This can vary a lot depending on your subject area and school. Some use a combined “Results and Discussion” section, where results are presented alongside analysis. Some prefer to separate the results and the discussion into separate chapters. As such, you will want to check with your advisor about the best way to present your results.
Generally, though, reliable tips for presenting results in a thesis include:
The “Discussion” part should focus on the significance of your results. Think about:
Since this is where you really dig into the value of your research, the “Results and Discussion” section may be the most important part of your thesis. As such, you should take time to make sure it thoroughly addresses your chosen research question.
The conclusion is where you tie everything up together. As mentioned earlier, it should work with the introduction to “bookend” your thesis. As such, it should:
Your overall aim is to briefly explain how you have answered your research question. However, make sure not to introduce new arguments or evidence in the conclusion. If you need these to support your point, they should be included in the main body of the thesis.
In any academic document, you will need to cite sources. This typically means:
The details of how to do this will depend on the referencing style or system you’re using, so remember to check your style guide. However, we will offer some general tips here.
Referencing involves identifying the sources you’ve used in your research, usually with some kind of in-text citations and full publication information for all sources in a reference list.
There are several reasons to take referencing seriously in your thesis:
This last point is the most important as plagiarism is considered academic fraud. And if you’re found to have plagiarized someone else’s work in your thesis, you will lose marks.
You will need to cite a source whenever you:
This should protect you from unfair accusations of plagiarism.
In-text citations come in three main types, each used by different referencing systems:
And while these citation styles differ, there are some tips that apply in all cases:
As above, this will help ensure you don’t accidentally commit plagiarism in your writing.
Quoting sources is a great way of supporting your arguments in a thesis. However, if you are going to quote a source in your writing, you need to do it right.
The first step is knowing when to quote a source. Generally, this is most useful when:
If you do quote a source, make sure to place the borrowed text in “quotation marks.” This shows the reader that you have taken it from somewhere else. The accompanying citation should then identify the source and the page(s) where the quote can be found.
In many cases, it is better to paraphrase a source than quote it. This means rewriting the passage in your own words, which shows that you have understood it. However, remember that you still need to cite sources when paraphrasing something.
Every academic document that cites sources should include a reference list or bibliography. These terms are sometimes used interchangeably, but the general difference is:
As with citations, this may depend on the system you’re using and different referencing systems will have different rules for creating a reference list. In all cases, though:
One helpful tip for drawing up your reference list/bibliography is to keep a running list of sources as you work. In other words, whenever you find something useful during research, note down the publication details. You will then have all the information required if you need to reference it later (plus, you’ll be able to find the same source quickly if you need it).
Finally, you may want to look at using reference management software when writing a thesis. This refers to programs that store and organize your references, such as:
Whether you use reference management software or not, you should always double check citations and the reference list before submitting your work. That way, you can be sure that the referencing in your thesis is clear, consistent, and error free.
For more information on referencing in different systems, see our blog posts on:
Not every thesis will include an appendix or appendices. However, as mentioned above, you can put useful but non-essential information in an appendix.
Common examples of things that you might put in an appendix include:
You will need to check your style guide for advice on appendices, such as whether they count towards the word limit, but standard rules for adding appendices include:
If you then needed to point the reader to something in an appendix in the main body of your thesis, you would simply have to cite the relevant appendix label. For instance:
The interviews show that most people like ice cream (see Appendix C for full transcripts).
This lets you keep the main text of your thesis focused on the research question.
Most theses come with a suggested word count. Ideally, you will get as close to this as you can (within 10% either way is usually acceptable). Exceeding or being significantly below the word limit may lose you marks, so make sure you know what to aim for.
If you are struggling to stay within the word limit on an essay:
If you are struggling to reach the suggested word count, you can:
The key is that anything you add to increase the word count should also add to your argument. Do not try to pad out your writing by simply adding extra words and phrases.
Before submitting an essay, you will want it to be perfect. This means that you shouldn’t just submit the first draft you write. Instead, you’ll want to go over your work and refine it.
We’ve touched upon this above in our tips on staying within the word count. In this last section, though, we’ll look at editing and proofreading an essay in more detail.
A “draft” is a version of a document, with the “final draft” the finished version. And writing a good thesis will require redrafting. This might be because the focus of your thesis shifts part way through, meaning you need to tweak what you’ve already written. Or it may simply be that you wrote your introduction first and want to adjust it after finishing your conclusion.
In any case, redrafting is a good way to polish your writing and pick up extra marks (as well as to avoid embarrassing errors and typos). Typically, the process looks like this:
The key to a truly great thesis is giving yourself enough time to redraft at least once or twice. Keep this in mind when working out your schedule before you begin writing.
Another point to note here is that some online companies offer to redraft your thesis for you. However, using an editing service may count as plagiarism if your work is being marked.
But it is a good idea to seek professional proofreading for your thesis.
Proofreading differs from editing because it focuses on technical errors, such as spelling and grammar mistakes, while preserving the meaning and content of your writing. As such, you can have your work proofread without falling foul of plagiarism rules.
Proofreading your own work can be difficult as it’s easy to miss errors when you’re already familiar with a document. If you do plan to proofread your own thesis, though:
It is almost always best to have someone else proofread your work, though. If you would like one of Proofed’s academic writing experts to check your thesis, why not upload a document today?
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