Dissertation Diary

It seems like the more I know the less I know. Here are 5 more questions I need to answer:

1. Is there a difference between the epistemic work of orienting and topical themes?

2. What should I do about the orienting themes that are not doing epistemic work?

3. Are all topical themes that are not phenomenal epistemic?

4. Do I want to find out about the nature of phenomena? (degreeof abstraction)

5. Is there any information in the taxonomy which is not needed to answer my research questions?

Data – 7 1st Year Psychology essays (Introduction to Psychology). 7 2nd Year Psychology essays (Developmental Psychology).

A. What do I want to find out?
How is knowledge constructed? In 1st and 2nd year psychology essays?
1. To what extent are authorial interventions used to warrant knowledge claims?
All children love chocolate vs According to Taka all children love chocolate.
2. What form to these interventions take?
Reference to research (as above) or Author assertion I believe that children love chocolate.
3. How visible is the author?
I believe that… This paper argues that…. It is clear that….
4. How does the author refer to previous research?
Smith(1993)….Various studies…

B. Why?
• Varies from discipline to discipline-many students have to write in a number of disciplines or master one
• Problematic for EAP and NS students
• Presented in writing courses as “common core” academic writing. (eg academic writing requires references to literature/academic writing requires objectivity)
• Use of some forms may be related to cognitive development (eg indirect personal forms)

C. How?
Classification system

D. Problems
Phenomena in student writing
Data analysis – too much?/Excel problems

E. Possible solutions
Narrow focus even more?

I presented a brief outline of where I have got to with my research so far to the MA study group. Writing it was really helpful as it made me summarise my ideas so far. Presenting it was helpful as well as it made me realise that I have actually made a lot of progress since I presented last time. We talked about the problems I am having and ways that I could make my categories more concise such as by choosing to look at only orienting Theme. We also talked about the difference between cognitive and intellectual development. It was interesting and really helpful, but I am still not sure what I am going to do next.