Introduction to Your Thesis or Dissertation

Introduction to Your Thesis or Dissertation Introduction As you are working on the introduction, make sure it contains some mandatory components. Set the scene: You must introduce the general topic of your research, your research problem, and its relevance to the reader. Research background: Here you will incorporate the findings of the most significant studies that relate to your problem or topic. Gap in research. Here you will indicate where you see the gap in empirical or theoretical literature. This way you will be able to justify the importance of your study. Study purpose: Outline the purpose and goals of your study. You may want to include the questions or hypotheses you are going to test. It is possible that your research questions will be based on external references. Outline the key components of your study. You can use one or several phrases included below to make your introduction more colorful. Setting the Scene: Researchers are increasingly interested in X. The past years saw a surge in interest toward X. The growing body of literature suggests that researchers are concerned about X. Numerous methods and designs were used to study X in the past twenty years. Researchers were excited about discovering X. Research background: Earlier studies have shown†¦ Previously, researchers suggested that†¦ A recent study confirmed that†¦ Gap in research: Just a few studies were completed to†¦ Unfortunately, earlier studies have failed to address†¦ The issue X remains mostly underexplored†¦ Study Purpose: The purpose of this work is†¦ This thesis is intended to clarify the following issues†¦ The aim of this dissertation is to†¦ Outline: The thesis includes the following sectionsChapter provides an overview of the methods used to test the proposed hypotheses Tip: As you are collecting evidence, it is never too late to make remarks and review the wording used by other researchers in their studies. Use the most interesting expressions to make your dissertation more interesting to your reader!