Dissertation

Mention the word dissertation to a student in any part of the world and you’ll more than likely elicit a similar response. Students are known to loathe the idea of undertaking a dissertation and many regard it as the most stressful aspect of their studies. However the dissertation is also a chance for students to hone in on a topic that interests them. And while I myself am no different to other students, I am determined to give it my best shot.

When tasked with choosing a dissertation title back in December I was at a complete loss. Picking a topic out of the sky seemed impossible as there were so many options available. When looking at potential research areas I found myself going down an internet rabbit hole. Despite trying to narrow down my list of potential topics, I found the list getting bigger by the day. I decided that it would be best to weigh out the pros and cons of each topic and see which would work best. In the end I picked usability as my topic due to the fact that I had just completed a large assignment on usability testing. I had enjoyed the experience of testing the usability of a local government website. When writing the literature review for this assignment I uncovered plenty of interesting articles. I had started to realize that a lot of these articles shared something in common. The majority of them discussed usability issues with e-government sites in developing countries. Also, a lot of the usability issues mentioned in these studies were very similar. I therefore decided that I wanted to write a dissertation on the usability issues found on e-government websites in these developing countries.

With the title decided I now had to pick a methodology. This was perhaps even trickier than finding a topic as I had only ever completed two large research papers. The methodologies used in those assignments would not be suitable for the topic I had proposed. However when writing the literature review for one of these assignments I came across the term systematic review. A systematic review provides an exhaustive summary of evidence related to a research topic. It summarizes past research and and allows overall conclusions to be made. It also only includes quantitative studies which means there’s a whole range of qualitative studies left out. For this reason I decided I would not undertake a systematic review but rather an integrative review. The integrative review is similar but it includes qualitative and quantitative studies. It also allows for new theories to be developed instead of just making general statements on the state of literature.

Although I have decided on my topic and methodology, there still remains a lot of work to be done. I have chosen a methodology that I have not used before so I am taking a risk. However I want to write a dissertation that contributes new findings to the current knowledge on my topic. I feel that this can be achieved although it will not be easy. By the end of this experience I will have gained a wealth of new knowledge on usability which can only be a positive thing. I will also have a piece of research that can be shown to potential employers. Therefore I will hope to have a different opinion on writing a dissertation by the end of this experience!