How to Choose a Dissertation Topic

The first big challenge in writing a dissertation is the topic selection. We’ve noticed that students that order from our dissertation writing services struggle with this part tremendously. And why wouldn’t they? This important choice determines everything from how long it takes to write the paper to how engaging and good it ends up being.

Choosing a dissertation topic is a process that you must handle with cautions. There’s a lot of uncertainty surrounding this. Will the topic be worthy of the research? Has it been adequately researched? Will you be able to find information for your Literature Review? Is it important for the field?

A Guide on Choosing a Dissertation Topic

To come up with a dissertation topic that is of high quality and engaging, you need to perform some research. This is why, we are here to help with dissertation topic selection, and are more than glad to write the entire assignment on your request.

To give you a better understanding on how to write a dissertation or pick a topic for the same, we’ve created the short guide that follows:

Step 1: Test Different Approaches for Choosing the Dissertation Topic

You can always wait for inspiration to strike, but this isn’t guaranteed to happen. Not to mention, your idea might not be the best you can have since the topic has to be researchable, engaging, have enough information you could use, important for your field, etc.

That being said, here are some approaches we recommend for when you pick a dissertation topic:

• Read all the relevant literature you can find
• Take notes about your ideas and brainstorm them
• Engage in discussions with peers and scholars

At the end of this step, you should have around 5 top ideas that you are considering for your dissertation.

Step 2: Research and Brainstorm the top 5 Ideas

Now it’s time to do some research. You won’t know if a topic is good or viable unless you research it a bit. This can come really helpful when you are writing the proposal or the paper after, so it’s definitely not a waste of time.

Research your topics shortly to make the decision and narrow it to the one you prefer most.

Step 3: Make Your Final Decision

We have some general things that should apply to your final choice for dissertation topics:

• It is something you find interesting – will hold your interest and keep you motivated for a long time
• Is manageable in size i.e. is not too narrow or too broad
• It makes some kind of contribution to knowledge and your field
• It is doable depending on your deadline and schedule
• Has obtainable data – you can find sufficient and good information to use in it
• It hasn’t been too researched – there’s a new angle that you can try

Where to Get Ideas for My Dissertation Topic?

Dissertation topics won’t just come out of the blue for you. Here are some sources that have big potential:

• Faculty members, your mentor, and other students
• Your professional interests and goals
• Professionals in the field
• Librarians
• Current theories that are recent in the field
• Other dissertations you read

How to Choose a Dissertation Topic for Undergraduate Students

If you are an undergraduate student, chances are you need to write something that’s more of a thesis and less of a dissertation. This means that your work will be smaller in size, but definitely not less significant.

For undergraduate dissertations, you can choose topics that are researchable but don’t require tons of data to be written. Even so, all of the steps and tips above apply in picking the topic in this case, too.

How to Choose a Dissertation Topic for Masters

A Master’s or PhD dissertation is much more demanding. These papers are usually hundreds of pages long, which requires thorough research, tons of work, and topics that have a lot to be said about.

Use the tricks above to pick a Master’s topic, but make sure to do more research during the choosing stage. Since you’ll be writing this paper much longer, it must be something that will keep you interested.

Get Inspiration from Dissertation Topics Examples!

One of the best ways to come up with topics is to see what they’d look like in writing. This is why we provide students with dissertation topics examples and samples of dissertations we’ve written. This way, you can make your decision and come up with great ideas!