Your Psychology Dissertation

Dr Emily Harrison is a Senior Lecturer in Psychology at Birmingham City University. Her main research interests are concerned with understanding how children acquire and develop literacy skills, namely reading, phonological awareness and speech rhythm sensitivity. Emily studied for her undergraduate degree and her PhD at Coventry University, where she conducted her dissertation in the area of reading development, investigating the relationship between reading skills and speech rhythm sensitivity. Her PhD later investigated the effectiveness of a rhythmic-based reading intervention for enhancing literacy skills in children. Emily has worked at Birmingham City University since September 2015, where she is currently the Deputy Course Director on the BSc (Hons) Psychology programme, and leads multiple modules, including the undergraduate dissertation module.Dr Panagiotis (Panos) Rentzelas is an Associate Professor in Social Psychology and Director of Internationalisation for the School of Social Sciences at Birmingham City University. Prior to his appointment, Panagiotis was employed as a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow in Social Psychology at the University of Essex and as a Policy Advisor/Scientific Officer for an international organisation. Panagiotis holds a PhD in Psychology from the University of Nottingham and BSc (Hons) in Psychology from the University of Essex. Panagiotis’ research lies in the area of experimental social psychology, cross-cultural and contextual cognitive differences and in human motivation.

• Section 1: Getting StartedChapter 1: Welcome to your dissertation!Chapter 2: Managing your supervisorChapter 3: Choosing a research topicChapter 4: Understanding the LiteratureChapter 5: Developing your rationale, research question(s) and hypothesis; and choosing between quantitative or qualitative research designSection 2: MethodologyChapter 6: Quantitative methodologyChapter 7: Qualitative methodologyChapter 8: Mixed methods research projectsChapter 9: Ethical considerationsSection 3: Data analysisChapter 10: Quantitative data analysisChapter 11: Qualitative data analysisSection 4: Writing UpChapter 12: Writing StyleChapter 13: Writing the discussion chapter and preparing for submissionSection 5: Beyond the dissertationChapter 14: Communicating research