Is PHD a good path or a tough path ?

This post has been edited by Layla-95: Apr 20 2013, 05:18 PM

So you asked a good & a tough question. OK. Perhaps you could tell us a little about your thoughts that led up to that.

Ms Layla, do you have any views on this: “No head injury is too trivial to be ignored”?

of course is tough. study till permanent head damage to get a phd.

It's both. Your best and worst memories will come from doing a PhD.

A good path to torture you mentally and a good path to ruin your personal relationship with your loved ones.

damn. I just started. dunno wht will happen next

Obtaining your PhD is like swimming across a big lake. Some students cannot swim, so they’ll sink.

Fret not! Since you've just started, learn to swim at the lake bank before going deeper.

Keep this in mind: PhD students and their advisors tend to focus only on the content of the research that leads to the doctoral thesis. All other issues are often taken for granted: how to organize your work, give a presentation, work in a team, cope with your supervisor, and effectively manage your time. In other words, you should master all the non-scientific aspects of getting a PhD as well.

Thanks for the brief guidance. just few questions since I presume you already finish your ph.d.
How am I going to find proper reading materials related and relevant to my research? It's rather confusing because what I'm doing right now is to find any papers related to my research based on keywords that I already identified. I strongly believe that literature reviews is going to shape major portion of my research and might nullify my initial ideas. even my research title. How do I manage these materials? Do I just read everything that I have already found?

Then again, from what I have learnt, ph.d really emphasize on literature reviews.

p's: Might want to open a thread about this. But probably already posted before. I'm new here.

Hi Al Puccino,

Before you carry out your first experiment in the lab, you would be well advised to spend some time in the library (whether virtual or real) doing a thorough literature search of your research topic. The investment of time in the library will pay off many times over in the lab. You don’t want to risk doing work that someone else has already done, or going down the same worn path that others have traveled before you.

Supposed that you have already identified the scope of your research project, take advantage of the breadth and scope of the internet and do an electronic search on your research topic. Start by searching popular and comprehensive databases such as AIAA (Aerospace), Georef (Geoscience), IEEE Xplore (Electrical & Electronics Engineering and its subdisciplines & interdisciplines), MedLine (Medicine), PubMed (Biomedical), ScienceDirect (Elsevier) and SpringerLink (Springer). Your university library should have a subscription to some of these and other databases that are password protected. Download and copy the articles that are the most pertinent to your research. As you get more involved in your search, you will start to a get a feel for the important researchers in the field.

Perhaps you should ask: “What kinds of scientific literature exist and which ones will be most important to my research?” Broadly speaking, scientific literature can be divided into two types of articles: primary and secondary.

Most of the articles published in scientific journals, both primary (original research) and secondary (review articles) have gone through a stringent process called peer-review. Before an editor will accept a paper for publication, he/she will send it out for review to at least two experts in the field. The identity of the reviewers is always kept secret from the author so that any comments will be impartial.

Secondary literature is published in the form of review articles. As the name suggests, these articles are often very comprehensive in nature and review the scientific findings in a particular field over a particular period of time. Reviews do not present new and original data, they are compilations of other people’s work, but very often written by a big name scientist in the field. Review articles can be a goldmine of information and will significantly help you with your literature search by cutting down on the amount of time you have to search out individual (primary) research articles.

As you embark on your literature search, you may feel quickly overwhelmed by the pile of articles and papers you accumulate, so keep in mind that is impossible to read all the research ever published in your area. Being selective about what you read is key to getting a thorough overview of a particular field, without drowning in too much information.

As mentioned above, it’s another excellent way to get started with your literature search is to read recent review articles published on your topic. Think of this as a bit of a short cut. Someone, somewhere has done much of the work before you and compiled it in a comprehensive review article that may contain up to 200 references.

Sorry that I could only bring this much at this point. Please allow me to give the floor to postgraduates and doctorates: alexkos, bb100, Blofeld, exquisite_markas, Farmer_C, giovanni, v1n0d and [PF] T.J.

It's not tough if you follow these steps:

1. Choose the right supervisor to guide you in PhD research. If you mess with this step, then be prepared to live a miserable life.

2. Choose field and research that you are really interested in. It's hard to stay motivated if you choose the research you are not interested because PhD requires you to read heavy research papers and write critically.

3. Manage your time well. Set up goals every time you need to finish the tasks.

These steps are not necessarily right to all people. Some of them (maybe a few) finish their PhD successfully without following these. Perhaps they are lucky or gifted. But following these steps will make your life easier on the road to obtain your PhD.

Good luck! Share your experience with us

It is terrible path of shattered dreams, broken lives, that is walked upon only by those who are either fools or dreamers.

You are most certainly welcomed to join our brotherhood. I can promise you that there is no pot of gold at the end of this road, only endless suffering, personal sacrifice and loneliness.

Nevertheless there is a small chance you might actually contribute something to the body of human knowledge before you are old, broken and used up. All men die, but few die doing anything remotely useful.

Or put it another way, you are like a monk pouring petrol on his clothes and setting himself on fire. Most of the time, nothing happens, nothing changes. You just catch on fire and die. But sometimes, a burning monk can move a people and a nation. And like that burning monk, you won't know the impact of your actions because you are on fire and will soon be dead.

You must've had a very tough road mate