Thesis (part-time study) (NUMW6004)

The format of your thesis should be discussed and agreed upon with your supervisor in the early stages of candidature. The length of the final thesis should be between 10,000 and 15,000 words. This variance is to ensure adequate information is presented across the introduction, literature critique, design, results, discussion and recommendations and conclusions; your supervisors will guide you to your word length based on the approach you take with your thesis.

The final format of the honours thesis may take the form of a traditional thesis (as detailed below), or as a thesis including publication/s (likely manuscripts under review given the timeline of the honours program). Where publication/s are included in your thesis you will need to provide a response addressing each of the thesis sections that would be addressed in a traditional thesis and how you have addressed these in your manuscript. Further, when submitting a thesis by publication, you will also be required to submit evidence of submission to your chosen journal and the journal aims, scope and guidelines. The journal must be mutually agreed upon between you and your supervisory team.

The thesis format for Nursing and Midwifery Honours follows the UQ Thesis requirements, which includes the UQ preamble (Word template is available in the course Blackboard Assessment Tab). Page two and three of this document provides the structure recommended for the honours thesis.

As the sole author of the thesis you are the copyright holder and therefore you are fully responsible for everything contained in it. If the thesis contains third-party material (for example photographs, maps, drawings), you must obtain permission to reproduce copyright material if permission has not already been granted as part of the publication process by the copyright holder. If copyright on a publication or third-party material has been assigned to a publisher, permission must be sought to reproduce the work in the thesis. 

Further information about thesis formats can be found the course Blackboard Assessment Tab.

Thesis format - Abstract

• Outline the main approach and findings of the thesis and must be between 300 and 800 words.
• Declaration by author (verbatim as per word document in Blackboard)
• Publications included in this thesis - If you have not included any of your publications in the thesis then state “No publications included”.
• For each submitted manuscripts included in this thesis list citation information and status of the manuscript (accepted date, under review date).  Include your contribution to the authorship if you are not a sole author and other author contributions to the paper in terms of 1)conception and design of the project; 2) analysis and interpretation of the research data on which the publication is based; 3) drafting significant parts of the publication or critically reviewing it so as to contribute to the interpretation. 
• Contributions by others to the thesis If no one contributed significantly then state “No contributions by others.”
• List the significant and substantial inputs made by others to the research, work and writing represented and/or reported in the thesis. These could include significant contributions to: the conception and design of the project; non-routine technical work; analysis and interpretation of research data; drafting significant parts of the work or critically revising it so as to contribute to the interpretation.
• Research Involving Human or Animal Subjects If no human or animal subjects were involved in this research please state: “No animal or human subjects were involved in this research”.
• All research involving human or animal subjects requires prior ethical review and approval by an independent review committee. Details ethics approvals obtained including the ethics approval number and name of approving committees. A copy of the ethics approval letter must be included in the thesis appendix.
• In the Acknowledgements recognise those who have been instrumental in the completion of the project. Acknowledgements should include any professional editorial advice received including the name of the editor and a brief description of the service rendered.
• If no financial support was provided then state ‘No financial support was provided to fund this research’. Otherwise if you received any other financial support for your project, you are also required to acknowledge the funding body/bodies in this section.
• Maximum 10 keywords; use lower case throughout, separating words/phrases with commas. For example: word, word word, word, word, word word
• Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classifications (ANZSRC) provide data that links your thesis to the disciplines and discipline clusters in the Federal Government’s Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) initiative.  Please allocate the thesis a maximum of 3 Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classifications Codes (ANZSRC) at the 6 digit level and include the descriptor and a percent weighting for each code.
• Fields of Research (FoR) Classification Allows for categorisation of the thesis according to the field of research. Please allocate the thesis a maximum of 3 Fields of Research (FoR) Codes at the 4 digit level 

Thesis forma - Body of thesis

 The remainder of the thesis should be in the following order.

• Dedications (if applicable)
• Table of Contents
• List of Figures & Tables
• List of Abbreviations used in the thesis
• Main text of the thesis - Presented as chapters

Chapter 1: Introduction

• Your introduction should contextualise your research project in relation to the present state of knowledge in the field. 

Chapter 2: Literature Review including Research Question and Aim

• Clearly stated Research Question and aims;
• a methodology to answer the Research Question and establish how the research was conducted, based on your Research Proposal;
• report of the findings and a discussion which places them in the context of the wider literature;
• Interpret and report the significance and meaning of your results and how these relate to addressing your Research Question. 
• Concisely re-state your findings and relevance to your field of research.

Chapter 3: Research Design

Chapter 4: Results     

Chapter 5: Discussion 

Chapter 6: Conclusions         

References

Appendices

Bibliography or List of References

Appendices

The thesis should be written grammatically correct with a logical structure to enhance the reader's comprehension. All sources are referenced using the 7th edition APA format as per academic writing standards (UQ library https://guides.library.uq.edu.au/referencing/apa7).