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Journals, articles, and academic research

Theses and dissertations

Theses and dissertations are structured, extended pieces of academic writing presenting an author’s research findings. They are usually submitted as the end of a course as part of the requirements of a university degree. In the UK, 'dissertations' are usually written by undergraduate and master’s students, and 'theses' are produced at doctoral or research degree level.

Doctoral theses are considered particularly insightful as they usually contain original research and make new contributions to scholarship. They are often made openly available on university institutional repositories or digital archives such as City Research Online.

Finding PhD theses

Many institutions maintain open-access repositories of their PhD theses and dissertations. You can learn more about these in our finding open access content guide. You can also find dissertations at the links below.