Eureka Moment?

Hi Everyone,

This is my first post and so I thought I would give you an explanation as to why I thought of writing a blog. On my recent holiday whilst lazing by the pool I had some sort of "eureka moment". I have just completed a MA course at the University of Sheffield and throughout the course I often needed advice or guidance about whether I was at the right stage or doing the correct thing but as I was studying part-time sometimes this was hard to obtain. Whilst reflecting on holiday I suddenly thought that I should have wrote a diary to capture my thoughts, progress and difficulties. With this in mind and as I have decided to continue studying, I decided to write this blog. The primary objective of this blog is to record my progress over the next 4 years and capture the process of completing a PhD from a researcher's point of view.

Whilst studying at MA level I was often asked and also asked others - "How's your MA/PhD going?". However often the response that I and others gave was "I'm busy but it's going well thanks." or "Slow going, writing at the moment". Far too often I think the answer to this question is short. Maybe this lack of a response reflects the fact that completing a PhD is often completed in isolation and topics are often personal and specific which could inhibit the researcher from giving a full and informative response. From this I hope that other researchers will read my blog and relate to the work that I will embark on, give myself and others an outlet in which we can share our ideas and experiences.

To give you an idea of my PhD topic...at MA level I completed a dissertation investigating the effects of background music on Internet gambling behaviour. My PhD will extend the findings of this dissertation to (hopefully) investigate music's presence, use and functions within real-life and laboratory environments.

Much more to come but for now it's time for me to sign off.

Steph