Preparing a thesis
Guidance on writing your thesis and the support available.
English language requirements
Theses should normally be written in English. In exceptional circumstances, a student may request permission from their Faculty to present a thesis that is written in another language where there is a clear academic justification for doing so, eg. where the language is directly linked to the research project, or where there is a clear benefit to the impact and dissemination of the research.
Likewise, the oral examination should normally be conducted in English, except in cases where there are pedagogic reasons for it to be held in another language, or where there is a formal agreement in place that requires the viva to be conducted in another language. Permission should be sought from the appropriate faculty for a viva to be conducted in a language other than English.
Guidance on writing the thesis
The main source of advice and guidance for students beginning to write their thesis is the supervisory team. Students should discuss the proposed structure of the thesis with their supervisor at an early stage in their research programme, together with the schedule for its production, and the role of the supervisor in checking drafts. Supervisors should be prepared to advise on such matters as undertaking a literature review, referencing and formatting the thesis, and on what should or should not be included in the thesis, including any supplementary or non-standard material.
Additional support is also available via the English Language Teaching Centre (ELTC), which offers academic writing and thesis writing courses. In addition, the University offers a to help students to manage better the process of writing their thesis.
Students may also find it helpful to consult theses from the same subject discipline that are available in institutional repositories such as or via the British Library’s EThOS service.
Students who intend to include in their thesis any material owned by another person should consider the copyright implications at an early stage and should not leave this until the final stages of completing the thesis. The correct use of third-party copyright material and the avoidance of unfair means are taken very seriously by the University. Attendance at a copyright training session offered by the Library is strongly recommended.
Students should take care to ensure that the identification of any third-party individuals within their thesis (e.g. participants in the research), is only done with the informed consent of those individuals, and in recognition of any potential risks that this may present to them. This is especially important because an electronic copy of the thesis will normally be made publicly available via the White Rose Etheses Online repository.
Guidance on good practices in authorship is set out in the GRIP policy expectations.
Acceptable support in writing the thesis
It is acceptable for a student to receive the following support in writing the thesis from the supervisory team (that is additional to the advice and/or information outlined above), if the supervisory team has considered that this support is necessary:
- Where the meaning of the text is not clear the student should be asked to re-write the text in question in order to clarify the meaning.
- If the meaning of the text is unclear, the supervisory team can provide support in correcting grammar and sentence construction to clarify its meaning. If a student requires significant support with written English above what is considered to be correcting grammar and sentence construction, the supervisory team will, at the earliest opportunity, request that the student obtains remedial tuition support from the University’s English Language Teaching Centre.
- The supervisory team cannot rewrite text that changes the meaning of the text (ghost writing/ghost authorship in a thesis is unacceptable).
- The supervisory team can provide guidance on the structure, content and expression of writing.
- The supervisory team can proofread the text.
- Anyone else who may be employed or engaged to proofread the text is only permitted to change spelling and grammar and must not be able to change the content of the thesis.
The Confirmation Review and the oral examination are the key progression milestones for testing whether a thesis is a student's own work.
Requests for an extension to a student’s time limit for the student to improve their standard of written English in the thesis will not be approved. Students who require additional language support should be signposted to appropriate sources of help at an early stage in their degree to avoid such an occurrence.
Yellow Sticker scheme for disabled students
The University runs a sticker scheme for students who have an impairment that can affect aspects of their written communication. This applies to all students, including PGRs submitting a thesis for examination.
Word count
The University does not have any regulatory requirements governing the length of theses, but most faculties have established guidelines:
- Arts and Humanities: 40,000 words (MPhil); 75,000 words (PhD)
- Health: 40,000 words (MPhil); 75,000 words (PhD, MD)
- Science: 40,000 words (MPhil); 80,000 words (PhD)
- Social Sciences: 40,000 words (MPhil); 75,000-100,000 words (PhD)
The above word counts exclude footnotes, bibliography and appendices. Where there are no guidelines, students should consult the supervisor as to the length of thesis appropriate to the particular topic of research.