Dissertation Committee Responsibilities/Involvement- Your Experiences

[ClinicalABA]

I faculty in a relatively new doctoral program (ABA, not psychology per se). Our first cohort is now at the dissertation defense stage. I'm chairing a few committees, and am a reader on some others. When I did my dissertation, committee member received my final draft a few weeks before the defense meeting, and gave their feedback during the defense. Students did work on drafts with their chair, with usually multiple revisions before sending off to the committee. Basically, your committee approves your proposal and the non-chair members aren't really that involved until its time to actually defend.

In my current program, committee members are provided drafts of the defense document, and provide feedback prior to the defense meeting. By the time of the defense meeting, it is basically a formality, as presumably all committee concerns have been previously addressed. I see pros and cons to both systems. What are your past/current experiences with the dissertation defense process?

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Pragma]

This will vary a lot by program. I would say that most of the programs I have familiarity with operate similar to what your experience was like.

 

[quickpsych]

My program followed the process of the current program you described where feedback , recommendations for revisions, etc is done prior to the defense. In fact the defense was basically described as a "formality" without them saying that outright. Occasionally they'd make a few requests for minor revisions and some feedback during it but the heavy feedback and changes were done prior to the defense. They rarely would schedule a defense unless all committee members had an opportunity to review and provide feedback and recommendations on the pre-defense draft first.

 

[summerbabe]

My program was like this and there was a ‘no surprises anticipated’ expectation at the defense.

You’ll still get critical question but short of being absolutely clueless which throws into question how you did this work or if you actually understand any of it, you’ll pass since major problems were addressed beforehand (which might include pushing back the defense date).

 

[AcronymAllergy]

It's been a little while, but like those above, my program/experience was more similar to your current program. Most critical feedback, revisions, etc., were completed before the defense. Once the defense rolled around, there might be minor changes you're asked to make, but the biggest chunk of work was working with the graduate school to be sure the document formatting was correct for filing with their electronic thesis/dissertation database.

It did happen that occasionally a person needed a second defense. Usually because prior feedback was given but not adequately addressed/implemented by the student. Or there were substantial changes that weren't, for whatever reason, discussed with the committee beforehand.

 

[Ollie123]

My graduate program had a formal proposal meeting where you basically had an intro/methods laid out (since original data collection was largely an expectation - at least at that time). If approved and you stuck to the plan, the defense was largely a formality. People were sent documents in advance but there was no additional back and forth. Sometimes you might consult with individual committee members who had expertise in a given topic (e.g., running a wonky modeling issue by a stats prof, discussing theoretical implications for findings for one DV with a member who specialized in the area) but it was usually negligible. The primary mentor/major professor largely handled reading all the drafts. Most would not let you progress to the defense unless it was basically 100% guaranteed you would pass. When a student failed a defense, it was pretty much because the mentor dropped the ball and let sloppy work slide or the student had extremely poor emotion regulation and couldn't effectively communicate through anxiety around the defense. Most defenses were extremely chill.

I'm in the AMC world so hadn't sat on too many committees until recently. I'm on one now where there is much more hand-holding expected. Its a program where students have much less research exposure (PhD program, but not in psychology) prior to the dissertation. Its been way more work than anticipated already and we're just getting started.

I don't deny there are some genuine problems with the academic job market. However, whenever I hear stories about how difficult it is to land an academic job, I can't help but reflect on the fact that getting a doctorate still seems to be a disturbingly low bar. I wonder how much this accounts for some of the issues.

 

[R. Matey]

My graduate program had a formal proposal meeting where you basically had an intro/methods laid out (since original data collection was largely an expectation - at least at that time). If approved and you stuck to the plan, the defense was largely a formality. People were sent documents in advance but there was no additional back and forth. Sometimes you might consult with individual committee members who had expertise in a given topic (e.g., running a wonky modeling issue by a stats prof, discussing theoretical implications for findings for one DV with a member who specialized in the area) but it was usually negligible. The primary mentor/major professor largely handled reading all the drafts. Most would not let you progress to the defense unless it was basically 100% guaranteed you would pass. When a student failed a defense, it was pretty much because the mentor dropped the ball and let sloppy work slide or the student had extremely poor emotion regulation and couldn't effectively communicate through anxiety around the defense. Most defenses were extremely chill.

This was very similar to the structure of how defenses happened in our program. The only thing I'd add is sometimes it depended on who you had on your committee since drama could erupt between people who didn't know each other or strongly disagreed with one another. Mine were all in the same department and worked very well together making the defense very, very low key.

 

[Dazen]

My graduate program had a formal proposal meeting where you basically had an intro/methods laid out (since original data collection was largely an expectation - at least at that time). If approved and you stuck to the plan, the defense was largely a formality. People were sent documents in advance but there was no additional back and forth. Sometimes you might consult with individual committee members who had expertise in a given topic (e.g., running a wonky modeling issue by a stats prof, discussing theoretical implications for findings for one DV with a member who specialized in the area) but it was usually negligible. The primary mentor/major professor largely handled reading all the drafts. Most would not let you progress to the defense unless it was basically 100% guaranteed you would pass. When a student failed a defense, it was pretty much because the mentor dropped the ball and let sloppy work slide or the student had extremely poor emotion regulation and couldn't effectively communicate through anxiety around the defense. Most defenses were extremely chill.

I'm in the AMC world so hadn't sat on too many committees until recently. I'm on one now where there is much more hand-holding expected. Its a program where students have much less research exposure (PhD program, but not in psychology) prior to the dissertation. Its been way more work than anticipated already and we're just getting started.

I don't deny there are some genuine problems with the academic job market. However, whenever I hear stories about how difficult it is to land an academic job, I can't help but reflect on the fact that getting a doctorate still seems to be a disturbingly low bar. I wonder how much this accounts for some of the issues.

This is also consistent with my program. I also really like the proposal defense as a way of emphasizing how important it is to have strong rationale for your methods and analyses before running headlong into a project (and have good mentorship for that) and IMO mirrors the ideas of open science and pre-registration. It can also help demonstrate that it’s possible to do science well and get null results by focusing more on the process.