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[zharkov]

A comment in another thread reminded me of a conversation I was in a couple of weeks ago, to whit:  How much outside help is acceptable in writing one's dissertation?  (Assume the outside help gets paid.)

For example, is a copyeditor OK?  A statistical consultant?  A research assistant to look up authors, articles, do library runs, make copies?

Part of me say that those skills (writing, stats, researching authors) are part and parcel of what dissertation writing is all about and one should do his or her own work; another part of me say that some "outsourcing" is OK.

How do you draw the line?

[dr_prephd]

Our program requires us to hire a copy editor before turning in the final draft to the committee. I can see the value in this, but having been a copy editor in a previous life, I'm a little miffed that I have to pay for someone else!

[imawakenow]

Our program requires us to hire a copy editor before turning in the final draft to the committee.

We aren't required, but it's unofficially recommended. That's partially because we have lots of ESL students and partially because we have a number of strict faculty.

The university offers statistical consulting for any Ph.D. student, but they won't do the analysis for you. They will meet with you to discuss your design and make suggestions as to how best to analyze your data.

I'm fine with both of the above and will likely get someone to read my diss for style when it is finished.

Otherwise, I figure it's up to the writer and adviser to work it out. My adviser's approach is to point out areas of inconsistency, lack of clarity, and other areas that need improvement, but it's up to me to do the work.

[carebearstare]

I know of someone who paid an assistant to input and clean up hus footnotes. I thought it was shady.

[pink_]

The only help I paid for was take-out and someone to clean my apartment.

[prof_smartypants]

I think hiring an assistant for pretty much anything is shady. If the copyeditor is simply cleaning up typos and the like after the diss has been defended, it's not problem. If the hired editor is doing more than that (rewriting paragraphs, etc), it gets shady.

I am receiving considerable help from one of my committee members on my data analysis, but I can see where even this sort of thing could easily cross the line between "guidance" and "doing it for me". He has been very clear on avoiding the latter, but I'm not sure everybody would.

[stanwyck]

I do think some of this might be field specific, though.  In my field (architecture), it's not uncommon for graduate students to fund and manage survey teams as part of the Ph.D. process, especially grad students working on ancient (archaeological) sites.  I'll probably be paying someone to do some elevations for me in the end stages of my own dissertation.

I was just looking at the overseas research handbook the SSRC sends out to Ph.D. students with IDRFs.  There is a section on the logistics/benefits/drawbacks of hiring a research assistant while abroad.  The advice appears to be aimed mostly at sociologists and anthropologists--not my fields, so I really don't know how legit it is to use an RA while completing the Ph.D. as a soc or anthro grad student.  The SSRC seems to thinks it's okay, though.

[prof_smartypants]

Who are these PhD students/candidates who have the cash to throw at an RA?

Goodness, ethics aside, I'd love an assistant. Latte please!

[verbena]

I think hiring an assistant for pretty much anything is shady.

Me, too. I want to know who is responsible for every typo and every comma splice in every dissertation I read. I'm in the humanities, though, and I imagine this is also field-specific.

[carebearstare]

The questionable dissertation I mentioned upthread was historical, with lots of primary documentation. This person simply found it easier to pay someone (a pretty penny, too!) to do the backtracking for hu.

I don't know about anyone else, but polishing up my footnotes was one of the most arduous jobs of completing my diss, taking me a whole week and many trips back to the library and whatnot. Maybe if I'd been a little more organized at first, but you know how it goes.

[prof_smartypants]

Verbena makes a good point. At some point YOU have to defend your dissertation.

I am doing a fairly stats-heavy diss, despite the fact that I am not the world's best statistician by any stretch. I ask for help when I need it from committee members or friends who know what they are doing, but I also ask for a complete explanation regarding the whys and the hows of the various techniques I am applying in order to clean and analyze my data. I figure this is all part of the learning experience.

Theoretically, I could hire a stats whiz to just do all this for me, but the second my committee asks what my rationale was for doing x method, the stuttering would result in a failure to pass.

Something like copyediting doesn't pose the same issues, since hopefully grammar won't really be a topic of conversation during the defense. And as far as footnotes go - get ye endnote. Ah the glories of endnote!

[jonesey]

At the Education school I'm attending, I've known people who paid someone to do all of the statistical number crunching, and someone else to do all of their references (fixing APA errors, etc) for them (in addition to correcting grammar, spelling, etc).  This isn't uncommon, and okay with the university. 

[llanfair]

I'd never heard of hiring a copy editor for a dissertation till I saw this thread.  My supervisor and readers were my 'editors' - and frankly, I'm arrogant enough about my writing to think I know better than most editors could.

I do see the point in ESL cases, though - that makes all sorts of sense.  But doesn't the copy-editor thing get expensive?

[stanwyck]

Who are these PhD students/candidates who have the cash to throw at an RA?

Well...hm...for my colleague working on an ancient/archaeological site, it was part of the itemized budget that she submitted with the grant application--transportation, housing, food and pay for a survey team.  This is completely common.  I suppose I also could have asked for survey assistance in my fellowship budgets, but I think my sites are pretty well documented, I can make up the documentary deficiencies myself.  I can see asking for funding for architectural drafting/elevations/cross-sections later, though.

I'd be curious what the sociologists or anthropologists have to say--how many people hired assistants while they were doing survey work, especially overseas?

I think I would be open to the idea of hiring a research assistant for archival research overseas--it's not so much that you need someone to do research for you, it's more that you need a local person that knows the local rules, and how to make things happen.  And although I think my language skills are good enough, I can see why people add translation services into fellowship budgets.

[kedves]

This example is so far outside the line that I am giving it only to show why almost everything discussed here seems fine to me, although official policies and practices differ.  I know of a high-level administrator at a big state university whose assistant's job was to research and write the Ed.D. dissertation for the administrator.  This was someone who was in a non-academic job; the doctorate was for prestige and salary, not to use as a basis for teaching or research.  I don't know how the administrator defended it--very careful reading, maybe.