Struggling to Choose a Thesis Topic—Any Advice?

Hi everyone,

I'm doing my degree in public policy and just finished my coursework and now I need to pick a thesis topic, but honestly, I’m completely lost. I have no idea where to start, and when people ask me about my interests, I’m not even sure what to say. I feel like I don’t know enough about any one thing to come up with a solid research idea, and it’s really stressing me out. Has anyone else been in this situation? Who should I talk to, or how can I figure out what’s currently worth researching?

I’m starting to wonder if I’m even cut out for this thesis thing. Any advice or tips would be really appreciated!

Thanks!

Reply 1

George&Mary

Original post by Fatim.

Hi everyone,
I'm doing my degree in public policy and just finished my coursework and now I need to pick a thesis topic, but honestly, I’m completely lost. I have no idea where to start, and when people ask me about my interests, I’m not even sure what to say. I feel like I don’t know enough about any one thing to come up with a solid research idea, and it’s really stressing me out. Has anyone else been in this situation? Who should I talk to, or how can I figure out what’s currently worth researching?
I’m starting to wonder if I’m even cut out for this thesis thing. Any advice or tips would be really appreciated!
Thanks!

You are cut out for it, don't worry! Public Policy is such a ginormous subject that you can bend anything to it. Equally it's so massive that it is hard to shrink it down to one area.

Do you know roughly what the mark.scheme is ? Does it give significant weighting to primary research? Secondary is relatively straightforward. If there is an expectation of Primary data (quant or quali) then I think unless wedded to a specific topic it can be really useful to give that some hard thought before you get to the refining of your title / synopsis.

Do you have a personal tutor hlu can work this through with? Are there particular areas of research going on in your uni that you could relate or piggy back off, ( as long as timing aligns - back to data and timing again) not to plagiarise but to enhance focus in a particular area. One of the researchers may have some ideas.

Is there a particular area of public policy that interests you, like health, education, economic? Narrow it down that way and then think of a niche area of a big ticket item. Or take a universal / perennial issue like the difference been equality and equity and evaluate its application in two areas... or nudge theory, or demographic change, or AI implications. Prince Harry's recent point that we are no longer necessarily arguing with facts ...

Sit and talk through your thoughts with your tutor and try and work out what appeals. But make sure it's practical and doable in the time and word count !