Thesis

[fionaB]

I am going into my second year of my Masters in Nursing, Educator, and I have to write a thesis,does anyone have any ideas or advice? I currently work in a Cardiothoracic Unit where we care for both intensive and stepdown patients so my hope is to find something cardiac related or student nurse related.

Thanks

[llg, PhD, RN]

Start by identifying a few general topics that interest you. Then browse the literature to assess the state of knowledge on those topics. (What do we know about that topic and what do need to know? Which topics seem "ripe" for some more research?) That should help you narrow it down a bit.

Then choose 1 or 2 topics and do a more detailed literature search on. Use the skills you should be learning in school to evaluate the literature and begin to brainstorm a couple of possible ideas for your project. Meet with your advisor to discuss the feasibility of actually carrying out a few of the ideas you have brainstormed.

That process should help you find a topic that is both of interest to you and also feasible given the resources at your disposal.

[fionaB]

Thanks, I have already taken Advanced research but the topic I chose is going to be difficult to complete as a thesis which is why I am looking for new ideas.

[Whispera, MSN, RN]

What topic did you originally choose? Maybe you can tweak it a bit and not have to reinvent the wheel!

[fionaB]

I did a research paper on food rewards in the schools, are we teaching our children from an early age to eat if they achieve something, I used Pavlov as an example, but I ran into lots of road blocks in the schools, teachers like food parties, they are "easy", hence the reason for looking for a new topic

[Whispera, MSN, RN]

Is this a thesis based on lit search or experimenting you do yourself? I would think if you were doing the lit search thing, to research the impact of food rewards in people in general might be interesting. You could include Pavlovian theory. You could tie it into cardio health too.