Question: What is a PhD?

Melanie Zimmer answered on 11 Mar 2016:

A PhD is a Doctor of Philosophy, which is another university degree followed a Bachelor’s (and in some cases Master’s) degree. There are different PhD programmes, it normally takes 3-4 years.

It is not easy to say what you exactly do during your PhD as it depends on the subject you are studying, but at the end you would normally have submitted a thesis detailing the research you have been doing and also defend your work (which means that you would present to your supervisors and external examiners what you have been doing and answer their questions). The research needs to aim to provide new knowledge, which can also be done in different ways – you could come up with something completely new or you can build on existing knowledge. If you

I’m currently in my first year and looking into narrowing down my problem area.

Tom can probably give you more details as he is about to finish in a few months. 🙂