This document provides guidance on writing the findings and discussion chapters of a dissertation. It describes what should be included in each chapter for an empirical dissertation with separate literature review, methods, findings, and discussion chapters. The findings chapter should present the results of the study through data summaries, tables, graphs, and extracts. The discussion chapter should interpret the results, compare them to previous literature, and explain their implications in relation to the research aims and hypotheses. The document also provides tips on organizing qualitative results thematically and using hedging language to qualify statements.

1. PG Dissertations: writing up
your findings and discussion
You will be able to…
Describe what should go in each chapter
Explain how your findings and discussion are linked
Analyse how to use your aims and literature review to
plan your findings and discussion chapters
Rhian Wyn-Williams
Skills@ljmu.ac.uk

2. What do you want to learn from today’s
session?

3. What are they? Empirical (separate chapters for
literature, methods, findings and discussion)
Findings/Results Chapter
• What was found as a result of your study
• Use summary data
• Graphs and tables
• Extracts from transcripts
• Calculations
• Details of thematic analyses
• If there is an analysis of the errors or
uncertainties, include them here
• Identification of themes and trends
• Restatement of aims/objectives/hypothesis

4. What are they? Empirical (separate chapters for
literature, methods, findings and discussion)
Discussion Chapter
• A summary of the main results of the study
• How your results prove or disprove your
hypothesis
• Comparison of your results with other
investigations or literature
• Factors which may have influenced your results
• Implications of the results
• Interpretation of what you think the findings
mean/show
• Suggestions for why you got the results you did
• Restatement of aims/objectives/hypothesis

5. There is no single, correct way of writing them
but they all should:
• Be clearly themed
• Explain what you think your evidence/findings
mean
• Compare with the literature throughout.
• Contribute clearly to your conclusion: it is a
step in building up your argument.
• Always show relevance to your research aims.
What are they? Non-empirical (themed chapters
discussing findings and literature)

6. Findings and Discussion: find your story
You will have a mass of material and ideas in your head that you need to
turn into a text that makes sense and tells your research ‘story’.
Find your focus: what have you learnt?
- write a sentence for each
- organise them into groups
- check them against your aims and objectives
- plan how to order them (following your objectives/develop
new themes)
But keep sight of the big picture: significance and patterns identified.

7. Results/Findings
Your results/findings chapter will vary
enormously depending on your
subject and the type of research you
are doing.
What could effect the way you
present your findings?

8. Quantitative results:
Table 5 shows the most common modes of computer
infection in Australian businesses. As can be seen in
the table, home disks are the most frequent source of
infection.
The influents to filter A and B were analysed fully on a
number of occasions, and the averaged results are
presented in Table 6.1. It can be seen from the table
that the wastewaters from plants A and B were of
similar composition.
Usually presented in figures and tables, not raw data.
Think about these key features:
• show calculations if relevant
• summarise information given in the figure or table
• highlighting statement to point out the significance, e.g.
trends, patterns, results
Look at these examples. Where are the key elements?

9. 6.4.3 Themes from the Interview Data
For each of these graduates, the data reveal that they were all seeking ways to improve their
pedagogy and achieving success in different ways. Angela suggested that in her second year
of teaching she had changed in that she was planning in a "more child oriented" way. Ahmed
discussed a similar experience:
‘One of the things I've changed is this idea of herding children through the day: they go from
indoor play to snack time to the mat and so on. How I do it now is that I have a lot of
different things happening at once. I'll have a small group on the mat and there might be
some children sitting down and having a snack and there's still some children in home corner
playing.’
From these comments, two themes emerged. First, the ability to identify changes in their
planning through critical reflection, and second, the congruence between expressed beliefs
and the practice described.
Qualitative
results:
Text-based, and rarely would
have tables or graphs.
Refer to specific words and
phrases, often quotes.
Think about how careful
introductions of sections and
subsections can help you ‘find
the story’

10. Discussion
• Whether you are writing your discussion as a
separate chapter (empirical), or writing themed
chapters (non-empirical) you need to think
about what it is and what it is for:
• It’s where you show what you think your
findings mean.
• It’s where you may want to explain why you
found what you did.
• You could think of it like an essay answering
your research question with your evidence.
• It’s like a conversation between your research
and the research of others: keep linking back to
the literature.

11. Discussion
83% of respondents said that
environmental issues did not
influence their travel choices as
tourists.
That contradicts Jones’
argument that ‘most
people’ do now consider
the environmental impact
of tourism (2017, p.82).
Maybe this project’s participants were
less concerned than the average because
they were all students on a budget who
said low cost was their priority.
Read through either the extracts from some non-
empirical discussion chapters or the one from the
empirical chapter. I have emailed you all with these.
What do these tell you about how you can develop
your argument in this chapter?

12. This means that you need to think about
where your findings link to the literature
Aim Objective Findings Link to reading Critical Analysis
Do your findings
challenge what
you have read, or
offer further
evidence for
established
arguments? How
do they compare?
What these
findings mean to
you in relation to
your research aim
and objectives?
Find reasons for
them and draw
conclusions.

13. Useful language: hedging -
caution in academic writing
In the academic world nothing is a 100% certain. Use language to
show that you understand that.
Rather than rushing in with ‘the’ answer, stop and add some caution.
• use impersonal subjects (It is believed that ..., it can be argued that ...)
• use verbs such as would, could, may, might.
• use qualifying adverbs such as some, several, a minority of, a few,
many to avoid making overgeneralisations.
• Globalisation is a positive development for
nations. 
• Globalisation is perhaps beneficial for a
number of countries in several areas (Smith,
2006; Chen, 2008). 

14. • It is apparent from this table that…….
• Overall it can be seen that there is no difference in perception of effectiveness between male and female
participants.
• A significant number of the respondents argued that LJMU should provide more Directed Study Weeks.
• The interviews with academic staff suggest that there is a link between their enthusiasm for additional classes
and students’ perceptions of effectiveness. This is clearly demonstrated in Table 3, which shows the frequency
of positive language markers in the interview tape scripts; within individual faculties and between students
and staff.
Further examples of language
Findings

15. • These findings support the assertions of Roberts (2018)
• More surprisingly are the differences between the responses at interview to those expressed on the questionnaires.
This seems to support Davenport’s (2017) statistical work outlined earlier.
• There are similarities between the attitudes expressed in this study and those described in previous studies (Fox 2014;
Beaumont,2017) in relation to students’ perception of progress.
• Thus, it can be suggested on the basis of these findings, that there is a difference in perception between staff and
students in relation to the effectiveness of Directed Study Week (Doran, 2018).
• It may be argued that this study has presented some unusual findings.
Further examples of language
Discussion

16. Reflection…..
• Which aspects of planning and writing about
your findings and discussion would you now
make sure you remember?
• Why?
• How will you make those improvements?

17. Next steps: webinars to develop your dissertation writing, and
other assignments you may still have.
This Friday:
Academic Writing: reports
Next week:
PG Dissertations: Writing about your
methodology
Academic Writing: reflections
Week starting 30th March:
Editing and Proofreading
Dissertations: Question Time
Academic Writing: case studies