Doctoral Advisor Essay

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The doctoral advisor is a vital component of a student’s doctoral experience. While much of the literature focuses on the student’s perception of the advisor, Barnes and Austin (2009) examined what doctoral advisors believe to be their function in the doctoral process. The authors goal with this study was to “address a gap in the literature” (Barnes and Austin, 2009, p. 298) by offering insight into what advisors view as their responsibilities to their students. The findings presented in this article can provide invaluable advice and guidance to doctoral students, as well practitioners and advisors’ trainers.
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Related Literature Based on literature about doctoral advising, Barnes and Austin (2009) broke the information “into three primary thematic areas—influences on advising, advising practices, and outcomes” (p. 299). From the literature, they concluded that there are many factors, such as personality or research interests, that impact how an advisor engages …show more content…

They conducted “one-on-one, open-ended, in-depth qualitative interviews designed to explore advisors’ perspectives” (Barnes and Austin, 2009, p. 302) with 25 doctoral advisors from a public, research-focused university. Advisors from natural sciences, social sciences, and education were invited to participate based on their “exemplary advisor” status. Exemplary “was defined as a faculty member who has been one of the tool produces of Ph.D. students in his or her department over a five-year period” (Barnes and Austin, 2009, p. 303). During interviews, participants were asked the questions which were intended to help the authors understand the advisors’________________________. Interviews were recorded and transcribed. The data was divided first into themes, next into thematic categories, then subcategories and finally placed into thematic matrixes through open coding and axial coding (Barnes and Austin,

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