The Importance of the Dissertation Acknowledgements Section

A dissertation is your piece of work that encompasses all of your work while in graduate school. Every graduate student is assigned a professor and given expectations of what their dissertation should include, the acknowledgements section being one of the essential components to include. It is usually at the end of your dissertation and is the section where you give thanks and acknowledgement to any outside person or party who made your work possible. The acknowledgement section is just as vital to your dissertation as the rest of the work is.

The importance of giving acknowledgement is just as important as giving thanks to your doctor after surgery. In your acknowledgements section, you should give acknowledgement to the outside parties in the order you received their help. It is also essential that you mention how they helped and on what specifically they contributed to your dissertation. For example, if a professor guided you to finding your topic you would mention them first in your acknowledgements section, if you needed research funding you would give credit to the people who funded the research that made your dissertation possible. Do not mention exactly how much money each contributor donated. Pay special attention so as to not confuse your readers or listeners on who helped with what part of the dissertation, so state it clearly.

Although you are essentially giving thanks and acknowledging the people who made your dissertation possible in this section, make sure to not delve and give too much thanks to one specific outside party helper, or go off on a tangent about who you appreciated the most or who you liked the most. Giving acknowledgement and gratitude is vital, but it is unprofessional and ungrateful to others if you concentrate on one specific contributor or concentrate on the details of what one contributor gave. If it looks like you are trying to give one contributor more attention, the other contributors will not appreciate it and therefore, be less likely to help you in the future. It is important to keep this in mind, so as to keep your acknowledgement section professional and clear.

Don’t forget to mention every contributor, no matter how small the contribution, what they helped with and in the chronological order of the help, these tips and your acknowledgement section will be just as important as it should be.