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Abigail, PhD | Social Researcher

@abbyelstudies

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Postdoctoral Social Researcher
Sharing research processes & motivation💡
🎓BA, MA, PGCE, MA, PhD
⬇️ free resources & my papers

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One of the reasons I’ve been quiet on here is because I’ve been spending my time outside of work, being a mum and trying to survive applying for a promotion at work to be a senior researcher.

This involved a lengthy personal statement, a research proposal, a presentation and preparing answers to situational and past example questions.

I was *so* close to passing the interview - I got really good feedback for my research knowledge and my situational question but the past example answers didn’t meet the mark.

I’ve heard it’s quite common for people to not pass promotion the first time, which has been a big comfort for me! Also, going through the whole experience means I know what to expect next time - because I definitely will try applying again in the future!

I wanted to share as I think it’s important to share “rejections” as much as the positives because it’s part of the reality 🫶🏻

If you’ve been through anything similar, I’m sending you lots of love and I believe in you for next time 🥰 by @abbyelstudies

While I wait for a peer review decision on my systematic review manuscript, I’m moving onto my next PhD journal article - this one is (hopefully) going to be a mash up of three of my themes to convey a finding about teacher motivation versus the employment market (work in progress 🤪)

I’ve drafted 1,300ish words for this methods section and have some comments to come back to once I’ve drafted the findings (e.g., confirming how many participants fed into this article)

Next up: writing (and figuring out how to write) the findings section 🤞🏻

Do you like writing about methods? by @abbyelstudies

I got my PhD graduation picture back! Shoutout to the photographer (I cannot remember his name although I did ask for it and swiftly sent an email to Ede and Ravenscroft to tell them how fab he was) as he got me and my fam smiling 🫶🏻

Also thank u if you voted on my poll and helped me decided to wear this dress! by @abbyelstudies

Accidentally took 11 weeks away from journal article work - after I submitted my systematic review, I took a little break and just focused on working and living. That accidentally turned into 11 weeks without working on post-PhD outputs 😅

Back now and ready to re-plan what I’m doing. Next up: methods section of my first PhD empirical article 🥳

How have you been? by @abbyelstudies

Please keep your fingers crossed that my systematic review manuscript makes it past the editors’ desks 🤞🏻

I’ve been sat on this draft for a while and I’ve finally found the motivation since my PhD graduation to tie up the lose ends and get it ready to submit 🙌🏻

Are you working on any manuscripts at the moment? by @abbyelstudies

All the times over the past 5 years that Heslington Hall has been the site I’ve used to mark an occasion within my PhD programme.

Side note: a coincidence that the sun is shining when I passed my viva and graduated?? (Answer: probably because the other photos were taken in autumn/winter lol)

This was the first day of my PhD! My hair was purple, was excited to finally start and I met up with my PhD supervisor 🫶🏻

I attended a research group meeting with my 👶🏻 whilst on maternity leave. The research group was fab and supportive and it was more of an informal coffee get together to celebrate some PhD students who had passed their vivas recently and a chance for 👶🏻 to see the campus.

It’s also the day I learned my campus isn’t very pram friendly (so many stairs and not enough lifts) so I ended up leaving my pram at a reception and carrying 👶🏻 everywhere - I would have brought my baby carrier if I’d have known!

The last first day of school 🥹

I remember thinking “wow this is thick” when I picked up my thesis and also feeling really proud!

I was tired, my eyes were closing (hence the lack of contact lenses) and I felt mixed emotions about my viva, but Heslington Hall was shining for me 🥰

My final (?) selfie with Heslington Hall celebrating my graduation 🥳

Who knows, maybe I’ll be back in the future for something work related or for someone else’s graduation?

Either way I had fun documenting key events using Heslington Hall as the backdrop - because let’s be honest, it’s the prettiest building on campus and it was right next to my college/department 🥰 by @abbyelstudies

Finishing my journal article manuscript draft involved creating two reference lists: one for my reviewed studies (I.e., my data) and one for literature I’d referenced throughout the article outside of the reviewed literature.

To do this I had a list of my reviewed literature and then a list of all my references (which included my reviewed literature) so I copied both into a spreadsheet document and used conditional formatting to highlight the duplicates. Then I went through the “all other references” list and deleted the references highlighted as duplicates. It took less time than I thought it would!

Now my article is ready for submission, my next step tonight is to figure out open access as I don’t quite understand what I need to do lol - but I will be submitting this one night very soon 🤞🏻

Are any of your mini projects coming to an end soon? by @abbyelstudies

Some horizontals I took on my PhD graduation day 🥰

Eye patches were a must as I didn’t sleep too well the night before - I’m telling myself it was because of the excitement 😂

My child really wanted some of the cookie my bestie got me so of course I shared 🍪

Wearing the doctoral bonnet was so fun and it was way more comfier than the mortar board, although it did make me partially deaf 😅🎓

Then we went out for dinner at the Star Inn The City and I had risotto which was so good! by @abbyelstudies

What’s next after my PhD graduation? Writing up journal articles!

In between my corrections and graduation, I did not feel motivated to work through my journal article plans. However, after graduation I’m feeling very motivated!

Last night I created a Gantt chart for these plans (template in the link in my bio) 🙌🏻

So I have plans to turn my PhD into 6 journal articles manuscripts for different journals - we’ll see if that actually materialises because I might end up combining a couple into one, but that’s part of the journey 💭

The first one I’m starting on is my systematic review as I actually have a manuscript almost ready to go, I’m hoping to polish this up and get it submitted next week!

Are you working on any journal articles? by @abbyelstudies

Obviously I didn’t do a PhD for the graduation, I did it because I absolutely love research and I wanted to contribute to the knowledge and (hopefully) policy field and practice 🫶🏻

Here’s the 16 seconds of my graduation, I doffed my cap to the vice-chancellors, gave my family a 🫶🏻 and high fived my amazing PhD supervisor 🥳

Will be reliving this for the foreseeable future 🥹 by @abbyelstudies

Introducing Dr Abigail Bowling 🥳🥳

I can’t put graduation yesterday into words yet as I haven’t fully processed it but what I can say is what a fantastic day 🥹

For all the PhDers, you can do this, I believe in you and I cannot wait for you to experience this 🫶🏻

Graduation was just the motivation I needed to get back to work tomorrow and also start project journal articles, starting with a Gantt chart (of course) 👊🏻 by @abbyelstudies

The Socia Research Association’s annual conference was really interesting! This was my first time attending a conference without presenting and I felt a lot more relaxed haha

The talks on trauma informed ethics and deliberative methods were stand outs for me

How you ever heard of deliberative methods? It was the first time I’d heard of them! by @abbyelstudies