By Rebecca Seymour, Postgraduate researcher in HLS and PhD mentor
The importance of creating and maintaining a social support network during your PhD cannot be underestimated.
Although there are many students doing PhDs at Coventry, nobody is doing exactly the same topic, which can lead to feelings of isolation as students move through their degrees at different paces and use different methods. It’s easy to work from home during your degree as you’re not required to be ‘at work’. While there are times that staying at home is beneficial; such as writing weeks, the decreased social interaction can have a negative effect on your health. Depending on whether you live on your own, with flatmates or family, it can be a slippery slope from working at home, to not getting dressed, to not showering and not leaving the house for days with only Frankie the spider to talk to. Not having social interaction can lead to tunnel vision regarding your degree and you can forget that you are not only a student, but a person with friends, family and hobbies as well.
Whether it’s by coming into the student offices to work, meeting people for coffee or going to the gym, it’s vitally important to create and maintain a social network during your degree. While other students aren’t doing exactly what you’re doing topic wise, they are completing similar degrees, and at the end of the day everyone will have the same chapters in their theses. Meeting and discussing issues or newfound knowledge with other students will strengthen your ability to defend your work, or clear up confusion about topics. You might find a better method to use for data collection, or a paper that explains your theoretical framework perfectly.
Life isn’t all about your degree. The friends you make will support you in the other areas of your life, such as feeling homesick if you’ve moved away, after-work social events on a Friday to de-stress, keeping you motivated when you have bad days and question for the thousandth time why you’re doing this degree, motivating you to exercise, and of course, being there to listen. The friends you make during your degree are the start of your professional network and may become lifelong friends.
Doing a postgraduate degree is a great life decision – ensure it goes as smoothly as possible by surrounding yourself with friends who will push you over the finish line!
Rebecca Seymour
Postgraduate researcher in HLS and PhD mentor.
Twitter: @R_J_Seymour