A Puzzling Confrontation: Overall Quality and Usefulness of PhD Design Research vs Master Design Research

Abstract

This paper presents a short critical comparative analysis of a sample of Design PhD Thesis and Master dissertations developed at Lisbon School of Architecture. It is based on a basic comparative analysis of near 100 PhD Design Thesis and an equal number of Design Master Dissertations in terms of its overall quality and usefulness (in terms of results and its application in society). For this purpose, the overall quality includes not only the assessment made by the jury members but also the evaluation of the research in terms of process - methodologies - and also in what concerns results - the impact the research has in society and/or potential impact to be further explored. This last aspect is linked with the construct - usefulness - that encompasses the degree in which the produced knowledge can be transferred to societies/persons/communities and the level of its impact. As preliminary conclusions we discover that master dissertations perform better in terms of knowledge transfer being also more “linked to reality” and more likely to have direct social impact than PhD Thesis.