Use of Separate Documents/Previously Published Articles in Theses/Dissertations

Requirements:

The Graduate College recognizes the necessity for graduate students to undertake collaborative research with a mentor and/or with other graduate students.  Such collaborative research often results in coauthored journal articles and/or meeting presentations; nevertheless, the Graduate College does not allow coauthored dissertations or theses. 

When including previously published journal articles or meeting presentations, the student must meet the following conditions:

1. The student is the first listed author in the coauthored journal article or meeting presentation;


2. The article must constitute its own chapter within the dissertation or thesis; although, it may retain its original abstract and references;


3. An overall Introductory chapter must explain how each chapter approaches and examines the central thesis or dataset;


4. The last chapter of the document must summarize the findings of all chapters and appendices.

In a separate appendix, the student must either include signed letters from coauthors granting permission to use the articles, or a statement by the student to the effect that all coauthors have granted their permissions.

Instructions:

Students incorporating previously published journal articles into their documents may do so in one of two ways:

Option 1: The articles may become chapters within the document; or,
Option 2: The articles may become appendices.

If you chose Option 1, the format of the entire document must be uniform.  If you chose Option 2, those appendices containing the articles may be formatted per the journal of publication.

In both options, a complete set of citations must be placed at the end of the document for ease of researchers even if separate reference sections appear at the end of some chapters or appendices.

The following shall apply to all dissertations and theses:

1. Each student must complete a dissertation or thesis as an independent and original scholarly work.


2. No student may use the same research to create more than one dissertation or thesis unless the research for the second document includes either more data, new data, or an alternate analytical approach to that data.