The dissertation is an independent piece of work (compulsory for all Honours students), which is designed to assess the student's ability to complete a major and worthwhile piece of research, with some guidance, but largely self-motivated and with a minimum of supervision. The accounting & finance dissertation course requires students to complete a series of asynchronous materials that aim to familiarise them with the interrelated stages of the research process (from theory building to theory testing), with a range of methods utilise in social sciences research, and with real-life examples of research in the different areas of the accounting & finance literature, which the students can use for their own dissertation.

There are around eleven online (asynchronous) sessions made available prior to the start of Semester 1. Each session is dedicated to the discussion of the main features of a seminal method in accounting and finance research, and the evaluation of its relative strengths and weaknesses. There are also up to five (5) individual supervision meetings totalling to four (4) contact hours.

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The course is assessed as a whole on the basis of a dissertation of 11000 words (100%).

Reassessments are normally available for all courses, except those which contribute to the Honours classification. For non-Honours courses, students are offered reassessment in all or any of the components of assessment if the satisfactory (threshold) grade for the overall course is not achieved at the first attempt. This is normally grade D3 for undergraduate students and grade C3 for postgraduate students. Exceptionally it may not be possible to offer reassessment of some coursework items, in which case the mark achieved at the first attempt will be counted towards the final course grade. Any such exceptions for this course are described below. 

The aim of this course of study is to:

■ Enable students to complete a substantial piece of independent work on a research topic of the student's choice within the disciplines (broadly defined) of accounting or finance.

■ Provide students with the ability to select and apply appropriate theories, methods and methodologies in the conduct of their underlying research.

■ Allow students to present that work in a way that demonstrates a critical understanding of the literature of the field.

By the end of this course students will be able to:

■ Demonstrate a critical understanding of issues in Accounting and Finance in the chosen area of interest;

■ Draw upon relevant principles, perspectives and theories to inform their selections of method and research design;

■ Critically evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the selected research methodology as it has been applied in the specific research project; 

■ Construct and present well-reasoned arguments to support the decisions made within the research process and the findings and conclusions of the dissertation.

■ Report the findings produced by this research project and display the ability to reflect on the project findings and their implications for theory, practice and future research.

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