Effective Doctoral Education: Interpreting Factors and Outcomes of Success through a New Framework, Autoethnography, and Quantitative Study of Passion

The purpose of this disquisition is to increase knowledge about the factors and outcomes of success in doctoral education. Enhanced understanding about the factors and outcomes of success could help optimize effectiveness of the complex systems that educate doctoral students. To achieve the purpose of this disquisition, three manuscripts were prepared. The first manuscript presents a new conceptual framework, the P Model of Doctoral Success, through which outcomes and factors of success could be interpreted. Outcomes of success are presented in terms of personal and professional outcomes. Personal outcomes include personal satisfaction; professional outcomes include measures of program completion, job placement, publications and professional satisfaction. Factors of success are comprised of basic, external, internal, and operational factors. Basic factors include presence, proficiency, perspective, and pertinence. External factors include possibility, place, people, and prosperity. Internal factors include purpose, passion, persistence, and patience. Operational factors include process, practice, play, and pause. The second manuscript presents an autoethnographic method intended to enhance understanding of knowledge creation and reflective scholarship through a process of writing and interpreting personal reflections. Themes revealed through the analysis of reflections included reflective scholar definitions, mindfulness, cycle of knowledge creation, and domains of knowledge creation. The cycle of knowledge creation theme included sub-themes of uncertainty, disciplined inquiry, and new perspective. The domains of knowledge creation theme included interest, career, and literature. Interpretations of the themes are provided. The third manuscript presents a quantitative study exploring passion for research. Existing Ph.D. students and Ph.D. alumni were administered an electronic survey, along with an adapted version of Vallerand et al.?s (2003) Passion Scale. Paired samples t-tests indicated that participants possessed significantly higher levels of harmonious passion than obsessive passion. ANOVA results revealed statistically significant differences in levels of obsessive passion between three stages of doctoral education for participants representing the college of Human Development and Education. Multiple regression results indicated that obsessive passion and harmonious passion were significant predictors of knowledge creation and dissemination in terms of refereed publications. Implications of these results are provided for administrators, faculty, and researchers