Which Students Write The Longest Masters Theses?

How does your thesis compare to those written by fellow students exploring other subjects?

Marcus Beck of, author of R is My Friend, compiled a graph of every masters thesis from the University of Minnesota, written from 2009 to the present. He sorted out all 930 records by major and the average length of papers to figure out which majors produce the lengthiest papers.

According to the graph, Medical Chemistry and Science Technology and Environmental Policy take first and second place respectively, with papers over 100 pages, while Psychology and Clinical Research come in last, with average papers of just 25 pages.

However, cautions Beck, “Dissertation length is a pretty pointless metric of quality, so interpret the data only in the context that they’re potentially descriptive of the nature of each major.”