The road of a PhD candidate can be long and troublesome. Data collection is always delayed, your paper gets rejected (again!), and an avalanche of student emails keeps clogging your inbox (and your mind). Many external factors can keep you from staying on track. But face it; the biggest threat to finishing your dissertation on time is you. Self-determination theory A lack of motivation to finish your PhD project (or any other project for that matter) is not uncommon. But what

This year, I embarked on the half-exciting /half-terrifying task of conquering the theories and practices of Big Data analysis. For some, the thought processes involved in writing code may be intuitive and come as second nature. If you are one of those lucky folk, keep moving along, this is not the blog you’re looking for. For those like me, that are coming from the comforts of the SPSS world, here is what you may experience in your first attempts at Big Data research: 1. Den