Using a multi-criteria decision making approach to doctoral dissertation title selection

Dissertation title selection is one the complicated and time consuming decisions that a doctoral student makes in the beginning of his/her research career. The aim of this paper is to propose a multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) approach to doctoral dissertation title selection process. Firstly, the most important criteria influencing the choice of doctoral dissertation title selection are identified. This is realized through a survey conducted among the target group and the studies in the literature. Two MCDM methods are then used in the selection process. More precisely, Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) is applied to determine the relative weights of evaluation criteria and the extension of the Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) is applied to rank the doctoral dissertation title alternatives