Let’s say there is this dissertation:
The impact of interest rate on economic growth in country X
Can I write my dissertation about:
The impact of interest rate on economic growth in country Y
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6This seems far too shallow of a contribution for a dissertation. What if you generalized their approach such that it could be applied to any country? That might be interesting. Talk to your advisor about it!– Austin HenleyCommented Jan 5, 2018 at 19:22
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can I follow the same chapters the previous author did? That seems like a really strange thing to do. Surely the more meaningful thing to do is follow the same methodology.– Thomas SteinkeCommented Jan 5, 2018 at 19:28
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Also, what is your goal? Replicating previous work on a different country is unlikely to suffice for a PhD thesis, but it might form part of your PhD or be a Masters thesis.– Thomas SteinkeCommented Jan 5, 2018 at 19:29
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2Will it be detected by Turnitin? – This is not he question you should ask.– Wrzlprmft ♦Commented Jan 6, 2018 at 8:40
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It is plagiarism only if you do it without citing that previous dissertation.– GEdgarCommented Jan 6, 2018 at 13:42
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1 Answer
It is not (necessarily) plagiarism (unless you actually copy parts, or merely rewrite the previous thesis), but it would make a pretty boring thesis. A PhD should add something new to a field; investigating the same thing in a different group/country would probably not be enough. Therefore, you can, probably, not write your thesis about it (i.e. the thesis committee/advisor/... would probably not accept it as being sufficient for a PhD thesis).
Unless, that is, you add something interesting. One possibility could be (though keep in mind that I am in a very different field) to say that:
According to previous work, the effect of foo is bar, as shown by studies in Country X. Country X is a dictatorship/christian/... country. There are reasons A, B and C to suggest that foo⇒bar has been observed because of Country X being a ... country. According to our theory, in a democratic/pastafarian/... country the effect of foo should be buu, not bar. We test our theory in Country Y, which has such a system. Furthermore we show that the effect foo depends on [country property] by doing some more studies.
