ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the theoretical background to the five approaches are values, independency to dependency, developing creativity, lecturing, and curriculum design. It reviews some of the alternative models that have been provided for looking at research supervision – most of them focusing on doctoral supervision. The chapter focuses on the research behind create a framework as clear as possible – it used a multi-method but largely qualitative approach, and included some less usual, but illuminating, ways of testing the data. The chapter believes that an over-emphasis on the functional approach, to the exclusion of all others, creates a rigid and arid experience for both academic and student, so the introduction of four other approaches to working with research students is a deliberate attempt to put the functional approach in its rightful place. Shaher Shalfawi carried out another investigation of PhD students’ preferences for approaches as part of an assignment for a development programme for supervisors at the University of Stavanger.
