Traditionally in academia, the two main purposes of master's-degree and doctoral projects are (a) to provide graduate students guided practice in conducting and presenting research and (b) to make a contribution to the world's fund of knowledge or to improve the conduct of some activity.

The practice aspect goes well beyond the demands of a typical term paper or individual-study assignment, since the aim is to equip students to do research and writing of respectable, publishable quality in the future.

Theoretical refers to ways of explaining phenomena. Theoretical contributions typically consist of new ways to view and interpret familiar events. A theory usually identifies (a) which facts or variables are important for understanding the issue at hand and (b) how those variables interact to produce some outcome of interest. (Chapter 4 includes a description of roles theories can play in research projects, and Chapter 5 describes ways of creating or adapting theories as components of theses and dissertations.) The following are titles of studies intended to advance the understanding of theories in representative academic fields.

The word practical in the present context refers to studies whose purpose is to improve the conduct of some activity. The author's aim is to help people do a job more efficiently. The job can be of various sorts--teaching children, furnishing social services to the needy, directing a political campaign, guiding individuals' vocational choices, planning a company's financial future, establishing a health-enhancement routine, searching the World Wide Web, and thousands more.