Thesis

Using publications in your thesis

Last reviewed 18 September 2026

Every chapter of your thesis has to be classified under the Graduate Research School's and the Business School's rules on including publications. Working papers count, so this covers most economics chapters. The classification decides how you present each chapter, what you need in writing from your coauthors, and what you declare in GRIS when you submit.

What counts as a publication

UNSW counts work that is published, submitted for publication, or in a form suitable for publication. For the Business School that includes:

• a paper published or in press in a journal, or a chapter in a book;
• a paper submitted to a journal and under review;
• a working paper in a series such as SSRN, NBER or CEPR;
• a conference paper in the proceedings, or a full paper linked from the conference programme.

Your job market paper on SSRN counts, even though no journal has taken it. If only the abstract is posted, say so in the chapter.

The three categories

When you submit, GRIS asks you to declare one category for the whole thesis.

One Category 3 chapter makes the whole thesis Category 3.

The difference between Categories 2 and 3 is whether you rewrite the paper as a thesis chapter or reproduce it word for word. Rewriting is Category 2: restoring proofs you cut for length, updating the literature, expanding the discussion.

Using a paper in place of a chapter

You may do this only if all of the following are true of that paper.

• The research was done during this PhD. Work from an earlier degree does not count; if you started the paper during your MPDBS year, check with the PGC.
• You contributed more than 50% of the content and are the primary author. Exactly half is not enough.
• You were responsible for planning, executing and preparing the work.
• No contract, publisher agreement or data agreement prevents you including it.
• You have it in writing from every coauthor, including any who is your supervisor, that they agree to the paper going into your thesis and that you contributed more than 50% of the work. An email is fine. Keep it.
• Your supervisor and the PGC approve it.
• The paper appears word for word, in the author-accepted version: the final draft as accepted, before the publisher's copyediting.

If you edit, expand or renumber the paper to fit the thesis, the chapter is Category 2 instead. You may match the thesis font and line spacing, and move tables and figures to where they read naturally.

Alphabetical authorship is not primary authorship

Economics lists authors alphabetically, so your place in the byline says nothing about your contribution. UNSW asks whether you contributed more than half the content and led the work. Describe what you did.

• An equal paper cannot go in as a chapter. If you and a coauthor each did half, neither of you contributed more than 50%. Write it up as your own chapter instead, saying what each of you did.
• Two PhD students cannot both use the same paper as a chapter. Where two HDR candidates want to include the same coauthored work, both must present it as an ordinary chapter.

Linking text

You must add sections before and after the paper explaining how it fits your thesis. A chapter usually looks like this:

Chapter 4   Paper 1
   4.1   How the paper fits the thesis
   4.2   The paper
   4.3   The results in the context of the thesis

Use those sections to give fuller methods or results that the paper omitted, and to discuss later work and the paper's limitations. If your examiners ask for changes to a chapter of this kind, answer them in the linking text instead of editing the paper.

Include an introduction, discussion and conclusion for the thesis as a whole, and put the chapters in a logical order. You cannot submit a collection of papers without them.

Acknowledging coauthored work

At the start of each chapter, or in a footnote, name your coauthors and say what each of you contributed.

Ask every coauthor, including any who is your supervisor, to confirm in writing that they agree to the work going into your thesis and that you contributed more than 50% of it. An email is enough; it does not have to be a signed form. Keep the replies as evidence of their agreement and your contribution.

The Business School suggests wording like this for work that has not been published. Adapt it, and say only what is true of your paper:

This chapter comprises a working paper presented at [conference] in [month,
year]. It is coauthored with [names]. I am the primary author and contributed
more than 50% of the work. [What you did; what each coauthor did.] I have
written permission from my coauthors to include this work in my thesis.

This chapter is based on unpublished work with [names]. I contributed more
than 50% of the work presented in this chapter. [What you did; what each
coauthor did.] I have written permission from my coauthors to include this
work in my thesis.

If a paper was presented at a conference that publishes no proceedings, give the conference and the date. If these sentences do not describe your paper, ask the PGC what the chapter should say instead.

Changes a journal's copy editors made to a chapter you have published count as editorial assistance, and go in your acknowledgements along with any use of AI. See thesis submission.

What you declare in GRIS

Everyone completes the Inclusion of Publications Statement, including candidates with no publications. For each paper used in place of a chapter you give its title, authors, journal or series, status, your contribution in your own words, and where it sits in the thesis. A paper under review has no volume, pages or date, and "submitted" is a valid status.

At the oral examination the panel will ask you to account for your contribution to any paper used in place of a chapter, and for what your coauthors contributed.

The Graduate Research School runs a seminar, Using Publications in Your HDR Thesis, with worked examples of all three categories. Slides are on the UNSW HDR Hub (UNSW login required). The Business School has its own guidelines on including publications; ask the PGC for a copy.