The Discussant

For the poster and round table sessions the role of the chair and discussant are combined.

As a discussant it is your role to give constructive and supporting feedback to the presenter on the content of their work. In order to be able to do so, you will receive a paper of the work the PhD-candidate is going to present. Please keep in mind that the PhD-candidates possibly present their research (in English) for the first time, and that this can be a challenging experience for them. Try to formulate your feedback in a constructive manner and provide the presenters with stimulating advice, so they can continue their research with new ideas and fresh motivation. The feedback should be given orally, (about 5 minutes per discussant). In case of a paper presentation, the discussant can make use of a brief PowerPoint or afterwards hand over some written comments (if possible).

We would also like you to involve the audience in the discussion by creating a group discussion. For instance, raise an issue about the main results and discuss this issue with the presenter and the audience. Minor points concerning the paper can be exchanged in written comments or by discussing them after the session. All presentations and discussions will be in English.

For all paper presentation sessions we have also assigned a PhD candidate to be a discussant, to give PhD candidates the opportunity to practice their future role as a discussant.

A poster session:

Poster sessions will be in Wonder.me. This software gives the discussants and audience the opportunity to roam around the room, and visit different posters after the poster pitches.

For more information on how this works, Download the instructions for a poster session.

Discussants and chairs will enter this session as a host (use this link), to be able to give broadcasting rights to the presenters.

At the start of the session, the appointed chair will invite the presenters of this session to the broadcast. Presenters are now asked to introduce their poster during a 3 minute pitch. After this short presentations you will end the broadcast, and the audience will roam around the room to discuss the posters with the presenters, who are at their appointed number. There are two discussants in the session. Please keep track of the time yourselves, so you can discuss al posters appointed to you. The discussants will discuss both content and lay-out of the poster. With regard to the lay-out, the following points can be discussed:

§ The clarity of the poster (overall)

§ The extent to which the poster draws attention

§ The clarity of the textual information the poster conveys

§ The clarity of the graphical information the poster conveys

§ The originality of the design of the poster

Duration of the various presentation types and discussions:

Duration of a paper presentation and discussion

Total duration: 30 minutes

§ Presentation: 10 minutes

§ Discussion: 15 minutes (starting with the jr. discussant (5 minutes), and then the sr. discussant (5 min.), followed by the group)

There will be 2 paper presentations in a session of 1 hour

Duration of a poster presentation and discussion

Total duration: 1 hour

§ The session starts pitch by presenters (per poster): 3-5 minutes. After all pitches, all posters will be discussed simultaneously, while the audience can move between the different posters for the remainder of the hour.

Duration of a round table presentation and discussion

total duration: 30 minutes:

§ Presentation/pitch: 5 minutes

§ group discussion: 25 minutes