I'm not writing a thesis, but a book on teaching coding, and this one point is really important. One of my chapters was on the cognitive benefits of writing software code--which I assumed were great because of Seymor Papert ("Mindstorms") and Ted Nelson's ("Computer Lib/Dream Machines") glowing enthusiasm for teaching kids how to code.

I started writing the chapter and had to get into the literature to find references to support the idea that learning to code carried concrete cognitive benefits. The research was extremely mixed, with one survey of the literature being highly critical of Papert for assuming so many benefits when the research was not finding that at all. I ended up having to stop everything and just read papers for a week to understand what science really knew about the subject. When I went back to rewrite my chapter, I had to temper my own enthusiasm and add numerous qualifications and cautions about my claims considering the evidence.

I'm happy for the experience as my thoughts on the subject are much more highly nuanced now, but it was very disheartening at first.