University of Sistan and Baluchestan Iranian Journal of Applied Language Studies 2008-5494 18 1 2026 07 01 Mentoring Characteristics in Doctoral Education: Perspectives of Doctoral Students and Supervisors 1 18 10000 10.22111/ijals.2026.54559.2586 EN Saloumeh Khodabakhshi Department of English Language, Faculty of Humanities, Bu-Ali Sina University, Hamedan, Iran Hassan Soodmand Afshar Department of English Language, Faculty of Humanities, Bu-Ali Sina University, Hamedan, Iran Journal Article 2026 01 25 The benefits of mentoring relationships between postgraduate students and their supervisors have been reported in the literature. However, despite research on mentors’ characteristics, there is a notable lack of ELT studies that give voice to both mentees and mentors. Few studies have explored the features of doctoral mentoring from both perspectives. For this reason, 55 ELT doctoral students and 18 doctoral supervisors responded to an open-ended question as part of a large-scale project. In addition, nine doctoral students and five supervisors volunteered for a follow-up semi-structured interview. Conventional content analysis of the responses to the open-ended question and the interviews demonstrated that, in the opinions of doctoral students and supervisors, a doctoral mentor should be supportive, knowledgeable, humanitarian, and available. Using directed content analysis, the identified mentoring characteristics were categorized into psychosocial, personal, and professional attributes. According to the findings, both doctoral students and supervisors prioritize psychosocial attributes, followed by personal and professional attributes, because the stressful conditions of doctoral education demand social and emotional support from doctoral mentors. This study also addresses implications for doctoral education, including how supervisors and their graduate students can effectively fulfill their respective roles. https://ijals.usb.ac.ir/article_10000_1725e18e5f5930bf4c81b88ef652f5e8.pdf