Literature%20Review

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Literature Review

• How not to reinvent the wheel

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What is a literature review?

• A brief review of existing knowledge in an area
  as it relates to your topic of study. It is
  organized as an argument in favor of a given
  research study, explaining why it should be
  undertaken and how it will contribute to our
  knowledge on a given topic
• A reader should come to the conclusion that your
  proposed research will shed light on an important
  topic/concern.

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Literature review

• Consists of
• A search for information regarding the chosen
  topic
• Quality of information
• Quantity of information
• A thoughtful analysis of the content identified
  in the first step
• Organization
• An essay written based on that analysis
• The steps overlap

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How do you approach a literature review?

1. Develop a general understanding of the topic
2. Identify major theories, research streams
3. Identify subject terms and important language
   relating to your topic
4. Search library catalogs and databases for quality
   information on the topic
5. Supplement scholarly information with news and
   popular culture sources

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• 5. Organize the material for presentation
• 6. Write the review, edit, rewrite, edit again,
  etc. until the final piece is well-written,
  succinct and compelling

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Important information to make your life easier

• You can download a citation manager/database
  software program from UK for free
• Endnote X2 for your appropriate operating system
• http//download.uky.edu/

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General sources Encyclopedias

• General v. topical

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Handbooks

• Somewhat more hit-and-miss than an encyclopedia
• However, articles tend to be more in-depth and to
  cover research better

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Consider a textbook

• Textbooks on the topic area can be useful as well

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Yearbooks, annual reviews
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Take-away from general sources

• A basic understanding of the topic of interest
• A set of sources for further, more in-depth
  reading

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Books

• Range from popular books aimed at a general
  audience to scholarly books that are advanced and
  demanding
• Abstracts and book reviews help you determine
  whether a book is too general or too advanced and
  demanding for your needs

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Search library catalogs and databases for quality
information on the topic

• Go to the Library web page
• Choose either
• Or

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Identify subject terms, important language of the
field or study topic

• Examine the library catalog entries for subject
  terms that relate to those books and articles
  that you find most useful
• Keep a list of terms for use in searches
• Write down important terms from abstracts,
  headings and subheadings in your reading

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For books

• Search the catalog
• Scholarly books on a topic are
• most likely to provide a comprehensive treatment
  of your topic
• most likely to develop a fully laid-out
  theoretical argument
• often out of date compared to articles
• not subject to the type of peer review that
  articles are

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Edited books

• Some books are a compilation of reviews of
  important topics within a larger subject area
• Chapters are written by experts on particular
  topics and are reviewed by the editors of the
  volume to see that they meet high standards

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For articles

• Go to the database page
• Find an appropriate database to search for
  articles
• I usually pick resources organized by subject and
  then scroll to Communications and hit submit
• Communication and Mass Media Complete
• This database provides citations from a great
  number of media-related journals, usually with a
  short abstract. You can download full-text (pdf)
  files from several of the periodicals.

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For articles

• You can search using the subject terms you kept
  from the earlier citations
• Limit your searches around the terms to try to
  find the best sources first
• You can limit the search to scholarly
  (peer-reviewed) and/or full-text articles
• Expand if you dont get enough cites at first

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For articles

• Boolean logic
• And v. or v. not
• Use of selected fields
• Some fields are quite restrictive (title) while
  others not at all restrictive (all text)

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An example Cultivation

• Type cultivation in blank and require that it
  be included in the abstract
• or
• authority in all text and television in
  abstract

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For articles

• You could also find one or more of the articles
  cited in the overall reviews you looked at
  earlier
• Then use the subject terms for the best articles
• Or else look for the authors of the overall
  reviews and see what they have written

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For articles

• When you have found some good articles and are
  reading them, you should be able to identify
  sources the authors used that would help your
  review
• Carry on a fan-out searchlook up the sources
  from the bibliographies of the best articles
• In several of the databases you can
  electronically link to cited sources and can even
  save full-text versions of those articles

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Reviews in academic journals

• Some journals will carry review articles or
  overviews of a topic area
• Use review or overview as a search term in an
  appropriate database along with topic-specific
  terms
• Holmstrom, A. J. (2004). The effects of the media
  on body image A meta-analysis. Journal of
  Broadcasting Electronic Media, 48, 196-217.

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Dont be skimpy

• When you are starting out its easier to collect
  too much and shed whats unnecessary than to have
  to make multiple searches
• As the literature review progresses and you know
  what you need, you can more narrowly tailor the
  follow-up searches and keep only the best content
  for use in the review

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Supplement scholarly information with news and
popular culture sources

• Though they generally are not as well thought-out
  or accurate, popular sources can provide
  examples, interesting angles and/or update your
  findings from the academic literature

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• Websites of organizations involved with your
  topic (may do their own research, develop white
  papers, etc.)
• Pew Center
• Newspaper/newsmagazine sites are available with
  helpful (and easily readable) stories about many
  topics of interest
• Library databases provide many full-text
  newspapers and popular magazines

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NOTE

• Go to news, popular magazine, or WWW sources
  AFTER you have done a good job mining the
  scholarly literature. Youll be more efficient
  that way, and will be able to critique the
  sources you find more effectively.
• Admittedly, some of the most recent or technical
  topics may call for more use of news and popular
  culture

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Organize the material for presentation

• Develop an outline!! (And then follow it).
• Dont do the train of consciousness thing.
  What seems perfectly rational and sensible to you
  will turn out to be full of logical holes, leaps
  of faith and self-contradictory logic.

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Writing the review

• Lay out your argument in step-by-step fashion and
  then place the evidence you have found where it
  fits on the outline.
• Do some of your claims lack support?
• Are some arguments especially controversial?
• These require the most background

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Write the review, edit, rewrite, edit again, etc.
until the final piece is organized, succinct and
compelling

• Presentation counts! Spelling, usage, structure,
  organizationthey all matter in how well your
  ideas are presented. You are trying to convince
  the reader of something. A well-written,
  articulate argument is more convincing.

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NOTE

• One of the most common shortcomings of research
  studies is that the researcher does not write a
  good literature review. Putting in the effort
  during the conceptualization stage will be
  rewarded during operationalization and
  interpretation. Your write-up will be faster and
  higher quality.