Review of Literature

Dr. Sasmita Mishra

 An effective review critically analyses material, synthesizes it, and will be relevant, appropriate and useful for the reader.

The place of literature review

The theoretical world
The world where our theories, ideas, hypotheses and concepts exist

Theory

The Literature Review

How can we contribute to knowledge by exploring, structuring and synthesizing: prior theoretical approaches to our topic Prior methods of examining our topic

The real world

The world we live in and observe

Reality

What is literature review?

Literally, it means a re-view (or look again) at what has already been written about a topic. This where you demonstrate that you understand that which has been done before, and can point to where this existing research is deficient some way.

 You dont know exactly what you are going to research until you have read the relevant literature and you dont know if what you are reading

 A literature review distills the existing literature in a subject field. The objective of the literature review is to summarise the state of the art in that subject field.

Literatures are important in

Supporting the identification of a research topic, question or hypotheses Identifying the literature to which the research will make a contribution and contextualizing the literature in that literature Building an understanding of theoretical concepts and terminology Facilitating the building of a bibliography or list of sources that have been consulted Suggesting research methods that might be useful Analysing and interpreting results

Evaluating information sources

Articles in scholarly journals should form the base of lit review Books
Relevant to the research topic Written by an authoritative author Up-to-date Published by a reputed publisher One that includes extensive reference to other literatures Clearly structured and well presented

Evaluating web resources

who is the intending audience? What is the frequency of update? Which organisation is the publisher or website originator? What is the web resource developers claim to expertise and authority? Are there links or references to other relevant web, electronic or print sources? What do reviews or evaluations of this site say? Is a license or payment necessary for access to resources?

Literature searching and locating information sources

Library catalogue Search engines On-line databases or abstracting and indexing services

Developing conceptual framework and mind mapping

Identify additional search terms Clarify thinking about the structure Understand theory, concepts and relationships between them

Formats

Formats

Formats

Sample structure of literature review

Basic definitions Why the subject is of importance What research has already been undertaken on this topic A clear summary of the research opportunities and objectives that emerge from the literature review.

THANK YOU