Literature Review

Compiled by:

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Azizah Abdul Rahman & Dr Nor Zairah Ab Rahim

Edited (Sept 201) by:

PM Wardah Zainal Abidin

"A long, healthy, and happy life is the result

of making contributions, of having

meaningful projects that are personally

exciting and contribute to and bless the

lives of others."

Hans Selye

Sources

Central Queensland University Library

Writing Support, University of Toronto

Doing Literature Review, Chris Hart, Sage Publication, 1998.

MIS Research Methodology Class 2004

Prof. Madya Dr. Juhana Salim, UKM

Tom Cooper, Mathematics, Science and Technology Education Kelvin Grove

The classical thesis structure

INTRODUCTION What I want to do

LITERATURE What others say about it

DESIGN My plan for doing it

RESULTS What happened when I did it

DISCUSSION What this means

CONCLUSIONS What I found out

General definition

Literature survey is the documentation of a

comprehensive review of the published and

unpublished work from secondary sources of

data in the areas of specific interest to the researcher

(Uma Sekaran 2003)

What is LR? an essential early step in the research process

◦ it is used to find out what is already known about a question before trying to answer it

an account of what has been published on a topic by accredited scholars and researchers

A discussion of your knowledge about the topic under study an evaluative report of information found in the literature

related to your selected area of study (to support the knowledge)

review should describe, summarise, evaluate and clarify this literature

A foundation for the study Your review of the literature will continue until the research

report (paper, thesis) is submitted

Why LR?

to identify gaps in the literature

to avoid reinventing the wheel (at the very least this will save time and it can stop you from making the same mistakes as others)

to carry on from where others have already reached (reviewing the field allows you to build on the platform of existing knowledge and ideas)

to identify other people working in the same fields (a researcher network is a valuable resource)

Cont….Why LR?

to increase your breadth of knowledge of your subject area

to provide the intellectual context for your own work, enabling you to position your project relative to other work

to identify opposing views

to put your work into perspective

to demonstrate that you can access previous work in an area

to identify information and ideas that may be relevant to your project

to identify methods that could be relevant to your project

Types of Literature Review

self-study reviews

◦ demonstrate familiarity and learn from others

◦ increases the reader‟s confidence

context reviews

◦ creates links to a developing body of

knowledge

◦ establishes the significance and relevance of a

research project

Cont…Types of Literature Review

historical reviews

◦ shows the development of an idea or theory

over time

◦ only used on the most important ideas

theoretical reviews

◦ presents and evaluates different theories

◦ may integrate and extend theories

Cont…Types of Literature Review

integrative reviews

◦ presents the current state of knowledge

◦ provides a service to other researchers

methodological reviews

◦ evaluation of the methodological strength of

past studies

◦ a meta-analysis critically examines the findings of

a large number of research projects

Guiding principles

There will probably be more pieces of information about a topic area than you can read/understand during the period of your research

Find the seminal/key works: ◦ „chaining‟ – who does everyone cite?

◦ About 10 papers and 3 books about an area

◦ Research topic, methodology & theories = about 30 papers + 9 books should be investigated thoroughly (Leslie Willcocks)

◦ Also latest (3-5 years from the current year) work/soon to be published (conferences, network with key researchers)

Planning a literature search

DEFINE THE TOPIC

THINK ABOUT THE SCOPE OF

THE TOPIC

THINK ABOUT OUTCOMES

RECORD KEEPING

PLAN SOURCES TO BE

SEARCHED & SEARCH

RELEVANT SOURCES

Planning the search

1. Plan several blocks of time so that you

can immerse yourself in the search process

2. Identify your types of source

3. Decide on your search terms

4. Decide how to record the findings

Stages in developing a

literature review Selecting the topic

Setting the topic in context

Looking at information sources

Using information sources

Getting the information

Organising information (information management)

Positioning the literature review

Writing the literature review

Selecting the topic

can information be gathered locally?

are you in a position to travel to use various sources?

what are your interests and will this interest be maintained for the duration of the research?

who will be interested in this research ?

is it sufficiently interesting to keep you, the author, working for the next 2 – 3 – 4 years?

is the scope wide enough to be able to ascertain a particular niche?

is the scope so broad that it will lose direction?

does it involve technology that is readily available?

is training in technology and / or software readily available?

Setting the topic in context

For the topic to grow there must also be a context and this is influenced by existing knowledge.

The role of the literature review is to analyse the existing literature and give justification as to how your research will fit into the existing body of knowledge

allows the author to demonstrate how his research is linked to prior efforts and how it extends our understanding of this general line of scholarly inquiry

Looking at information sources

need to consult a wide range of

information sources

◦ Informal sources: peers, colleagues, other

researchers, your Faculty Liaison Librarian,

and your supervisor

◦ formal sources: books, journals - scholarly,

popular, research papers, world wide web,

bibliographies, encyclopedias

Using information sources

Defining the information need and stating it as a question ◦ what is the appropriate technique for…?

Breaking the need into its component parts

Identifying synonyms and prioritizing keywords

Searching specific sources

Evaluating the information

Evaluating the search process (adapted from Constructing a Search Strategy, Duffel, 1995).

Academic Journals

the most important research outlet

◦ Rigorous refereeing process

◦ Wide distribution

the lead time for publication in high quality

journals may be more than 2 years from first

submission date

many information systems journals have appeared

during the last 10 years – quality?

Sources of data

Tertiary literature sources

Secondary literature sources (sometime outdated)

◦ Books

◦ Journals

◦ Newspapers

Primary literature sources (more recent)

◦ Conference papers

◦ Research reports and theses

◦ Company reports

Media

◦ Paper

◦ Video and radio broadcasts

◦ The Internet- ???

Some Academic Journals

top IS journals are:

◦ MIS Quarterly

◦ IS Research

◦ European Journal of IS

◦ Information Systems Journal (ISJ)

◦ Journal MIS

◦ Journal of Strategic IS

◦ Management Science

…

Looking at information sources:

identify parent disciplines

go to leading journals and search for the recent issues for the latest information on the topic area. Use the references in those articles, and for "snowballing" - bouncing back and going through the history of the topic area.

From these articles it is possible to recognise names that reappear. They are often the leading people in the field.

This is necessary because when an examiner looks at a literature review they will expect to see certain leading names.

Conferences

The most up-to-date research outlet Some conferences have rigorous refereeing

(check acceptance rate) ◦ note difference between research papers,

research in progress & posters

The top IS conferences include: ◦ ICIS and ECIS

◦ HICSS, PACIS

◦ ACIS

Books

Be cautious when using books

Some books contain original research

◦ eg. Weber, R. (1997) Ontological Foundations

of Information Systems, Coopers and Lybrand,

Melbourne

◦ or collections of research articles, often

selected from the best papers at a particular

conference

Eg IFIP 8.2 Conferences

615-610 JCarroll

Theses

a thesis is the output of a research degree, usually a PhD

a bound copy of the thesis is kept in the university library

these may be found through indexes ◦ eg MISQ index

copies may also be ordered from central copying services ◦ eg, UMI (Proquest)

http://wwwlib.umi.com/dissertations/browse/89

◦ British Thesis Service

Government Documents

reports are published from government

sponsored research projects

can be purchased from government

publishing services

may be found in university libraries

of varying quality

Trade Journals and Research

Reports not refereed and therefore of uncertain

quality

up-to-date and therefore important for

some research projects

commercial research reports (eg. Gartner,

IDC) are intended for practitioners

The Web

some sites provide excellent bibliographies (eg ISWorldNet)

very uneven quality

◦ some on-line journals are refereed and of good quality

◦ much material on the web is of dubious quality and should be treated with caution

◦ internet sources can be “unstable” and difficult to document

“Internet is a powerful complement to Scientific literature research but relying on it exclusively is not enough”

Critically evaluating and selecting

•Classification (Creswell, 2005)

- Web, drafts, newsletters

- Indexed (conference papers, dissertations)

- Refereed (journals)

- Research books

- Summaries (Encyclopedias, Handbooks)

Quality Recency