literature review

Learning objectives

All students will be able to:

• Analyze and evaluate the credibility, relevance, and contributions of various sources to identify key themes and gaps in the existing research.

• Integrate findings from multiple sources to create a cohesive narrative that highlights trends, contradictions, and emerging questions in the literature

Literature Review

Suggestions:

• Stress in shelter cats, Mediterranean diet, instagram paper, AQB papers scored 5

• High scoring papers in your discipline AND OR any peer reviewed research you have come across. Maths, Sciences may have shorter literature reviews, please check this

• Purdue OWL can help with synthesis and how to write your LR.

Open Ended

What do you think a literature review is? Provide a brief summary only

1. It is a critical recap of what has already been researched on a topic.

2. Can be from books, academic journals and peer reviewed papers.

3. The purpose of a LR is to find out for yourself what's already known about the topic.

4. To give your reader a critical overview of what you found.
5. To look at the research methodology and to find out what's missing in the research - are there any gaps. This is where you can contribute with your research.

In short

Open Ended

We have been discussing gaps in the research for a while now. What is your understanding of a gap?

Why?

​It is important to understand the WHY?

It shows your credibility as a researcher.

Demonstrates your knowledge of your research topic – and in simple terms, shows you are up to date regarding the current state of knowledge in your research area.

As mentioned before – identifying the gaps in the literature and shows how your research links to one or more of these gaps.

Synthesis

Students normally ask – what is synthesis? When processing large volumes of information – you have to synthesize.

You need to summarize the information, evaluate it, interpret it, and draw conclusions for your readers.

Synthesizing is not just summarising! When you engage in synthesis, you contrast the critical points using your own voice and ideas.

Synthesis

`Two types: explanatory syntheses and argumentative syntheses.

Explanatory syntheses seek to bring sources together to explain a perspective and the reasoning behind it. Argumentative syntheses seek to bring sources together to make an argument. Both types of synthesis involve looking for relationships between sources and drawing conclusions

Main points to consider

The LR chapter needs to include an introduction or opening section, followed by the main body where you will provide an overview +synthesis.

A concluding summary – this should be a seg-way to your gap but as you have seen with the papers, gaps can be in many places. Most sensible place is the LR and the introduction of your paper - the instagram cake paper does this.
Signpost your paper – tell the reader this is the gap. Effective sign posting of papers score high.

In the opening, state the purpose of the LR, which is to synthesize the existing literature in relation to your research aims. Now, your reader will already know what a LR is, but you need to show what you are doing and you mean business!

​

​The opening!

Mohammed Ali: The influence of peer pressure on the decision-making and behavior of adolescents and high school students is a complex issue that has been vastly studied across distinct cultures and settings. The literature review synthesized the findings of numerous research studies arranged into five key themes: the impact on behavioral and academic performance, the impact on risk- taking and substance use, the effects on emotional and social well-being, the role of peer pressure in career and educational, and the psychological and developmental implications of peer pressure. All the sources used are either peer reviewed or from an academic journal. This review aims to fill gaps within the literature, considering the context of Al Ain.

​BODY:

This is beating heart of the LR – and where you are likely to earn or lose grades. You need a structure – by now your sources and annotated bibliography will be telling you that story:

Thematic
Chronological
Methods
Theories

​ THEMATIC: MOST popular
* As you have been reviewing your sources, annotating them, by now, you will have seen some patterns and themes emerging.
So you can use these themes to structure your LR. E.g. in the cake paper, the themes are: Foodie Culture, Plating and Photography, Social Media and Marketing.
* Advantage: Most common, and suitable for identifying factors that contribute to an outcome or variables. Also useful for contrasting viewpoints.

​ Chronological – date of publication - The simplest approach is to trace the development of the topic over time, which helps familiarize the audience with the topic.

With this approach, you start with the literature that was published first to most recent.
Benefits of this: makes it easier to discuss the developments and debates in the field over a period of time. You can create a narrative by doing this. It also allows you to highlight how specific articles or pieces of work might have changed the course of the field - ie. which research has had the most impact.

​ Method:
As the name suggests, you can structure your LR based on the research methods. This could mean structuring your discussion based on whether the studies were qualitative, quantitative or mixed method.

Benefit: if you are drawing research from different disciplines and want to critique various methods used.

​Theoretical, (Taken from Purdue OWL).

In many humanities articles, the literature review is the foundation for the theoretical framework. You can use it to discuss various theories, models, and definitions of key concepts. You can argue for the relevance of a specific theoretical approach or combine various theoretical concepts to create a framework for your research.

Poll

I might use this structure

• Thematic

• Chronological

• Theories

• Method

​ The GAP:

Top tip: signpost clearly

You need to clearly state your research gap because you have synthesized your annotations in the LR, and explain how your gap (s) links to your specific research so that your project is firmly rooted in the literature:


Word count: Variable between 1200 - 1600 - not set in stone, some LR can be two pages and some can be four.

Deadline: As agreed with the class for a first draft to be submitted in your folders titled literature review

Poll

Emotional damage?

• I feel great and can't wait to write my LR

• A bit stressed over this, need snacks

• Worried but I can manage

• I am learning new things and will not worry