Writing a Literature Review Evaluating and describing other people’s work                            What is a literature review? How do I decide what goes where? Learning From Secondary Research Evaluating Primary Research Additional information Copying = automatic fail

1: What is a literature review?

What is a literature review? A description of your topic area, supported by references A summary, discussion and critical analysis of academic work related to your research question Copying = automatic fail

What can you gain from literature reviews? Ideas about which approaches are likely to work, and which are the best If you find something similar, you can get Ideas for how to implement your deliverable Ideas for how to evaluate your deliverable The best ways to do things E.g. the fastest search algorithm Justification for the approach that you are taking Copying = automatic fail

What can you gain from literature reviews? Knowledge of what everyone else has done so that you don’t exactly replicate it Without a literature review you risk reinventing the wheel If you find something similar you may have to slightly change what you are doing to make it novel, or build upon what you found Copying = automatic fail

Organising the review In a separate chapter In several chapters The normal approach, used in this module In several chapters If it is the main part of the thesis, or very important Incorporated throughout the thesis as and when needed In addition to either of the other two approaches Perhaps incorporating individual facts from books Copying = automatic fail May use books as a reference source: e.g. the definition of SSL.

Overall Structure [Very important] In this module, we insist on a 3 part approach Part 1: Overview of your chosen broad topic The field that contains your research question Part 2: Explanation of your sub-area The area containing your research question Part 3: In-depth analysis of research relevant to your research question Critical evaluation of the primary research papers directly related to your research question Copying = automatic fail

Overall Structure Broad Topic Specialist sub-area Relevant Primary Copying = automatic fail Relevant Primary research Your research question Add your research topics

Melding the Structure The three parts of the review need to be melded together by explaining: how part 2 fits inside part 1 how part 3 fits inside part 2 Copying = automatic fail

2. How do I decide what goes where?

Conceptual models to help understanding Conceptual models can help you understand how the different research fits together Helps you decide upon an appropriate structure Choose a technique that you are comfortable with Spider diagram of the different papers? Research territory map? List of keywords? Write and repeatedly rewrite the review (rapid prototyping) Copying = automatic fail

The literature review process The literature review process should help shape what you do, and how you do it You should be prepared to change your mind or alter your approach in response to what you discover Always write up the literature review soon after reading the papers – otherwise you may forget what you have read The finished review should also shape how others perceive the quality/value of your work Copying = automatic fail

The literature review process The first role of a literature review is often to learn the topic. Copying = automatic fail From Dawson – The essence of computing projects

3: Learning From Secondary Research Secondary research includes books, research summaries and literature reviews

Secondary Research Books, literature reviews and web pages can give an overview of a research area These can help you to learn what a research area is about before having to read primary research Literature reviews should always start with reading secondary research, if possible Copying = automatic fail

Reading books Not enough time to read many books all the way through Can still use as a reference source, just read relevant chapters/sections Books tend to be less controversial and may also summarise the pros and cons of topics discussed (i.e. like a mini-literature review) The introduction of a relevant book should summarize the research area Copying = automatic fail

4: Evaluating Primary Research Primary research is research papers containing new findings - not a literature review

Your evaluation 1 Read the abstract and conclusions first Is it really relevant and useful to you? Summarise how it is useful Read the whole paper Are the methods correct? [BOUNDARIES] Is the scope of the study appropriate for your use? Make sure that you understand the findings [CONCLUSIONS] Read the abstract and conclusions again To make sure that you have understood the results and their context Copying = automatic fail

BOUNDARIES, LIMITATIONS, CONCLUSIONS Your evaluation 2 [LIMITATIONS] The discussion of limitations Should be near the end of the paper Read to make sure that the findings really apply to the situation in which you are using them How significant is the work? Does it make a major contribution? How does it complement other papers? BOUNDARIES, LIMITATIONS, CONCLUSIONS Copying = automatic fail BOUNDARIES, LIMITATIONS, CONCLUSIONS are the key ideas here

Multiple Papers Need more than one paper about important points Discuss points of agreement Discuss points of difference In computing there can be differences of opinion, but should not be big differences of fact The papers may try different techniques to solve the same problem Must use your own opinion on differences, but try to argue your case Copying = automatic fail

Selective reading What to do if you do not understand the paper Too complex maths Too much terminology >>Consider reviewing the outcomes of the research and not the technical details [black box approach] When to just read the abstract If it is clear that the paper is not relevant. Can still cite the paper in the literature review if it is near to being relevant and explain briefly why it is not relevant This shows that you have done a better literature review Copying = automatic fail Maths – have to skip, in refereed publications, should be able to take it on trust that the referees have checked it, unless there are other reasons to suspect it. Get other papers, do web search for terminology.

Common mistakes 1 Your own opinions without backup, no matter how strongly you believe them (it does not count!) E.g. Microsoft is good/rubbish Discussing irrelevant literature Short literature reviews Have not demonstrated the literature review skill Have not shown that you understand the context of your work Not targeting the review at an appropriate audience Copying = automatic fail

Common mistakes 2 Not joining the literature together into a coherent whole Using chronological order, unless necessary Including poor reference sources without comment Too small Not targeting the review to the research question Missing an important reference Your work is seriously undermined if you write about something as though you are the first, but someone else has already published on the subject Copying = automatic fail

Swales’ perspective "not sufficiently theme-based" "not structured according to the issues" "insufficiently informed by the research hypotheses" "boringly chronological" "just describe each piece of research one by one without adequate linkage" Copying = automatic fail Professor John Swales, linguistics expert on the structure of scientific communication.

5: Additional information

Plagiarism Plagiarism is passing off somebody else’s work as your own In a literature review you are discussing other people’s work so must clearly reference it In this module you must NEVER copy an entire phrase or sentence even if it is in quotes and properly referenced If you cannot describe something in your own words then you must not include it in your literature review. If you paraphrase other people’s ideas you still need to reference them Copying = automatic fail

Referencing your work You MUST reference your work This means giving the author name and publication date for all ideas and facts you have used (Harvard format) List the sources at the end (Harvard format) Failure to reference your work is Plagiarism and is an automatic fail. Copying = automatic fail

Harvard reference style You must follow the university Harvard style http://asp.wlv.ac.uk/Level5.asp?UserType=6&Level5=3165 (OR Google Harvard site:wlv.ac.uk) Smith (1999) says that C++ is faster than Java. C++ is faster than Java (Smith 1999). SMITH, T. (1999) Programming. Programming Journal, 21(5), pp. 61-73. SMITH, R. (1999) Programming. London: Birkett Computing. Do not use numbers in brackets [1] – this is not Harvard. Copying = automatic fail

References and Bibliography Reference list List of books, articles etc. that you have cited in your thesis Bibliography List of books, articles etc. that you have not cited but have used in some way Copying = automatic fail

Writing tips Structure to present an argument, discussing similar papers together Do not list the papers and write separate reviews Explain the useful information that each paper gives and compare and contrast to other similar papers Build an argument that will support the main aim of your thesis What you are doing/How you are going to do it/Why you are doing it Show how what you are doing is different to what has been done before Copying = automatic fail

Exercise Write a literature review for your chosen sub-area of your chosen topic. It should be a minimum of 2 sides of A4 (typed) and properly referenced (Harvard) It does not need to be targeted at your research question because you do not have one yet [But use the first 2 parts of the 3 part structure] As a practical consideration, you will not have time to get inter-library loans, so can focus on immediately available sources (e.g. Web, ACM) Cover 5-10 papers for this assignment and the 20 most relevant for the main module assignment Copying = automatic fail

Exercise Structure Broad Topic Specialist sub-area Copying = automatic fail Use 3 headings: 1) Broad Topic, 2) Transition, 3) Sub-area

Main module assignment Guidelines for literature review component Like a funnel with a few broad papers to set the context for the area and then to narrow down to focus on a specific issue. E.g. Intelligent Agents. First level is what they are and what areas they are being used in (~5 papers) Second layer is to pick one area and consider different types being used (~8-10) Third layer would be highly focused on a specific issue within that area (e.g. primary research) (~5-7) Copying = automatic fail