1. Critically reviewing the literature: The Searching, Selecting, Summarising and Synthesising Process
Research Week July 2014
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2. After today’s Session…..
You will have some tips on how to plan a database search and use specific techniques to make sure that you find relevant journal articles
You will have some tips to help assess which databases to will be of most use to you.
You will know where to find additional help and support.
Get an indication of what the group would like to find out. What are their main issues, what would they like to get out of today’s workshop?
It is quite possible for this workshop to go on for weeks. However, we will be trying to give you the skills to start planning your searches, evaluating your resources and when you may need help we will give you the details to know where to go for help.
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3. Literature review - why?
Provide a comprehensive review of published research that is relevant to your own topic of research
It will help to identify areas of debate, disagreement, controversy or inconsistency
Provide a platform for further research and investigation
John will discuss in more detail
Most students at your level will be required to complete a literature review. I find that they are quite interesting to do and gives you a powerful overview of a particular subject.
Checking out what the debate is around a particular subject will inform you about the discussions going on in your area of research.
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4. Literature search - the cycle
Plan your search
Evaluate material
Store Results
Refine Search
What we will be looking at today is the first part of the literature review cycle and what resources are available to you in finding material that will give you the ideas and background that you then use to inform your own research and your own view points.
Note that it is a cycle. You will continuously go through this process as you find material, store it, evaluate it, find more clues in new articles and books, refine your search, store your results, synthesize the material and on and on you go. That is why it is important to keep up to date with your topic, those of you doing a PhD will want to keep up with your topic on a regular basis over the years and you do that through alerts in databases.
You will find authors writing in your field of research, you may find literature reviews of your topic, you can find support and rejection of your theories. At all times you
I will show you some suggestions as to improve your searching techniques, use citations to develop your search parameters, and where to go for additional help.
We can’t cover everything in one and a bit hour, but you should have enough information to get you started, and some knowledge about where to go for help. Fee
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5. Research Steps Plan your search Evaluate your material
Choosing keywords
Developing search strategies
Choosing information sources
Evaluate your material
Assessing information quality
Refine your search to reflect new information
Assess your search strategies
The most important step before you leap into searching a database is planning.
Look at your topic carefully
Analyse it, break it down and discuss it out loud to identify keywords and explain it to yourself or a friend. If you talk it through often you will find that
You can identify Keywords through explaining what you are trying to achieve. Example of student looking for improving emotional intelligence. He had looked for the two key words emotional intelligence and improving.
I asked him to explain to me exactly what he was looking for and he said I understand emotional intelligence but I want to see how I can further look at developing various aspects of emotional intelligence. Initially he looked the concept and thought he wanted to improve on emotional intelligence – but no one was writing articles and indexing them in that way. He had made a judgement that emotional intelligence had to be improved.
However, quite a few authors were writing around developing emotional intelligence and that is how we restructured the search.
Be creative in your thinking and your approach. I often do a quick google search to help expand keywords or concepts.
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6. Planning - Keywords
“Discuss two aspects of organisational culture that you consider are essential for the success of the firm”
I have a database search strategy sheet that you may find useful when searching
We have a sample topic – how would you start analysing this topic?
Identify the concepts inherent in this topic – How you might to describe the topic?
Organisational culture -
Success – effectiveness,
Firm – company, corporation
What are the keywords you can pick out immediately
What are alternative keywords that you can identify
Corporate culture
Organisational culture
Management culture
shared values
Company personality
Other than talking about them – what tools would you use to get a more in-depth exploration of your topic?
Google,
Supervisor,
Thesaurus
Articles you have got ,

7. Planning - Alternative terms
organisational culture
corporate culture
shared values
success
successful
effective
What are the keywords you can pick out immediately
What are alternative keywords that you can identify
Corporate culture
Organisational culture
Management culture
shared values
Company personality
Other than talking about them – what tools would you use to get a more in-depth exploration of your topic?
Google,
Supervisor,
Thesaurus
Articles you have got

8. Planning - Truncation * The truncation symbol Success* Success
Useful for finding alternative endings of a word
Success*
Success
Successes
Successful
I will just give you some more tips before you start searching or looking for a database – there are some tools you can use to either broaden or narrow your search. It is worth knowing about these before you dive in.
Remember the whole process is a circle – you search for terms, if they do not bring the results you want – you modify. The tools I am showing now help you modify. I would also recommend that you keep track of how you search, what terms are successful.
You can occasionally find yourself in a loop – using the same words in the same order in the same database not changing the result. I have done that myself on many occasions. Then step back back and be more methodical.

9. Planning - Wildcards ? The wildcard stands for one letter.
Use it for different English or American spellings within a word.
organi?ational = organisational, organizational
wom?n = woman, women
colo?r = color, colour

10. Planning - Phrase Searching
Quotation marks can ensure that the exact
phrase is retrieved in search results e.g.
“organisational culture”

11. Planning - Using Boolean Logic
Boolean operators: ‘AND’ ‘OR’ ‘NOT’
AND = ‘as well as’
Use between different terms
organisational culture AND success
OR = ‘either/or’
Use between similar terms (synonyms)
organisational culture OR corporate culture

12. Our search strategy “organi?ational culture” AND success*
“Discuss two aspects of organisational culture that you consider are essential for the success of the firm”
“organi?ational culture” AND success*
OR OR
“corporate culture” effective*
Databases: Proquest/Business Source Complete
Our next step will be to choose decide where we could find this information.
Go to Business Source complete and search for articles using this search string. Show how they can filter
Go to Proquest and search for articles using this search string. Is there a difference?

13. Sources of information
How do you decide?
Perhaps students can share with the class how they decide on which databases to use?
There is no right or wrong way to decide – it really does depend on your topic, what you need to know in order to understand your topic.
There is nothing wrong with using Google as a way of understanding our topic, breaking it down into component parts and getting some starting points.
What can be an issue is just using Google or Google Scholar.
We do have a LibGuide that looks at Google and Google Scholar
How do you decide where you will find the information – some tips:
Use a LibGuide
Speak your Supervisor/Lecturer
Speak to your Faculty Librarian
Must be scholarly
Recommended readings?
Books ?
Scholarly journal articles?
Newspaper articles?
Websites?
Factual information?
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14. “Discuss recent issues about women on company boards in Australia”
Which Database?
“Discuss recent issues about women on company boards in Australia”
What type of information?
Factual – numbers, which companies….?
Issues – what is the trend, more in-depth discussion…..?
Comparative – what is happening in other countries……?
The data required informs the database selected
Which databases would you choose?
Factual – Datanalysis (it is Australian), Orbis (global); Factiva – possibly for both – can inform about statistics, trends, tap into the general pulse of opinion
Issues – bear in mind it is Australia – Informit (Australian + international); Emerald;
What functionalities do the databases have

15. Choosing Databases
To help select databases once you have identified the type of material you want:
LibGuides
Databases A-Z
Top Links
Library team
Go to the library Website to show LibGuides
New to research
Databases A-Z
Ulrich’s
Business Source Complete - EBSCO
ProQuest Databases – includes ABI Inform
Emerald – business, management and economics
Science Direct – extensive business component
APA-FT- Australian Public Affairs – for Australian articles
Factiva – full-text newspaper articles and company profiles
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16. Research Tip - Journals
‘Peer reviewed’ or ‘refereed’
Reviewed and edited by panel of experts
Accurate, well researched
Contributes to body of knowledge
Scholarly or academic
Report on research or analytical studies
Scholarly or academic environment
Emerald is a database that claims all the publications are peer reviewed.
Proquest and Business Source Complete – you can choose if you want scholarly journals and/or Peer Reviewed journals
Science Direct – Elsevier publications. Science Direct is a leading full-text scientific database offering journal articles and book chapters from more than 2,500 peer-reviewed journals and more than 11,000 books.
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17. Research Tip – Literature Reviews
Find Literature reviews on your topic:
Search your topic and add type of article “literature review”
Search your topic and add type of article “review article”
Search your topic and add the term “literature review” to search box
Remember to register for a database
Go to a database and set up an alert
Business Source Complete
255692f
ebony01*
Women AND “company boards” AND scholarly journals
Alert/save/share
Proquest
Pepper02
Scopus
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18. Research Tip – Theses Find a thesis that may cover your topic:
Curtin Thesis – check the catalogue
Trove – National Library
ProQuest Dissertations and Theses
Remember to register for a database
Go to a database and set up an alert
Business Source Complete
255692f
ebony01*
Women AND “company boards” AND scholarly journals
Alert/save/share
Proquest
Pepper02
Scopus
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19. You then receive alerts via email
Research Tip - Alerts
Use Alerts to keep current on your research topic
References to articles on a topic or subject search
Contents pages of recent journal issues
Citations to specific articles or authors
You then receive alerts via
Remember to register for a database
Go to a database and set up an alert
Business Source Complete
255692f
ebony01*
Women AND “company boards” AND scholarly journals
Alert/save/share
Proquest
Pepper02
Scopus
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20. Research Tip - Alerts Remember to register for a database
Go to a database and set up an alert
Business Source Complete
255692f
ebony01*
Women AND “company boards” AND scholarly journals
Alert/save/share
Proquest
Pepper02
Scopus
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21. Research Tip – Citation tracking
When one author cites another author a relationship is established.
Discover
who is citing articles
how it supports current research
follow the history of an idea or method
Web of Science and Scopus
Note that Scopus does not produce a citation map but that you can still see how many other people are citing a work
Woman on boards search
Show the LibGuides New to Research
Mention that we have a workshop on this subject
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22. Research Tip – Citation Tracking
Bateman, T.S., T. Sakano, and M. Fujita "Roger, Me, and My Attitude: Film Propaganda and Cynicism toward Corporate Leadership." Journal of Applied Psychology 77 (5): doi: // Check Scopus for examples
Go to Scopus and put the title into the search box
Click on the article and show that it has been cited 28 times by different authors
Click all items and export to EndNote
Go to Web of Science and put the title into the search box
Click on the article and show that it has been cited 23 times.
You can create a citation map showing how it has been cited in a pretty diagram
Why is this important - - get some feedback from the class
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23. Research Tip - EndNote Managing your search results
Export from databases to EndNote
Export from Catalogue to EndNote
Export from Google Scholar to EndNote
Write research notes
Rate your material
Organise your material
Show a quick insert citation, Show how easy it is to manage your bibliography
Open test document
Quick tour around EndNote template – show a reference with a document attached
ONLY ONE ENDNOTE LIBRARY
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24. REMEMBER Only 1 EndNote Library
Research Tip - EndNote
REMEMBER
Only 1
EndNote Library
Too often when I see a student with EndNote problems it is because they have more than one EndNote library. The set one up for each topic or assignment
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25. Research Support Consultations with Faculty Librarians
Search Strategies
Databases
Referrals to appropriate contacts
Collection
Recommend items for purchase
Document delivery
Research Support LibGuides
Library workshops – see Bookings
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26. Faculty Librarians Business: Kitty Delaney Health: Diana Blackwood Humanities: Marilyn Coen Science & Engineering: James Ward
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27. Writing a Literature Review
Dr John Fielder
Introduce myself
What I do
How I can help them
Contact details
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28. After today’s session…
… you will understand the process of drafting a critical review of the literature in your field.
… you will be aware of the need to position your study within the literature relevant to your research question.
Get an indication of what the group would like to find out. What are their main issues, what would they like to get out of today’s workshop?
It is quite possible for this workshop to go on for weeks. However, we will be trying to give you the skills to start planning your searches, evaluating your resources and when you may need help we will give you the details to know where to go for help.
Curtin University is a trademark of Curtin University of Technology
CRICOS Provider code J

29. Types of Literature Reviews
A narrative literature review – your ability to position your research within your field of study, and to “paint a rich picture” (as defined by your research question)
(see:
A systematic literature review – this is more like a data collection and analysis process that provides a rationale for capturing literature meeting select criteria (avoiding bias)
(see:
copyright jeanne dawson

30. information knowledge papers/theses learning process
seminars observations
readings data
papers/theses
transformation

31. Functions of a Literature Review
copyright jeanne dawson
Functions of a Literature Review
It provides the context for research.
It acknowledges the work of others.
It familiarises you with the disciplinary ‘conversation’.
It informs and modifies your own research.
copyright jeanne dawson

32. It finds evidence to establish the need for the proposed research.
It identifies an appropriate research question.
It informs and modifies your own research.
copyright jeanne dawson

33. It establishes your thesis in the chain of research in your field.
It shows an examiner you are familiar with important research in your area.
 It demonstrates to an examiner your critical understanding of theory. 
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34. Concept-centric rather than author-centric
copyright jeanne dawson
Concept-centric rather than author-centric
A literature review is organised in terms of conceptual themes - NOT by authors.
copyright jeanne dawson

35. Content of a literature review
The literature review contains summaries and critical analyses of reported research relating to aspects of your research question or proposition and the methods available to address the question.
Don’t just patch ideas from different sources together. Think about how your sources as a whole provide answers to your research question.
copyright jeanne dawson

36. Coherence & Relevance
Lit. review presents a coherent argument, leaving the reader in no doubt that the research is necessary and valuable.
Presents a well-judged selection of material; it is not necessary to include everything you have read on the topic, only those relevant to your research question. 
copyright jeanne dawson

37. Evaluative perspective
Avoids merely presenting a description of the literature and previous work on the topic.
Comments on the value of the literature summarised in the review.
Clearly presents your argument and perspective in relation to the literature reviewed.
Correctly interprets the findings of the reviewed literature.
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38. Questions a literature review should answer:
What do we already know in the research area?
What are the characteristics of the key concepts/factors/variables?
What are the relationships between the key concepts/factors/variables?
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39. What are the existing theories?
Where are the gaps and inconsistencies in our knowledge and understanding?
What views need to be further tested?
What current research designs or methods seem unsatisfactory?
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40. What evidence is lacking/inconclusive/ contradictory/too limited?
Why pursue the research question?
What contribution to the area can my research be expected to make?
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41. The Reading-Thinking-Writing Process
Concept mapping: use this as a planning/reviewing tool (some researchers develop a theoretical framework).
Try to write as much as possible without looking at your sources (just use to check you have things right and to get the referencing correct).
Recognise that it takes time to work out how all the pieces of the puzzle fit together and how to best explain things. Reading and writing critically comes from immersing yourself in your topic and repeatedly reviewing what you have and have written.
Expect your text to evolve into a good piece of writing!

42. For more detail … Two excellent literature review guides:
Contact : Dr John Fielder