Transcript Literature Reviews in STEM Disciplines

Literature Reviews
or, “Locating Your Study”
Sarah Perrault and John Stenzel
University Writing Program, UC Davis
November 5, 2011
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Reasons to Review the Literature
• Through writing a
literature review, you:
– Develop a good working
knowledge of the research
in a particular area
– Raise questions and
identify areas to be
explored
– Demonstrate that your
study is needed / original
– Place your study in context
– Show how your study
relates to the literature in
general
– Show how your study
relates to previous studies
• Doing this helps you:
– Define and limit the
problem you are working
on
– Avoid unnecessary
duplication
– Evaluate promising
research methods
– Fine-tune your argument
and anticipate objections
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Reading
• Don't let the arguments in the text distract you from your agenda
• Preview the text:
– Do you need to read everything with equal attention?
– Can you see where the arguments are headed?
• Things to consider about any text:
– Who wrote it? What do you know about the authors? What is their
perspective?
– How old is the material?
– Are the arguments logical? Are they supported by reliable evidence?
• Ask general questions:
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What were the authors trying to discover?
Why is this piece of research important?
What was measured? How was the data collected?
What information do you have on the sample?
• Have specific questions in mind as you read.
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Taking Notes
• Note taking strategies:
– Dual entry page
– Color coding
• What to put in the second column or in the other color:
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Reactions
Comments on methodology
Connections to your project
Connections to other things you have read
Questions
Evaluative remarks about the quality of the text
What confuses you
Always Remember: If you can’t cite it, you can’t use it.
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Creating Order 1
Types:
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Narrative
Systematic
Meta-Analysis
Focused
Categories of focus:
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Historical overview
Current work
Theory/Model
Issue
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Creating Order 2
• Benefits of Matrices:
– They allow us to eyeball the literature
– They encourage us to make connections
– They help us avoid getting trapped in lowlevel comparisons
– They point us to common threads
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Creating Order 3
Year
Theory
Sample
Size
Model
Used
Country
Type of
Study
Study 1
Study 2
Study 3
Study 4
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Starting the Lit Review
• Provide some kind of overview
– Make a generalization
– Discuss some accepted knowledge of the field
– Present information that is widely known
• Describe the selection criteria for the literature in
the review
Remember that
figuring out what to include
is an ongoing process
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Using Metadiscourse
Elements in a written text that refer to the
text itself, not to the subject matter.
– The longer the text, the more metadiscourse.
– The more complex the material, the more
metadiscourse.
– It’s common at the beginnings and ends of
sections, chapters, etc.
– Attitudes toward it vary by culture
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Integrating Sources
• Find out what is common in your field:
– Direct quotes vs. paraphrases vs. summaries
– Integral vs. non-integral citations
– Citation verb tense and aspect
– Single citations vs. groups of studies
– Verb tense (present, past, or present perfect)
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Choosing a Verb Tense
Simple Past
Reference to a single study
Smith discovered…
Tan et al found…
Present Perfect
Reference to an area of study
Microbiologists have discovered…
Studies in nutrition have found…
Simple Present
Reference to generally accepted knowledge of the field
The speech signal is continuous, but it is
perceived as a sequence of discrete segments.
Past  Present Perfect  Present
The research reported is increasingly close to the writer in some
way — close to the writer’s opinion, the writer’s research, or the
current state of knowledge.
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Taking a Stance
• Even if you don’t use your own
perspective to organize your literature
review, it has to have some part.
• Hyland suggests these ways to show
stance:
– Hedges
– Boosters (words that strengthen a claim)
– Attitude markers
– Personal pronouns
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Summarizing
• Useful questions to figure out what to include in
a summary:
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What was done?
How does it work?
How was it done?
Who did it?
What is different / innovative / advantageous?
What questions did it lead to?
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Evaluation Criteria
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Coverage
Synthesis
Methodology
Significance
Prose
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Evaluation Criteria
• Coverage
• Synthesis
– Distinguished what has been done in the field from what needs
to be done
– Placed topic or problem in the broader scholarly literature.
– Critically examined history of topic
– Acquired and enhanced the subject vocabulary; discussed and
resolved ambiguities in definitions
– Articulated important variables and phenomena relevant to topic
– Noted ambiguities in literature, & proposed new relationships
– Synthesized & gained/offered a new perspective on literature
• Methodology
• Significance
• Prose
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Evaluation Criteria
• Coverage
• Synthesis
• Methodology
– Identified main methodologies & research techniques
used in the field, and their advantages &
disadvantages
– Related ideas & theories in the field to research
methodologies.
– Critiqued appropriateness of research methods to
warrant claims
• Significance
• Prose
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Evaluation Criteria
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Coverage
Synthesis
Methodology
Significance
– Rationalized/critiqued the practical
significance of research problem
– Rationalized/critiqued the scholarly
significance of research problem
• Prose
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.
Evaluation Criteria
•
•
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•
Coverage
Synthesis
Methodology
Significance
Prose
– Created a coherent, clear structure that supported the review
– Included integral and/or non-integral citations, as appropriate for
your field
– Used a variety of reporting verbs and structures
– Used the correct verb tenses for citations
– Used metadiscourse to guide readers and ensure they can see
the research story that is unfolding
Almost all material in this presentation is from Christine Feak & John Swales, Telling a Research
Story: Writing a Literature Review, which I strongly recommend you buy and read.