Pearson and AccessEd: Literature Review

TITLE: Literature review and finding trustworthy

sources SERIES: Pearson - AccessEd EPQ Express support

videos Webinar number: 2

Welcome to this webinar on literature reviews

and finding trustworthy sources. So you're doing a literature

review* So you're considering doing a literature

review. This video is great for those of you who:

- Are doing a dissertation or investigation research project this could be part of

an Extended Project Qualification, otherwise known as an EPQ, or any research project

- Those who need to write a literature review for their research project

- If you are writing a stand-alone literature review for another project

- If you want to understand how to critically assess literature sources, which this video

will show you how to do - And, for of you those who want a 5-step

plan for writing a literature review we'll show you the process for doing this.

One thing to note is that we will use the term literature review throughout this

video, although you may hear other terms used for the same thing, for example research

review, which is what it is called if you're doing an EPQ. Literature review tends

to be used more often. What we'll cover*

So, what will we cover in this video? We'll cover:

- What is a literature review - What is the reason we write literature reviews

- Types of literature review sources - Knowing whether sources are trustworthy

- How to critically analyse sources - 5 steps for conducting a literature review

- And, how to structure and write a literature review.

What is a literature review So, what is a literature review? A literature

review should describe the previous studies and data that are relevant to your project

title or research question. A literature review is an overview of sources on a specific topic

that you are doing for your research project.

- Your literature review summarises, analyses and evaluates research that has already been

done and is available on your subject - It provides your reader (be that your teacher,

or supervisor) with an overview of knowledge on this subject

- It allows you to identify relevant theories, methods, and gaps in the existing research,

to do with your topic - It presents this research in an organised

way - And it clearly addresses your research project

title, question or challenge. Literature review example

Here is a short extract from an example literature review. This shows how a literature review

looks practically when laid out. It's written text, with a series of references to authors

and sources, embedded inside paragraphs of text. You can that for example with the reference

of The Economist online or BBC News or Jackson 2017. This might form part of writing your

research project dissertation. Although this literature review is fictional,

it's about the use of social media linked to the performance of secondary school students,

it is an example of what one could look like. Later, you will learn the steps in more detail

for writing one of these and the structure too. We will revisit this.

What is NOT a literature review* So what is not a literature. To be clear,

we'll lay out some of the things that are not a literature review. This will help you

understand what is contained in one and what isn't.

- One, a literature review is not just a descriptive list or summaries of books, articles or whichever

literature sources you are using. The literature review is about understanding and conveying

what is contained in your sources. A literature review is not a source-by-source summary of

everything you have read. This is wrong because it means you won't be able to synthesize

or bring together the sources enough, and you risk focusing too much on your own reading,

instead of focusing on your research topic specifically.

- Number two, it is also not an exhaustive bibliography on everything that has ever been

written on the topic, you need to make an active decision and careful selection about

what sources to include. - Number three, it's not a list of your

arguments and ideas, like in a normal essay. Arguments and counterarguments and your own

ideas are included the discussion section of your dissertation.

If you're doing an EPQ or another research project or paper, the literature review simply

lays out the most important existing pieces of evidence and thinking, before then, in

the next section, moving on to argue your assessment of the question and different viewpoints.

Why do we do literature reviews? So what are the reasons for doing a literature

review? Why do literature reviews (or research reviews as some call them), exist, and why

are they such an important part of your dissertation or research project.

There are some key things that literature reviews help you to identify.

- It helps you identify what research has already been done in your area or on your

topic, which is an important part of showing context and background

- It helps you identify the big thinkers on your topic. In other words, who are the well-known

authors or writers in this area - It helps you identify the main ideas, interpretations

and fields of thought relevant to your research question.

Why do we do literature reviews? Other reasons that we do literature reviews

include: - Demonstrating to your reader, teacher or

supervisor an in-depth understanding of your topic area. This includes the key concepts,

theories and definitions associated with your topic.

- Finding the areas where there are open ended questions and ongoing disputes, so there is

scope for you to add your own point of view. - And then it's convincing your reader,

teacher or supervisor that your research question is important, interesting and worth

writing about! That will encourage them to read on.

5 steps for writing a literature review

Conducting a literature review involves collecting, evaluating and analysing publications, such

as books and journal articles, that relate to your research question. Here are 5 main

steps in the process of writing a literature review, which we will outline in more detail

in this video and explain how you go about each stage.

One, search for the relevant literature and sources related to your topic, that you are

considering using. Two, analyse the sources you are going to use. We will show you a simple

table for analysing and evaluating your sources later. Three, identify the main themes and

topics in the literature sources you have found. Four, understand how to structure your

literature review, and then outline this format ready for writing. This is a good way to plan

the contents of your review and format it. Five, finally, write the literature review.

Step 1: Search types of sources So, step 1 of writing a literature review,

search. If you are writing the literature review section of a dissertation, investigation

or research paper you will search for literature related to your title and specific research

question. Literature sources come in a variety of forms. These can be broken down into primary

and secondary sources. Primary sources are generally sources that are original, i.e.

they are first-hand information close to study. Primary sources could include speeches, letters,

diaries, autobiographies, interviews, official reports, and the likes for photographs or

drawings.

Secondary sources provide non-original or second-hand data or information. For your

literature review, you are likely to mainly be using secondary sources. These could include

books, journals, online articles, blogs, newspapers or magazines.

Will we talk about the difference between a blog or online article that's say by an

expert, such as a former astronaut talking about the International Space station, versus

taking a quote from a blog that is from an enthusiast with no obvious expertise or qualification

in that topic. As we will see later, often it's better to go with factual publications

over anything that could be seen as an opinion.

Step 1: Search finding your sources

In doing your search for sources, there are a variety of places that you could look for

these. So where to find your sources. In particular when you are searching online, you should

search for literature using keywords. Start by creating a list of keywords related to

your research topic. Places to find literature sources could include

your universities library catalogue, Google Scholar, online academic journals and articles.

These could include places such as JSTOR, Wiley, Project Muse, Medline, Econlit. These

are just a few examples. Also, you can use sources that provide publicly accessible summaries

of research, such as magazines or news organisations, for example the BBC, New Scientist or The

Economist. If using articles or books, read the abstract,

which is the summary text at the start of an article or book, to find out whether an

article is relevant to your question. When you find a useful book or article, you can

check the bibliography to find other relevant sources too.

One tip, to identify the most important publications on your topic, take note of the same authors

which keep appearing in your search. If these same authors or books or articles which keep

coming up in your search, you should make sure to have a look at these.

A second tip is if using an article online, you could find out how many times an article

has been cited on Google Scholar. A high citation count means an article has been influential

in the field, and should certainly be included in your literature review.

Step 1: Search trustworthy sources*

There are a lot of sources out there for your literature review. You might have had the

thought that it's a bit confusing or overwhelming knowing which sources to use, and which sources

you can trust, too. In particular there are a lot of sources online and these are variable

in how trustworthy they are. Trustworthy-ness isn't just about whether

or not a resource is untruthful, although that happens every so often. It is also about

how reliable a source is by academic standards and you should be maintaining these academic

standards as part of any research project you do.

Here are some key questions to ask yourself when you find a source:

* Authority. This means, is it clear who wrote the source. Are there indications of their

qualifications? Do they have the authority and expertise to be writing on this topic.

* Accuracy. Are the sources of factual information clearly listed? Remember, anyone can publish

on the internet. There will be varying levels of accuracy in content you find.

* Bias. Is there evidence of bias? In other words, would the author be writing for a specific

angle or what is their purpose for writing the source? For example, some media outlets

may have a particular bias, if you are thinking of using news-based sources. Sources from

media outlets are likely factually correct, this ticks off point number 2, although some

newspapers, perhaps tabloids, still have the chance to get facts wrong. Either way, it

may only be presenting one side of the story, which means there could be bias.

* Date. Are there dates to show when it was written? Or when the webpage was last updated

for example. Is there newer research disproving what was written? It's good to use sources

that are up to date as practice. Think about science projects for example and for example

a project on illness. A source from 2019 compared to 2009 may include new things that have been

discovered, like treatment or a cure for an illness, for example.

Step 2: analyse So step 2 is analyse your sources. You won't

be able to read absolutely everything that has been written on your topic. You'll have

to evaluate, in other words assess and determine, which sources are most relevant to your question,

and which ones will be most useful in helping you answer your research question or challenge

as part of your project or dissertation. For each publication and source, ask yourself:

* Who is the author? * What question or problem is the author trying

to address? * What is the author's central point or

main argument? * What are the key concepts?

* What findings and conclusions are made? * What evidence is used to support the conclusions?

* What are the strengths and weaknesses of the research?

* How does the publication relate to other literature in the field? Does it confirm,

add to, or challenge established knowledge? * And, how is the text relevant to your project

or assignment?

As said before, you should make sure your sources are credible, and make sure you read

any famous studies and major theories in your field of research, if these exist. If doing

a dissertation or investigation, you can demonstrate your grasp of how reliable a source is by

inserting footnotes. In these footnotes, you can comment on your own source assessment

of the reliability of the source, using the 4 questions we have just discussed on how

trustworthy is a source. Overall, the scope of your review will depend

on your topic and subject. In the sciences the focus will be on recent literature as

science evolves quickly. However it can be good to show that the context of a problem

has been understood by exploring its historical development. In the humanities you might take

a long historical perspective, for example examining how a concept has changed over time.

A key point to note is that, just because sources are older, it doesn't mean they

are unreliable. Step 3: identify main themes and

topics* Step 3. This is about identifying themes,

debates, arguments and gaps in your sources. During this stage, you can gather your sources.

It's helpful to gather your sources in one place. You can use this table to help you

collect notes on some of the sources you will be including in your literature review. This

is a tool for your planning, it isn't the literature review itself. Filling in the table

alone is the first step. You will then need to write up your evaluation, too.

You'll have your research question or research project title by this point. Take, for example,

the question is the UK government capable of responding to a climate emergency?.

You might read and select a variety of sources and then use this table and fill it in.

- In the first column on the left, author and date. You should note this down so that

you can remember the reference. In this case, Johnson, 2019, when the article was written.

- What is the type of source. I'm noting that this resource type was a government policy

document. - Then there's the theme. I'm noting that

the theme of the source is a government response to climate concerns.

- Strengths. You should list multiple strengths, for example does the source contain a lot

of specific detail or statistics for use, or does it contain a unique argument.

- Then there's the weaknesses. For example, this government report doesn't have much

critical analysis of government response to this issue, which could be helpful for this

specific research question about whether the UK government would be capable of responding

to a future climate emergency. So what other gaps exist in what your reading?

- Then, is there bias. What is the angle. Is there an angle or purpose to your source?

For example, this report might be more aimed at showing government previous successes in

dealing with climate change concerns. - What are the links to other sources you've

read? You should write what other sources your source links to and how. This would help

you group your ideas later when writing. - Finally, how is the source relevant to your

own topic or research area exactly? This will help you really focus and hone in on the detail.

In reality you will want to fill in the table in more detail than how it's been done here.

To begin organising your literature review's argument and structure, you do need to understand

the connections and relationships between the sources you've read. Based on your reading

and notes, you can look for: - Themes, so what questions or concepts keep

coming up across the literature? - Then there's the debates and conflicts

and contradictions, so where do sources disagree with each other?

- There's pivotal publications, so are there any influential theories or studies

that really impacted on your field of research? - And then there's the gaps, what is missing

from the literature?

This step will help you work out the structure of your literature review, which is up next.

Step 4: Grouping and structuring your review*

Step 4. Grouping and structuring your literature review. There are various approaches to organising

the body of a literature review. This is about how you might group your sources or information

and you should have a good idea of your strategy before you delve into the writing. Here are

some ways that you could group your sources for your literature review.

One, is date order, or chronological. The simplest approach. You examine the development

of the topic over time. However, if you choose this approach, be careful to avoid simply

listing and summarising sources in date order. Try to analyse patterns, turning points and

key debates that have impacted thinking. Number two is by theme. This is one of the

most common ways of grouping ideas. If you have found some recurring central themes or

points, you can organise your literature review into sections that address different aspects

of the topic. For example, if you are reviewing literature about equalities or inequalities

in migrant working conditions, key themes might include workplace policy, or language

barriers, or cultural attitudes, legal status, and economic access.

Three, you can organise by methods used. This is mainly relevant to if you are doing an

investigation unit. If you draw your sources from different subjects or fields that use

a variety of research methods, you might want to compare the results and conclusions

that emerge from using different methods. For example, this could be in a scientific

project, and might be the results that you get from qualitative versus quantitative research

methods. If you are doing a dissertation, you will be using secondary sources. For a

dissertation, you might have a small-scale survey or an interview which you could use

to be one or more source, but it shouldn't be a significant part of the research.

Step 4: your literature review outline*

For the next part of step 4, we're looking at how to structure your literature review

outline. After grouping your sources, this is another important step in planning what

the structure of the literature review will look like.

You can picture structuring your literature review a bit like a funnel:

- Up top, you can start with a broader overview of your literature sources. This could be

some background and context for the literature review. This may include sources that are

linked in theme to your topic but might not be as close to your research question.

- In the middle, this is where you start to narrow. You might look at a smaller subset

of sources but in more detail. - Then at the end, at the bottom, this is

where you narrow and pick out the key and main sources for your research question. These

sources will address the issues that are closely related to your research project title. You

might highlight your 3-4 main sources here in even more detail.

Step 5: write your literature review* Step 5: write your literature review. Like

any other academic text, your literature review should have an introduction, a main body,

and a conclusion, even if your introduction and conclusion are just brief summaries. What

you include in each depends on what type of research project you are writing a literature

review for and how long it has to be.

So number one, the introduction. The introduction should clearly outline the focus and purpose

of the literature review. If you are writing this as part of a dissertation research project,

make sure to reiterate your central problem, the research question or challenge and to

give a brief summary of the academic context surrounding this topic. You can emphasise

the timeliness of the topic, for example, many recent studies have focused on the

difficulties with recycling plastic or highlight the importance of a topic, for example

given the recent studies on the negative impact of pollution caused by waste, recycling

is an important topic and very socially significant.

Number two, the main body of your literature review. Depending on your length of the literature

review, you will want to divide the body into subsections. You should use a subheading based

on theme, time period, or method you use. This links backs to grouping and structuring

your review earlier in the video.

As you write, make sure to follow tips. You will have done much of this evaluation in

your planning, using the table we showed earlier in the video. So, the tips:

- Summarise and synthesise. Give an overview of the main points of each source and combine

them into a coherent whole. - Then analyse and interpret, don't just

re-word what other researchers have said. To try express points in your own words, discussing

the significance of findings in relation to the literature as a whole.

- Then critically evaluate, mention the strengths, weaknesses and gaps of your sources.

- Compare. Make sure to compare sources to one another to show you understand.

- Then finally, write in well-structured paragraphs. Use transition words to draw connections, comparisons and

contrasts.

Three, the conclusion. In the conclusion, you should summarise the key findings you

have taken from the literature and emphasise their significance for your research question.

You should also highlight the issues about which there is debate, which will lead naturally

into the discussion you will do later.

Step 5: Write your literature review*

Here is the same short excerpt of a literature from earlier, a literature review on social

media and the impact on academic performance. So this is an example of what a literature

review might look like. Here some different sections highlighted, which we'll just have

a look at. At the beginning, the theme of the paragraph

is introduced, so in this case it's the impact of social media platforms on the academic

performance of secondary pupils has been well researched. Secondly, in grey, there are different

points of view on the topic which are introduced and this is backed up by citing the author

of the source, or what the source is, and the date. Here it's the Economist Online

2019 and BCC News 2018 are used as sources. Then, moving on, you can see the section highlighted

in green. Now this section elaborates on your research findings. Again, this mentions who

wrote the source and when. Lastly, highlighted in yellow, it states the significance of the

research findings.

Overall, this is an example of how part of the literature could be structured, or example

of several paragraphs. You can learn more on referencing and bibliographies in a later

video. Final tips for your literature

review* So, what are our final tips for conducting

a literature review or research review? Plan ahead. You can follow the 5 simple steps

laid out in this video, from finding your literature resources, to evaluating them,

to structuring your review, to then writing it. The next one is being analytical and giving

a clear picture. The best literature reviews don't just summarise sources, they analyse

and evaluate sources to give a clear picture of the state of knowledge on the subject.

They will also compare the sources and draw out key themes. The third one is keeping track

of your sources. You can keep track of your sources in clear list as you go. Make sure

to record the name and the date. This will prevent you losing them and having to dig

around later. Make a note of where exactly you found these, too, whether it be an online

or a book from a library. This will help you find them later if you need them. We'll

be giving more tips on how to practically keep track of your sources in another video,

referencing and bibliographies. Lastly, be sure to check how trustworthy your sources

are, particular those online, by asking yourself the 4 key questions from earlier.

Next steps and further resources* So, to finish off, what about next steps and

further resources. Well here's what you can do. Use our 5 step plan outlined in this

video to plan how you will conduct your literature review process. Once you have your research

question and topic to hand, find 3 sources relating to these. Practice evaluating them

and identifying themes, gaps and debates within them, using our table from earlier in the

video. This is really good practice for doing this for the rest of your source.! Speak to

teacher or supervisor about further resources and good place to find literature review sources

specific to your topic.

Finally, see the comments section of this video for any links to further resources outlined

in this video.

Thanks for listening.

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